I really enjoy making jack-o-lanterns. The whole process of selecting the photos, turning them into templates, transferring the images to the pumpkin, and carving the shapes takes some time, but it’s worth it to create something eye-catching…even if it will only last a few days.
I believe that this year I’ve made my best one. The subject is pretty simple, but the design is more complex than any previous ones. I chose to use the faces of our puppies and, because I got a fairly large (wide) pumpkin, to put both faces on a single pumpkin. I’m proud of the execution. The photos aren’t great, but you get the idea:
On the left, we have Suzy:
And on the right, we have Boo:
The template I used to create the carving was made by posterizing and editing a couple of photos from my iPhoto collection:
Category: Home Stuff
Posted by: Chuck @ 11:30 pm on October 30, 2008
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As if the millipedes weren’t unique enough, now we have a huge fungus growing in the front yard. I don’t know what kind of fungus it is, but it looks sort of like coral. When I brushed my hand against it, it felt cool and damp. You can see that it has enveloped the small plant that was growing in front of it. I’ll keep an eye on it to see if it digests any more.
To give you an idea of its size, here’s a photo with a newspaper for comparison.
Category: Home Stuff
Posted by: Chuck @ 6:55 pm on September 19, 2008
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We had a nice rain today and the yard was thankful. After it completed, Lexie and I stepped out onto the back porch to take in the rich green beauty of the cool damp yard. Lexie looked over at the back of the house and noticed something odd. There were lots of little things on the wall. She pointed them out to me and we realized there were millions of millipedes. Actually hundreds is more accurate, but they were millipedes.
I had my iPhone with me, so I took some photos. The millipedes are hard to see so you might need to click on the thumbnails so you can look closely at the full size versions.
This is the view looking down from the back porch:
To get a closer look, I went down to ground level and took a shot through the bushes:
This is the first time we’ve ever seen this. I wonder if it will be the last.
Category: Home Stuff
Posted by: Chuck @ 7:16 pm on June 14, 2008
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Today - Wednesday, May 21 - I’ll celebrate the best thing that’s ever happened in my life: my marriage to Lexie. This is our fourteenth anniversary.
Why it is that she would have me fourteen years ago and continues to put up with me to this day I don’t know, but I sure am glad. I have loved her all along and I know I always will.
Category: Home Stuff
Posted by: Chuck @ 7:19 am on May 21, 2008
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Welcome (back) to FreedomMind.
I’ve finally upgraded my blog. The old version was served with Movable Type on my ten-year-old Mac G3 but I figured it was time to upgrade. I’ve replaced the hardware with a G4 and the software with Wordpress.
I’m starting fresh because I couldn’t import the old posts. They were stored in a built-in database that was part of the MT installation instead of MySQL. Maybe I could have, but I don’t know how to do that level of database manipulation.
It took a while for me to get around to this. My office was piled up with boxes, papers, and loads of other stuff. I had some time this weekend, so I motivated myself to clean out the obstacles - including the old hardware - and install the replacement stuff.
I got rid of the CRTs and defunct printer and placed my flat-screen monitors on the G4 and XP box so it looks so much cleaner. There’s still a lot of work to do in the office, but at least I have a start. Not surprisingly, Lexie is far more proud that I started cleaning than of any new blog.
Category: Home Stuff
Posted by: Chuck @ 8:50 am on May 19, 2008
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