It may be getting close to summer where you live, but it is cold, wet and blustery outside my corporeal door; a good time to bundle up just a bit and take a stroll in some lovely and virtual woods.

If you are a Flickr fan, you know that they have redesigned their layout and added a ton of space. This means no more “Pro” of old and no more “200 photos”. Read all the important details here.

Now I have never been a big Flickr user. I upload favorites from time to time and sometimes upload a photo from the blog to Flickr when a merchant asks me to. My photos are never huge in size or in megabytes. But today after getting all my ducks in a row at the Home and Garden Expo» View author and full post… (more on that Thursday) I zipped over for a lovely walk in the woods.

I took a giant (for me) photo which was going to take forever for anyone to see. And my computer (now over 2 years old) was not terribly happy with the process either. I resized to 3000 pixels and did some jpg compression and got it down to 3 megs.

Oh my! Op ed time again. (insert grin here)

I noted today that there is a new Truth Hair Flickr» View author and full post… contest going on. Now I have some Truth hair that I have purchased and some that I have won. I like them both very much. I kinda have a thing with Flickr contests; sometimes they work and sometimes not. It doesn’t really matter if “I” win you understand; it matters that I can see why the person that did win — did. I am guessing that if you have been around long enough, you know what I mean. There have been times when I thought, “by golly she did a great job – - good for her”. There was a time LONG ago when the winners were so obviously “not winners” there was an outcry and I actually got a new and special prize *wink*. Ah well.

This thought has nothing to do with that and I wish the participants well; fame, glory and all that jazz. What bothers me really is that the minimum size that can be entered in the contest is 2048 x 2048. Now that is four times the size that can be currently uploaded to SL for vendors.

Feeling philosophical tonight and to be honest I have had an extra glass of wine .

Coming up on post 3000 soon, not a milestone I expected, but one I am happy to accomplish. I noted that I have a new Blogger follower today. Trust me, my list is much smaller than you might expect after five plus years and a fair amount of “fame”.

Happily I don’t worry about all that. Honestly? I think that my readers are among the most discerning. They are not innate followers; they are leaders. I know that many are bloggers and designers, and honestly those are the folks I write to.

So thank you for your continuing support. It’s been a great ride filled with adventure and memories. And no, it isn’t over yet. Who know? I might make it to post 5000 some day.

» View author and full post…

Just a quick comment in case some of you (primarily bloggers) find this happening.

I don’t know about WordPress, but Blogger has a list of your top three referring sites listed in the overview. For me, this is Google, a freebies feed and often something obscure. Today I noted filmhill.com. (Now DON’T GO THERE! *wink*). A bit of investigation shows this “free movie” site installs maleware on your machine. We don’t want that. And honestly the movies looked pretty lame anyway.

My question is — WHY is that one of my top referring sites? It makes no sense to me. So, just in case you find some strange places in YOUR lists, be aware they may not be a good thing.» View author and full post…

I greet the morning
fingers paused on waiting keys
a new day begins

Less than a minute. Much practice. » View author and full post…

It isn’t daybreak yet in my corner of the corporeal world, but it is morning in the MOSP garden. My photo of the early hours includes three new releases — well four if you count my new Manuela skin from AKERUKA which I am so loving.

*New hair releasing today from EMO-tions, * ARADIA * shown here in the color autumn
*A gorgeous new flower necklace (there are also earrings) from ECLECTICA called FLORA which has color changed options for all parts including many choices for the flower.
*A recent release from DUCKNIPPLE called 2Basic – Dress 1, part of a set of simple but very pretty garments perhaps designed with new avatars in mind.The hud includes both plain colors and patterns.

» View author and full post…

There is a bit of an op ed section to this post. I want to talk a moment about the new viewer and baking system. I am in the Firestorm camp and updated a couple of days after the newest release rolled out. I am thrilled with many of the new features including a choice of derezzing options.

The new viewers are part of the servers side baking system; everyone will need a new style viewer soon. Along the way there is some good news and some not so good news.

Strawberry’s new meme this week is asking us our three SL wishes.

This is going to be a toughie for me as I am very happy in SL. Sure there are times when I  raise my fist as the database fairy when it looses a bunch of my stuff (we’ll there’s number 1 I guess) but I found it most interesting that I didn’t relate to any of Berry’s wants. So I suspect that we will have a broader range of answers this time out.

Here we go.

#1 will be that the database would be more stable. Anyone who has lost a lot of inventory (and I have had three MAJOR losses in five years – one my complete home and garden folder) knows how devastating it can be. Not only are you out money and time — if it was a hunt prize — there are many things that are irreplaceable.

#2 is that we could go back in a time before The Labs decided to abandon their support of the education process and erase that decision. We have muddled through with Youtube tutorials and a few schools still carrying on, but for those of you that came after that edict (maybe 2008 for the beginning of the end), you can’t imagine the impact.

This post is jam-packed with newness so read carefully *wink*.

First up one of several cute and casual sets from 20.FIVE, the Bow Romper. A color change hud lets you choose your hue of the day.

My hair is “Forever”, a new release from EMO-tions coming SATURDAY.

Wrapped with messy tendrils, it includes a large range of colors within the main tonal theme.

A fancy clip holds the hair in place, but that was a bit too posh for my romper so I added an antique hair flower from the (*chanimations bonVoyage  set.

New from [CIRCA]» View author and full post…, the Divine Artisan Baking Table. Seven animations, wearable props and wall art (not shown here), it weighs in at 40 prims. Other models available with color change menus.

Now here’s a little techie info that might be of help. Just how does it fit into our theme of the morn? Well, it’s about clouds (see title please ).  The new Firestorm which “most” of us are using now comes packed with lots of new features for photographers. One of them is the ability to change your cloud textures.

Preferences> Firestorm> Windlight> Cloud Textures gets you a drop-down box. I need to restart to see the changes.

The newly released Firestorm viewer has lots of new features, one of my favorites — the ability to derender short term or permanently.  It also has a vignette feature for photography. Find that addition in the General Tab of the Phototools about two thirds down. From subtle to dramatic, the choice is yours.

I’m not sure I will be using the feature all that often in photography as my graphics program gives you more control (see above), but it’s good to know it is there and may come in handy for machinima. Those of you who hate to fiddle with post processing will no doubt embrace this feature.

My outfit of the morn includes new duds from SLC. Comfy and perky the Frilly Blouse Tartan and Mesh Skirt Anna go very nicely with the just out girlie hair from Vanity Hair.   Marshmallow is the name and it is indeed fun. The bands are click to color change (two at a time); stopping your AO is advised unless you are a more careful clicker than I.

I did a little shopping at Fantasy Faire and picked up these great raspberry bushes at The Looking Glass» View author and full post…. They are a RFL item and a very good value.

1. How long have you been blogging? April 2008  February 1,  2008 at Second Life Colors.
2. Why did you start blogging? Originally I was asked to join Second Life Colors. Then when that blog had to close (in retrospect it did not but LL was yelling and screaming at the time about any blog that had Second Life in the title) I started my own blog with a non-SL title *wink*. 
3. How many times a week do you post an entry? Usually daily. Sometimes more. I think my record was five in one day. Now and then I take a few days “off”.
4. How many different blogs do you read on a regular basis? I used to watch several feeds, but honestly they aren’t doing it for me of late. So “very few” would be my answer. I do watch the hunt feed to keep up to date. 
5. Do you comment on other people’s blogs? Now and then, mostly to admire a photo.
6. Do you keep track of how many visitors you have? Only in general. I watch the Blogger page view bar in the Overview. I don’t take advertisers; never my plan. So happily I don’t have to worry about any of that.

» View author and full post…