Go ahead, smile.  Doesn’t looking at a smiley face automatically force your mouth to grin?  It does for me.  That’s why it’s so fun when I see smiley faces in nature.  It’s like finding a Where’s Waldo, but not so obvious.  As I hunt for letters for Spell-It-Out Photos, I have come across many smiley faces.  So, I decided to take their photos to add to our office photo album.   We love keeping photos of the wonderful things that we run into while capturing letters.   If you see smiley faces and like to capture them, there is a fun Facebook page where people post their finds. It’s called Spontaneous Smiley.   https://www.facebook.com/groups/SpontaneousSmiley/

One of our customers even sent us a face that he found.  Can you see the whistling tree face?

Have fun finding a smile in everything and anything.  If you find a good one, take a picture and share it.

As Christmas rolled around, it got me thinking about a gift to celebrate Dad Tenerowicz, or perhaps it was to celebrate all of us with the Tenerowicz name. So what did I do?  I lied to everyone.  Of course in a good way.  I told everyone in the family that my younger son was doing a geneology project in history.  His assignment was to get everyone in his family to provide 2 words that described the name TENEROWICZ.   It was interesting to see the responses.  I didn’t really want to lie, but I wanted the responses to be raw.  If they knew what it was for, it might have changed their response.

What Tenerowicz means to us.

Once I got all of the responses, my business partner helped me design a specialty piece and we printed it on glass: one for each member of the family.  I must say, it was a very special gift.  I truly feel that it captured the family “being” very well.

These are the words (a couple phrases in there) that my family feels describes a Tenerowicz.

So in our rooting spirit, this creation is for all of the Oregon fans, who will root on their Ducks in the Rose Bowl.

We will be adding photos all season to our Winter gallery.  Whether you are decorating a cabin, an avid skier, or just like winter photos, a letter art frame is a great finishing touch to your decorating.

The one to the right was a Christmas gift for a customer’s employer who just bought a cabin.  The great thing, is that you can buy photos from our Country side gallery to replace the winter ones, once the seasons change.

Whether you are ordering letter art from Spell-It-Out Photos (we are small, and all of our suppliers are in the US) or  buying from your local gift store, keep in mind that each purchase is a gift in both directions.  One to the business that you are supporting and ultimately to the lucky recipient that gets a very thoughtful gift.

Let the shopping begin!

Did you know that small businesses…

•    Represent 99.7 percent of all employer firms.
•    Employ half of all private sector employees.
•    Pay 44 percent of total U.S. private payroll.
•    Generated 65 percent of net new jobs over the past 17 years.
•    Create more than half of the nonfarm private GDP.
•    Hire 43 percent of high tech workers ( scientists, engineers, computer programmers, and others).
•    Are 52 percent home-based and 2 percent franchises.
•    Made up 97.5 percent of all identified exporters and produced 31 percent of export value in FY 2008.
•    Produce 13 times more patents per employee than large patenting firms.

Source: U.S. Dept. of Commerce, Census Bureau and Intl. Trade Admin.; Advocacy-funded research by Kathryn Kobe, 2007 (www.sba.gov/advo/research/rs299.pdf) and CHI Research, 2003 (www.sba.gov/advo/research/rs225.pdf);U.S. Dept. of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics.

1) Shop EARLY – custom orders take time to create – plain and simple.  We at Spell-It-Out Photos, take great pride in creating each piece of letter art per your specifications.  Please allow enough time for creating and shipping.

2) Shipping – Shipping times (ground, 3-day, and next day) are AFTER your piece has been created.  It can take 3 – 12 days for us to make your piece, depending on the item ordered.  Once your piece is complete, we will ship it out according to your choice.  Also, the holidays get very backed up, leading us to item  #1, Shop Early.

3) Be creative – play around with our letters and products.  We have everything from stocking stuffers to large frames.

4) Ask for help – Can’t figure it out?  Need help with your creative juices?  Had something else in mind than what you see?  No problem, just ask us for help?  Email or call.  During this time of year, we may be working out in the studio, so please leave a message and we will return your call shortly.

5) Make it fun - Whether you are shopping with Spell-It-Out Photos or in the heart of the city, remember to make it fun.  This is a time of joy and giving.  If you feel the scrooge in you coming out, take a breath, walk in the park, tell a joke, what ever works, then tackle that shopping list one name at a time.

One Shot – when you press the shutter button halfway, the camera sets the focus based on the scene at that moment and holds that until you press the shutter release the rest of the way.

AI Servo – when you press the shutter button halfway, the camera makes a focus determination and then continues to update that (“tracking” the focus of the subject) until you press the shutter release the rest of the way to take the shot.  I use this option when I shoot my son’s sporting events.
AI Focus – isn’t really a focusing mode, but more of a “on the fence” setting. When you press the shutter release halfway, the system is initially in One Shot focus mode, makes a determination, and holds it – unless the camera senses movement of the main subject. Then it switches into AI Servo focusing mode and begins to track the focus of the main subject.

How to use them.

One Shot focus – We have no expectation that our subject is going to move.  We want the camera to determine the focus and then set it. A reason we want that might be that we have a lens with Full Time Manual focusing (which means you can turn the focusing ring and tamper with the focus even while in the autofocus mode), and we want the camera to make a focusing determination but then we will adjust it manually. So we don’t want the camera, after it’s been adjusted, to play with focusing any more for that shot.
AI Servo focus – We expect to be working with a moving target, and want the focusing system to be ready when we press the shutter release halfway, no questions asked.

AI Focus – We are not sure what is going to happen, and ask the camera to do what it thinks is best for us based on what is happening with the subject.

I attended an alumni BBQ for Campolindo High School’s baseball program this weekend.  First, it was so great to see players of all age groups gather, hug, share stories, and still smack that baseball.  Secondly, I was like a kid in a candy store.  Gloves and bats laying all around.  We were able to add several baseball letters to the gallery.  Lynn and I were  SO EXCITED when we were able to make this  WORLD SERIES letter art creation to celebrate the start of  World Series tomorrow.

Baseball letter art photography - by Spell-It-Out Photos

For those of you who don’t have baseball players, it’s not that easy to get shots of their equipment during practices or before games.  These guys are very superstitious.  They have set routines, warm-ups, and pregame good luck rituals.  Have you ever seen Pablo Sandoval bat (speaking of rituals)?  Anyway, the BBQ provided a very relaxed environment for me to nab a glove or two (or 10) and search for letters.  I love the above creation!  I hope you do too.

A fun home decorating activity that you can do with your kids.

Looking to decorate a wall in your child’s room, but not sure what to do?  Try doing this letter art project together.  It’s fun and requires a bit of word play, but it’s not hard by any means.  Plus, it will look great and have personal meaning to your child.

Here is their creative project on how to create a scrabble board wall display using beautiful images.

Kids love to personalize their room.  Incorporate them into the design process and make their wall their own.

1)   Work together to think of words that are important to them.  Just start listing the words. Perhaps it’s activities, friends, or just adjectives that describe them.  You won’t use them all, just brainstorm.

2)   Then choose one that is most important.  This will be the anchor of your design.

3)   See what other words can intersect or can be added to one another.  It may take some time, but it will be fun.  Use graph paper (larger print) to help with the organization.

4)   Once you have decided on your scrabble board design.  Go on to www.spellitoutphotos.com and choose the letters.  The glass squares are offered in the photo gallery.

5)   When the letters arrive, all you have to do is center them on the wall and hang them with 1 inch space between them.  You’ve just done a fun family project and decorated a wall in the house.

Like the idea?  Try using it in other areas of your house.  Here are some ideas

-       Parents room

• Words (love, beauty, believe, faith, dream, sleep)
• Names
• Places (honeymoon, places you’ve lived or want to go)

-       Kitchen – what do you like?

• Wine (Chardonnay, vino, etc.)
• Coffee
• Tea
• Cooking

-       General – What describes your family?

• Try doing your last name and the first one of all family members

There are no limits, just be creative.

The Lettered Cottage is a cute husband and wife blog.  They have fabulous decorating taste and a creative “redo” sense that seems to transform the ugliest of rooms into a picture perfect setting.

The Idea Room is filled with information to get your creative juices flowing.  It has everything from home decor to how to make monster juice for Halloween.  Their Facebook page  has wonderful links to creative projects.

The Inspired Room has wonderful visuals, which truly shows their creativity in using items in new ways.  I absolutely love their painted ladder as a wall shelf.

All 3 are filled with fresh ideas, warm and inviting photos, and friendly content.  They all make you feel like you are sitting in their kitchen with a cup of coffee sharing design tips.

Check em’ out.