David and I spent some time in Prescott for our summer vacation. It was fabulous, we had a great time doing a couple of hikes and eating pie from The Rustic Pie Company. Had to do the hikes to burn off a few of the calories. We made sure that we left home in time to arrive in Prescott before they closed for the day. Our first stop, even before we checked into our hotel. Yes, that good.

We happened to plan our vacation during Prescott's rodeo week. We made sure to get tickets and enjoy some bronc and bull riding (the bulls won, 8-0) as well as calf roping, barrel racing and bull dogging. Fun times and a great way to spend an evening outdoors. We also got to sample some of the local rodeo food and it was a fabulous pulled pork sandwich from .

We found some beautiful areas and I did some painting with my watercolors but I did not do the scenery justice. More practice is definitely needed. I am planning on using several of the photos I took as inspiration for some upcoming pieces.

​We hiked Thumb Butte (easy side) and also Lynx Lake area. Thumb Butte has a memorial for the firefighters that lost their lives in a local fire. The Prescott Costco had the book about the Yarnell Hill fire (My Lost Brothers) and I purchased it.

If you are a Costco member I recommend visiting the local store for the vacation area. I picked up some 'local flavor' reading material and was very happy I did.

What are your travel plans for the summer?

So I did promise to tell you about the software I used to create my book. As I mentioned before I used Blurb and their Bookwright program to create the book. For me, it was pretty easy and intuitive. A lot of drag and drop with some page layout options to choose from. Several font choices for getting just the right look for a project. There are other options available as you can use Adobe's InDesign if you have access to that as well as actually designing your book online.

For the graphics I used two different programs. I used Adobe Elements 10 but any Elements will work as I did not do anything fancy. Cropping, removing backgrounds, etc was about all I did. Depending on the pixel count and size of the photo you took you may need to use another program to resize your file. Elements does an OK job if it is close to the correct size, but if you have to crop a detail and you are not able to take a new photo this is a software you should check out: On1 Perfect Resize. This software uses Genuine Fractals powered algorithms for optimizing clarity and detail for different image types. Get the best quality enlargements for your photos, whether taken with a DSLR or your mobile device. (from their website).

I have used this software and their other suite of products for several years. On1 does an amazing job putting out a quality product and if you are focusing on improving your photos this may be something to check out.

Do you have a favorite software that you use for your photo editing? Would love to hear about what you use and why.

What a crazy, busy month this has been. David and I took a short vacation over the Prescott, Arizona and got all kinds of crazy inspiration from Jerome, Verde Canyon Railroad train trip and the amazing galleries in Prescott. Lots of photo opportunities and enjoyed some amazing food in the area and gelato at Cuppers Bistro. Check out the Rustic Pie Company if you are in the area.

Friday was a day to get together with a group of artists to discuss titling art, pros and cons of types and necessity of titles. It was a lively discussion. Some of the artists stated that they only read titles if they like the piece. I personally will read a title on a piece I am not fond of just to see if maybe I missed the point of what the piece is about. All the members of the group agreed that titling is important but not to give away too much or box the piece in. The viewer must be able to add their own narrative to the work.

My personal opinion on titling is that it should be the spice or icing of the piece. Maybe not totally necessary, but a nice thing to experience and a view into the artist's intention.

Quilts on the Wall had their meeting on Saturday and it was the turn in for the Roots/Routes exhibit and the election of the new officers. The exhibit is going to be great. All the pieces turned in were amazing and fun to see all the interpretations of the topic.

​Next years board members look great and I am looking forward to the new exhibit topic "Crossings" for the juried show. I actually already have an idea for this one. I have had an idea kicking around for a few years based on a photograph that my brother-in-law took. This might be the perfect exhibit for it.

I have not always followed this rule because most of the time the printed fabric outcome has not been critical to my final project. I tend to do more color manipulation of my pieces either before the quilting or after. My recommendation is that if the final color output is critical to your design, you take advantage of the test swatch option. It is money well spent as I will demonstrate.

The original piece I printed for this design was on cotton. I did some 'after Spoonflower' manipulation, but not an extensive amount. The below samples were printed on Poly Crepe de Chine and Silk Crepe de Chine. The design was created in Photoshop from my original photographs.

As you can see, there are two very different results and neither of them wrong, just different. The poly fabric is very true to color on the original design. The silk would have to have the saturation pumped up if I wanted the same results. The original cotton printed piece is closer in color to the silk. The poly is smooth, so the edges of the design are crisp. The silk has a sandy texture so the edges are softer. If you wanted a softer, more watercolor effect, the silk would definitely give you that result.

This is the photographers stand I purchased when I was first involved with Quilt San Diego (now Visions Art Museum). This is a great item to have. I use my stand for taking photographs of my quilts. We will be taking ours to help display some of our pieces.

If you are interested in one, Google backdrop stand and a variety of priced options are available. They can be purchased with or without the backdrop paper. I purchased a neutral gray fabric to make my backdrop.

I purchase a lot of DVD's from The Great Courses. They have some wonderful topics on art that I have found very useful in my own artistic endeavors. I always wait for a sale to pick up items that interest me.

My latest purchase from them is their Fundamentals of Photography. It is turning out to be just as impressive as the other courses I have purchased. I have only watched a few (you are given homework to complete as you go) but I am already learning a lot of great techniques.

The instructor is entertaining and very informative. He not only shows you his best work, he shows you some of the "not so great" and how to improve it. Two of the things I liked from his first lesson:

• You don't have to be in an exotic location to get great photos
• You don't have to have expensive equipment to get iconic photos

Since most of the time I walk around with a small, easy to carry, point and shoot, this was great news to me.

His defines an iconic photo as having great light, good composition and an interesting subject. This photo was shot in a vineyard during the harvest process this last weekend. As you can see, I have a long way to go. I think if I had thought to put some grapes in the shot it might have been better. (But when you've been up since 1:30AM, harvesting grapes with a headlamp, hauling bins of grapes to the truck and trying to get done before the bees wake up you don't stop and ponder the shots you are taking as much as you should.)

Each lesson is 30 minutes and packed with great information. I have done some advanced reading in the book that is provided. It is an abbreviated transcript of the course. It is very helpful when I review the course material and a great place to make notes for things I want to remember, practice or insights of learning from the homework.

My goal is to get better photos of my work and also travel photos that can be used as inspiration for future work.