My etsy store: http://www.etsy.com/shop/digitaldoodlebug
Your source for all things digital, and a few things that aren’t. ^_^

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Who doesn’t right? I’m also trying to eat healthy and I like baking.
Muffins are great because you can grab one on the go. My all-time favorite is blueberry. *Scrumptious. A berry in every bite. This has double the blueberries compared to most recipes.
I also experimented with cream cheese but its flavor doesn’t pop out, so next time I’ll try doubling it to 8 oz. (or leave out for less fat)

Ready to cook this easy 5 step healthy recipe?
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Line 12 muffin cups with paper liners.

(1) In a bowl mix the dry ingredients:
2 cups whole wheat four
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder

(2) In a seperate bowl mix the wet ingredients:
2 eggs
1/2 cup honey
1/2 cup applesauce (sugar free)
1 tsp vanilla
4 oz low fat cream cheese

(3) Stir the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients.
(4) Gently fold in  2 cups of blueberries.
(5) Scoop batter into the muffin cups.
Bake for 20 Minutes.

*Disclaimer: Please note these are muffins, not cupcakes. As such they are not overly sweet. If you are used to store muffins you might want to up the honey.

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My first interview is with Diapercakedesigns. She sells beautiful diaper cakes on bonanzle. http://www.bonanzle.com/booths/DiaperCakeDesigns
Or website http://www.diapercakesbymichelle.com/
And blog http://simplyadorablediapercakes.blogspot.com/

Tell us a little about yourself.
I am a professional diaper cake designer and work out of my home-office. I am a wife and a mother to 2 beautiful children. I do spend my spare time doing animal rescue and training ranging from reptiles to dogs, cats and livestock.

How did you get started in designing diaper cakes?
I have successfully owned and operated a custom diaper cake business selling to friends and family and selling in our local stores since 2004. I started out just making diaper cakes for friends and family as gifts, I had decided with the support of my family to go national on the internet and open my own website. My current focus is to bring you affordable diaper cakes with and elegant touch.

If you had to pick a favorite, what would it be?

My Safari Jungle Diaper Cake

You can find more diaper cakes on bonanzle

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But if you don’t want to spend the money on each picture, there are alternatives.   If you have photoshop or can buy it, that is the first choice. Open your image, then select the polygonal lasso tool (see picture). Trace the product, clicking every time you need to change direction.

Once you’re back to the beginning, double click to close your selection. Then go to Edit-Copy, File-New, Edit-Paste. Your image is now background free! You can make the background white, or any color you want.

If you don’t have photoshop my free choice is PhotoFiltre. I used it before I had photoshop and consider it as close to photoshop as it gets. You will use the same technique as in photoshop.
In either program you can see what a tool does simply by placing your mouse over the icon, text will display telling you the name of the tool.
Below is a picture in Photofilte, completely selected. You’ll see a dotted line, that is where I have used polygonal tool to trace around it.

The final picture is very pleasing, with no distracting background. In this example I used photoshop to add a soft shadow, and made it a gif so it has a transparent background. I can’t see that photofilter can make transparent backgrounds, so maybe there is a better free image editor.

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Today-The camera:
If you’re a serious seller, it’s a good idea to buy a digital camera. They are now very cheap. You can get one for under $100. The best brands are Olympus, Nikon, Canon, Fuji. (I have a canon I bought 5 years ago.
It has endured much torture and the only problem it has is I have to manualy open the lens cover).

Resolution:
Every camera takes pictures in megapixels (MP), it has a nice complicated description, but the higher the megapixels, the better quality (and bigger size) your image is going to be. Most cameras now have at least 4mp which should be fine for the average user.
I found this helpful little list.
* 1.3 Megapixel = 1280×960: Great 4×6′s, acceptable 5×7′s.
* 2 Megapixel = 1600×1200: Pretty good 8×10′s.
* 3 Megapixel = 2048×1536: Great 8×10′s, good 11×14′s.
* 4 Megapixel = 2272 x 1704: Great 11×14′s, and acceptable 16×20′s.
* 5 Megapixel = 2560×1920: Pretty good 16×20′s.
* 6 – 10 Megapixels = At this point you are usually limited by the lens, not the pixels.
Zoom zoom:
Now you’re looking at camera zoom. They have optical and digital. What does all of this mean?
Digital zoom can be ignored as it’s not really zoom. Now all you have to worry about is optical zoom.
Optical zoom brings your object closer. For example a 3x optical zoom can bring an object 3 times closer than the naked eye.

The pictures:
It’s best to use a white background. A lot of pictures I see have very busy background, try to stay away from this as it detracts from your object. If white isn’t possible, get a plain background of different color than your
object. (You don’t want to put an orange plate on an orange background).

I started this post to give info on image editing programs but cameras took up all my time so I’ll cover that in my next post.

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