Your Free Download Photo Calendar Template for 2016

Time really flies and suddenly Christmas is just around the corner. December has it very own spark which has just grown while having two little ones in my life. Unfortunately we are still missing snow.... The darkness is becoming almost unbearable. Every candle and light is appreciated now as we wait the snow to enlighten our days and continue to dream of white Christmas.

It's been a super busy past few weeks at work but today after getting home I took the time to put up the design I had in my mind for 2016 Photo Calendar Template. I hope you like it!

Feel free to download here!

I will continue my month in photos project next year as usual and I invite you to join me to share your monthly collages on my blog in the very end of every month. Note that you don't have to use my template in order to join, or any template at all. Feel free to pick your own way to present your month in photos. I hope to see you around :)

Should you need help with using templates, see this tutorial! Would you like to shop some templates, click here!

And if you wish to see my past years in photos,visit my  Pinterest boards, for 2012, 2013 and 2014. 2015 will be wrapped soon.

Sampling with random 2015 pictures...

Thanks for being here ❤

All the lovely things

My newest freebie can help you to collect your lovely things.
Download this template here!

Happy weekend!
Feels good ♡

See more of my templates here!

I hope to see you next week to join me in my month in photos project! I'm having a linky party on the last day of every month to share your month in photos - preferably in collage but any other way is fine too. You can use my template if you wish – download here.

Sharing with: Mosaic Monday

January days...

See, I made a post! I apologize for not showing up more often nowadays. It’s just that I haven’t had much to blog about and I’m still lacking a little inspiration… which does not mean I wouldn't take pictures. I shoot daily and sometimes share on my Facebook page, so if you wish you can follow me there! 

I think we'll all ride through phases of creative lulls and peaks, but sometimes, I worry about not having eager to blog, share or shoot, ever again. And as saying this I also know this happens with a camera, as in life, too. This is just how it goes. I still hope to see you here (or on Facebook) even I’m not as scheduled as I used to be.

But I will be here every last day of the month and I invite you too! I invite you to join me in my month in photos project next year! I'm having a linky party on the last day of every month to share your month in photos - preferably in collage but any other way is fine too. You can use my template if you wish – download here! To see more of my templates, visit my Template Shop.

So, I should go outside and snap in order to get something  for my January collage ;)

We've been spending time mainly indoors and I think these lines speak the best...

Love grows best in little houses,

with fewer walls to separate.

Where you eat and sleep so close together,

you cant help but communicate.

And if we had more room between us,

think of all we’d miss.

Love grows best in houses just likes this.

Here are some portraits that came to exist because of grey and cold January days inside our little house.

Template 2 from my Storyboard Pack 1

Textured with Florabella Collection 'Earl Grey'

Textured with Kim Klassen 'Follow'

Textured with Florabella Collection 'Frappe'

Textured with R.H. West 'Comfort'

Textured with 'Romance' from Rusty Romance Texture Collection

Sharing with: Texture Tuesday, Texture Twist, Little Things Thursday, 

December Memories & A Free Template for 2015

Here we go! It's about time to say goodbye to 2014! Such great year. I feel my life has finally settled and I've truly enjoyed the balance between family and work. Children have grown so too much and as it's making me a little sad it's also making my life easier and letting me enjoy life, notice the little things and allowing me to concentrate on life and love. There are no words to express my gratitude. So I'll just leave it here.

As promised here is your free Calendar Template for 2015. You can download it here!
I invite you to join me in my month in photos project next year! I'm having a linky party that takes place on  the last day of every month to share your monthly collage. Note that you don't have to use my template in order to join, any other way presenting your month in photos is perfectly fine as well. So please do join! It will be fun :)

Sharing with: Mosaic Monday, Inspire Me Monday, 

P.S. Also visit my Template Shop to find more templates and inspiration...

November Memories & Pure Picturesque - Free Printable Calendar {December 2014}

The days are getting colder, have a warm heart ♡

It's time to a look at our November. My month in photos shows bright and white but in fact this month has been darker than ever! The met says we've had about 10 hours of sunshine in November this year. And I feel it, unfortunately. We are desperately waiting for Christmas, snow, peace and longer days eventually.

Here is your free printable calendar template for December.
Thanks for all the downloads - this has been a pleasure and I'll try to find the time to create a free printable calendar for 2015 as well.

Click here to download!

Sharing with: Mosaic Monday, 

October Memories & Pure Picturesque - Free Printable Calendar {November 2014}

The haste of October has been incredible. And suddenly it's almost November that will be full booked as well. So we’re here, trying to remember to breathe. Luckily we've had enjoyable weekends, some calming nights, a few hours here and there to calm down, bake, read and love. Something to hold tight to. In the midst of this all is the simple fact that things don’t always work out just the way you think they should. Those days may be frustrating, but I’m thankful I’m here to spend those minutes just the same. I wish you happy November 2014!

And here is your free printable calendar template for October.

Click here to download!

Sharing with: Wednesday around the world, It's the little things, Little Things Thursday, 

September Memories & Pure Picturesque - Free Printable Calendar {October 2014}

Somehow we passed September... time is slipping through my fingers but I'm happy to discover that the real autumn, my favorite season, hasn't even started. It's about to break down any minute now and I'm desperately waiting to get my rubber boots on. Bring on all the colors, morning freeze, gloomy nights and candles.

And here is your free printable calendar template for September.

Click here to download!

August Memories & Pure Picturesque - Free Printable Calendar {September 2014}

After July being hot and lazy, a little wearing in it´s hazy atmosphere, August was a sudden breath of fresh air, beginnings that became routine and rain… rain & rain. The summer has come to an end and I’m enjoying rainy runs, warm blankets, a cup of tea and books! Oh, I've spent so many nights curled up with a book and waste my time in words. Autumn is around the corner and I do love it! ♡

And here is your free printable calendar template for September.

Click here to download!

Sharing with: Wednesday around the World, Little Things Thursday, 

Summer

Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass…It’s about learning to dance in the Rain 
- Vivian Greene 

It's been raining more than we've known. I'm stuck inside with my computer and I'm kinda liking it. I'm finishing my new textures, laying under my covers, enjoying. Normally I would be devastated, since summer is too short in Finland anyway. But right now rain feels good. Comforting. And my summer holiday is still four weeks away. Meanwhile I'll enjoy life as it is. And browsing trough my archives to see the sun.

I'm finishing with some texture news. The image below is textured with a freebie called 'Muse'. 

You can download it here! If you aren't PS or PSE user but would be interested in using textures in your editing, please check out my tutorial about working with textures in GIMP.

As I said I have a new collection coming up just in few days. It's called 'Rusty Romance' ♥

Here is a little peek textured with 'Charm' from the upcoming collection. Collection available now! CLICK.

Sharing with: Friday Finds, Simple Things Sunday, Weekly Top Shot, 

Working with Textures in GIMP {Tutorial}

News for all of you who aren't using PS or PSE! GIMP is a free editing program that allows you to work with layers; in other words the logic is similar to PS & PSE.  I've created a beginners tutorial for using textures so you can learn here how to work with layers and masks in GIMP and how to apply textures to your photos. Textures are an easy way to give your photos a totally new twist and help turning your creations into gorgeous piece of art. Welcome to learn!

GIMP is an acronym for GNU Image Manipulation Program. It is a freely distributed program for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition and image authoring. Learn more about GIMP and download the program here. 

Once you have your program installed you are ready to give it a try. Note that you can easily change the language in preferences. My screenshots in this tutorial will be in English. 

First open the image you want to edit in your editing program. When getting to know your textures in the beginning, the easiest way might be trying textures to still life with light solid background. Then choose your texture and open it in GIMP as well. You are warmly welcome to shop in my Texture Shop or download here a free texture that I've created just for you to try! I call this one 'Muse'.

In your window you can now see both of your images. 

Once you have both images open, go to your texture image and copy it by right clicking to edit and copy. Switch to your original image and paste it above your original image layer by right clicking to edit and paste as new layer.  

Then you’ll need to re-size your texture image to match the size or your original image. You can do that by using the scale tool. Choose the tool from your Toolbox, drag from the corner of your texture to re-scale and finally hit the scale button. Use move tool to position your texture above your image. Your texture now covers your entire original image, but you can see from the layers panel that your original image lies underneath. If you are missing your layers panel, click on "Windows" on the top menu bar. Click "Dockable Dialogs" and choose layers. 

Now we move to the creative and most fun part of texturing! Let’s start to experiment different blending modes. Try at least multiply, overlay and soft light -modes. Here is the image with soft light at 100% opacity. My image already looks different! Play with your modes and opacity and see what you can come up with!

Above is my image with Multiply mode and 70% opacity.

Besides adjusting blending modes and opacity, you need to learn about layer masks! Textured image very often requires layer masking; in other words you will want to mask out some areas of the picture for the subject not be buried under the texture. Therefore you’ll need to add a layer mask. To do that make sure you have your texture image highlighted. Add a white (full opacity) mask. You can see now your white layer mask at your layers panel next to your texture.

Now after adding the layer mask, take a large black soft brush to mask out the areas you want to uncover. Try different size of brushes and adjust the opacity of the brush to meet your requirements. Play and try. If you mask out too much, simply change to white brush and recover! Simple. Fun! Your layers panel will show what you've masked. As you can see in picture below, I used black soft brush at 30% opacity and at size 218.

Since GIMP works identically to Photoshop you can go through PS & PSE texture tutorials and then learn to do the same in GIMP with only by finding the similar tools from your program! Sky is the limit.

When you are done with your art work you can save it to your folders. If you wish to have a jpeg. or png. image, choose File and Export as... 

I wish you happy moments with textures! 

Sharing with: Texture Twist, Life Through the Lens, 

Sunday Pictures + Free Facebook Cover Templates {by me for you}

Happy Sunday! Mine is beautiful but busy... and the part of it is that we are on a holiday! Also meaning that instead of heading to office and daycare, we'll be heading to Stockholm Sweden.

Anyway. If you've seen this post and tutorial about templates, you should know how I love making collages and creating storyboards with my favorite pictures. I could be updating my blog header and Facebook cover constantly...

Yesterday evening I started creating some new Facebook Cover Templates and thought I would share them in case you would like to use them. So please, click here to download, if you wish.

These could be used for blog header as well. They are rather small sized but I just tested one of them and it worked quite well so you can try them for that too.

One more thing in case you haven't heard... I have a new little Texture Collection - Endless Elegy.

Find the details here and shop here.

Sharing with: Simple Things Sunday, Sunday Snapshot, Mosaic Monday,