Featured – Page 3 – Unlikely Martha

3 simple steps to organizing digital photos on your computer

Remember film, and how our parents would take photos of us and drop those little rolls off and a few days later come back with a bag full of pictures?

Those little kiosks in parking lots that were devoted solely to being the place where you would drop off and pick up your memories?

I do. My father was a photographer and film rolls in the refrigerator in those little round black containers were my reality. Fast forward lets say 30 years to be on the safe side and I can’t remember the last time I actually took the time to get my photos developed although it no longer requires me getting in my car, and is as easy as uploading to a site and having them on my doorstep in a matter of days. We’ll take issue with that laziness later.

Today I’m sharing with you a few tips for effectively storing photos to your computer so that when it is time to look for first day of school photos, or that photo with grandma from the family reunion, within a few clicks you will know where to find those memories on your computer. It is incredible the different things you can do to your pictures with a computer, have a look at these image best practices to find out more about the things you can do to make your pictures even better.

Create a Consistent Upload Location

I’ve been guilty of uploading photos to my desktop, my external drive and to the downloads section of my computer. Do yourself a favor and pick a consistent upload location. If you do this you will automatically know where to look on your computer for your photos

Create a Hierarchy of Folders

Say goodbye to just uploading photos, because we are uploading now. We’re not letting photos sit on our memory cards and deleting non important ones when we need space. We’re not.

Create a hierarchy of folders starting with one renamed for the year. This simply tells you, if you know the year the photo was taken it will be stored in that file.

From there break it down even further creating sub folders named after the month, and within those month folders create another level of sub folder renamed for any special events. Examples would include ballet recital, 100th day of school. Get really descriptive because it is likely in a few years a vague description won’t help you out when you are looking for a photo.

Create a Backup Location

As a person whose last half of 2013 is missing thanks to a dropped external drive. Please create a back up location, and then a back up for that back up. Facebook, Instagram and other social media sites do not count. While we think these places will be around forever they may die a slow death and take your photos along with them to a digital heaven you have no access to. Myspace anyone?

There are so many options for external methods for organizing digital photos. I currently use Dropbox and an external drive, and I am thinking about adding a cloud service as well. I’m not really versed on all of the technicalities of ways to back up photos, however Lashawn at Everyday Eyecandy has some great suggestions if you are looking to learn more about methods by which to back up your photos. She totally breaks down everything. Your memories are worth preserving so I encourage you to take a peek at the options she has to offer.

These are just 3 very basic steps to get you on track to organizing your digital photos.

How are you organizing your digital photos? Are you even dowloading them out of your camera?!

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Featured• Food

homemade calzones with turkey pepperoni

Pioneer Woman recipes make you feel like somehow your rendition of her recipes will come out looking just as delectable. After about a million tries, my end results on the majority of her recipes come out looking like, I don’t know. Let’s just say a hot mess.

Oh but those hot messes taste nothing like they look. The tragedy of their final outcome can never be compared to their taste and these homemade calzones were no different.

Telling you now these were a little labor intensive. You’ll start off with some unrisen rolls. If I were you I would make sure to follow the directions and cover them. I heard if you leave them uncovered the tops of them get really hard making it hard to roll them flat.

Heard as in I know.

You’ll be doing a little chopping and after that the rest of the recipe seems to be pretty easy. Don’t beat yourself up if your end result in the looks department leaves a bit to be desired. Manipulating the dough was not an easy task.

Moving away from pork was difficult for me. Much like some of y’all live for bacon, insert pepperoni for me. I finally am able to enjoy my pepperoni again with the discovery of turkey pepperoni.

Nope, not quite the same in the taste department but they are good.

After rolling your dough flat and stuffing with a mixture of cheese and pepperoni closing it is the most difficult step. If you try this I suggest putting a small amount of filling in. It makes it so much easier to seal the calzone.

Bake for a few minutes and ring the dinner bell. It’s time to eat.

Homemade Turkey Pepperoni Calzones

Prep time: 3 hours

Cook time: 20 mins

Total time: 3 hours 20 mins

Serves: 8

Ingredients

16 whole Frozen, Unrisen Dinner Rolls (I Use Rhodes) Note: Can Also Use Frozen Bread Loaves.
1 Tablespoon Butter
1 whole Medium Onion, Diced
1 pound Breakfast Or Italian Sausage
1/2 teaspoon Italian Seasoning
1/4 teaspoon Red Pepper Flakes
15 ounces, fluid Whole Milk Ricotta Cheese
1/2 cup Grated Parmesan Cheese
1-1/2 cup Grated Mozzarella Cheese
2 whole Eggs
1/2 teaspoon Salt
Black Pepper To Taste
2 Tablespoons Chopped Fresh Parsley
Marinara Sauce, For Serving
1 whole Egg, Beaten

Instructions

Place frozen rolls (or frozen bread loaves) on a baking sheet to thaw. Cover with a tea towel and let thaw and rise for 2 to 3 hours.
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Melt butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion and allow to cook for a couple of minutes. Add sausage and cook until brown, crumbling the sausage as you stir. Add Italian seasoning and red pepper flakes. Remove from pan and allow to cool on a plate.
In a separate bowl, combine ricotta, Parmesan, mozzarella, eggs, salt, pepper, and parsley. When sausage is cool, stir it in. Set aside.
When rolls are thawed and risen, roll them out on a lightly floured surface until paper thin. Spoon 3-4 tablespoons (approximately) filling onto half of the dough circle. Fold half of the dough over itself, then press edges to seal.
*Note: If you want a larger calzone, use frozen bread loaves and use about 1/4 to 1/3 of the loaf for each calzone.
Brush surface of calzone with beaten egg, then bake for 10-13 minutes, or until nice and golden brown. Serve with warm marinara sauce.

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Featured• Video

video | my favorite Dollar Tree kitchen items

When I attempt to lean my spending I flee to Dollar Tree to get a sense of buying without spending too much. Over time I’ve come across a few pretty remarkable items that have made their way onto my kitchen favorites list.

Initially I thought I would take photos of the items and then after I was about a million shots in pre-editing, I thought it would be much easier to do a video.

In under 5 min and 30 seconds I share with you my favorite Dollar Tree kitchen items and how I use them. If you are on Youtube be sure to subscribe!

Do you have any favorites that I didn’t mention and need to add to my list?

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Beauty• Featured• small business spotlight

small business spotlight: Miss Marie’s Hand Crafted Apothecary

As a woman working toward building her own little empire I truly get the struggle of women who gracefully juggle many roles while simultaneously burning the midnight oil and networking to bring to fruition those ideas that won’t let them sleep at night or let their brain idle. Those ideas they are passionate about and are determined to mold and refine into tangible representations to share with the world deserve to be seen.

Being a dreamer I know all too well the reality that some of those aspirations never make it off the paper. They are often defeated by thoughts of fear and the what ifs and never make it off the notepad on the nightstand and into viable action. Support is so important and I know in our society we need to do a better job at uplifting and encouraging women and moms to walk in their gifts.

This small business spotlight is highlighting Miss Marie’s Hand Crafted Apothecary

I had the privilege of meeting owner Alisa Matthews and was smitten with her quiet, and warm spirit. A mom, full time WAHM and small business owner she truly juggles all of these roles with style and grace. She is passionate about her business, and in her own words,

” It’s such a joy knowing that I am able to help polish, purify and perfect the skin of many!”

Her line of body products are hand made with the finest of organic ingredients to include essential oils. These products were the result of her being forward thinking about finding a great smelling way to combat her children’s problematic dry skin symptoms.

Miss Marie’s started in Alisa’s kitchen. I mean who doesn’t love a good grass roots start! It was in the heart of her home that she began concocting light and pleasant smelling organic body butters. Her signature products, Key Lime Coconut Butter (my FAVE) and Original SOS butter were the first products that put Miss Marie’s Hand Crafted Apothecary into business.

With a little word of mouth networking these products have found themselves into the hands of and have received glowing reviews from Olympic track star Funmi Kay Jimo and Maricela Cornejo, a female boxer from Floyd Mayweather’s camp.

With the impending opening of Miss Marie’s Hand Crafted Apothecary’s new Etsy shop Alisa is working to bring more organic skin goodies to her product line. You can look forward to a Pink Grapefruit body scrub and other relaxing bath bombs and bar soaps for the face and body made with goats milk, honey and a blend of natural and organic oils.

Be sure to visit her on the Web and on Instagram. Get 15% off your order with the code Mimi15.

She is also available via email at [email protected]

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