Author: Diana

Day 1 – The Year of the Leap

By Diana

That’s right it’s January 1 of 2016 and this is a leap year. An easy way to remember what year is a leap year is that it is always the presidential election year. Anyway that has really nothing to do with this blog but I needed to tie in the catchy title :)

Today was a pretty good day overall even if I am running on very little sleep. Carlos came over this morning so we could go to Best Buy to look at cameras. On our way we got some yummy Starbucks :) I was convinced that I was going to end up with a DSLR, but after about an hour and a half we decided on a camcorder. The specific one I got was $215 and we decided to do a 2 camera scenario. I already have a wider angle camcorder and this new one would be more versatile for close up and portrait stuff. I also ended up getting my mom a new FitBit. Her’s was one you wore on your wrist, but it had a strange buckle not like a normal watch. It was extremely hard for her to get on and hard for me to put it on her. So the one we got has a normal watch like buckle.

Then on the way back we stopped and got some Panda Express for lunch – Orange Chicken, YUMMY!!!!!

I ordered a couple more things for my setup for blogging and vlogging. Oh yeah and I got some stuff to try to help train these new little puppies. They are not house broken and they are a bit older than I would have liked to teach them this lesson. I think they are like 8 months old. They are the sweetest little things, but full of so much energy!

Penny and Dime taking a break from playing tug a monkey!!
Penny and Dime taking a break from playing tug a monkey!!

 

Canon Vixia Mini

By Diana
Vixia Mini Book Cover Vixia Mini
Canon
$249.00

I have not used this much yet. But there is a YouTuber who uses it all the time, my inspiration for getting it, and she loves it. She now has the newer version of this, but she used this one for some time. It has a fisheye lens so the result is a little different from other cameras. I like the uniqueness and plan to use it when I vlog.

2015 – Year in Review

By Diana
2015 - Year in Review

I have noticed that so many people have been wishing for a better 2016, but no matter how much junk I went through I had a pretty good year. I had several great trips and lots of good times with the family and even welcomed 3 new members - the puppies :)

Don't get me wrong, there are some things I would have really rather avoided, but there really is no use dwelling on those things in the past that you can not change.

I am happy about the friends I have and new friends I made this year. There are really good people out there and I am glad to know them!!

I am happy that I have this website again, it wasn't cool how I ended up with it, but again, oh well.
My brothers and I went on a great trip to Washington DC and I had a great trip to West Virginia.
I am going to be blogging and vlogging this year a lot more. I am looking into new equipment, but what I already have will work for now.

It is the last day of the year and currently 20:52 and I can hear the neighbors setting off fireworks. I am sitting in my bed with Archer on the TV and just trying to reflect on the year. I am having a hard time remembering anything before September and that is OK. I really look forward to this coming year and all the rest I will have.

Sorry this wasn't as amazing as I had imagined, but it is the best I can do right now. I have a major headache that I have had like all day long.

Happy New Year everyone!

Canon Selphy C910

By Diana
Selphy C910 Book Cover Selphy C910
Canon
$99.99

This is a photo printer by Canon, where the largest size is 4x6 print or postcard.  This is a wireless printer but can also take an SD card and also USB.  I am not a huge fan of the wireless printing just because I usually don't have great luck with it.  With this printer I had really good luck printing pictures that were taken on my iPhone from my MacBook wirelessly.  This printer will do full pictures, no border that is, but I actually like the ones that do have the border.  I just think it looks better.  Printing directly from the iPhone I have not figured out how to get the border, I can only get it from the MacBook.  But the good thing is that, at least with the iPhone, it was easy to get printing - same with the MacBook.  I did try for a couple minutes to print from my Windows 10 computer, but was not successful and didn't play with it anymore and I do plan on getting that to work.

The price was reasonable and the paper, which comes with the ink cartridge, is also reasonable.  I purchased mine from Amazon and it totaled around $137.  It is certainly more expensive then going to a place like Walgreens, but it is in your home and you might be more likely to actually get a picture printed.  Plus it is so small that you could actually take it with you like on vacation or something.  I can imagine if you were into scrap booking it would be perfect.

This is my first photo quality printer and so far I really do like it and recommend it to anyone who is looking to make high quality prints at home - and who doesn't need a multi-function printer.

Update: I used this a TON a couple weeks ago to print out pictures for my project and it did a great job!!  I did print from my Mac and the only downside is that you can not send a ton at a time, you have to be patient and send like one, wait for it to print and then send the next one.

Hotline Bling

By Diana
Hotline Bling Book Cover Hotline Bling
2015
Song
Drake

This song is AMAZING!!!!!  It is so incredibly catchy and easy to sing along to.  It does get stuck in your head if you are not careful :)  Also, watching the video for this song is a must because it really helps to dance with the song!!  Just super fun.

Making a Murderer

By Diana
Making a Murderer Book Cover Making a Murderer
Documentary
2015
Netflix
1

This is a review for the Netflix Original series Making a Murderer which was released in 2015.  It is the story of Steven Avery of Wisconsin who was imprisoned for 18 years for a sexual assault he didn't commit.  After his release, following an appeal made with the help of the Wisconsin Innocence Project, he filed a $36 million federal lawsuit as compensation and deterrent from unethical practices.  Shortly after he filed this lawsuit a woman is reported missing.  This woman was a photographer for the used car magazine Car Trader.  She was last known to be out on locations to take pictures of vehicles and one of those places was to Steven's house.   Shortly after she was reported missing, Steven was arrested.

I already like documentaries, but this one was very well done.  This is by far the longest real documentary I have watched clocking in at 10 episodes averaging out at about an hour each.

It basically walks through the trial including parts of his nephew's trial as well.  The nephew had provided a taped confession to helping Steven with the murder.  I don't really know how to review this without providing spoilers so if you are reading this and don't want to know what happens, stop reading now :)

I did resist reading about this while I was watching so I formed an idea about how it was going to pan out and let me just say that I was shocked.  Just the idea that he has spent 18 years in jail is crazy and then for him to be convicted of this murder with such poor evidence.  There are so many things that don't make sense it is almost comical.  First the woman's throat was supposed to have been cut while she was restrained on a bed in Steven's trailer.  Yet they found zero blood or any of her DNA in the trailer.  Now this man has a very low IQ and so does his nephew, so I think it is really unlikely that they could pull something off like this with no traces found.  And  the evidence that they did have was really crazy careless compared to the bedroom.  Needless to say I believe these men were convicted of crimes they did not commit.  Also, all their appeals for anything have been declined - crazy!

This is getting a lot of media attention now that this documentary has been released and I believe we will see something happen with this case in the near future.  My opinion is that they most likely did not commit this murder and are in jail unjustly.

Additional Comments

So it has been about a week since I wrote this review and this show has gone viral. I can't believe it is all over the news, everyone is talking about it. It really was that good and it certainly seems that there was something very wrong going on in this county. I urge anyone reading this to watch it and see for yourselves. That's all, just wanted to add that it was going crazy!