Little Bird Christmas
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Thursday, November 24, 2011
Sunday, July 3, 2011
What Is This For?
Is blogging for me or you? I haven't figured it out yet, and maybe there's no straightforward answer. All I know is that I need a vehicle for reflection, and it ain't happening in my journal anymore. I never use paper. Okay, that's an exaggeration; I use paper...sometimes. But I am always on my computer, so why not just post here. It's not like anyone is reading anyway.
This summer I had two surgeries in two weeks, back-to-back, but it's not as bad as it sounds. One was periodontal surgery, which was the worse of the two (partly because the doc accidentally, of course, nicked an artery on the roof of my mouth while removing the graft, and we didn't realize this until 7 hours, and what seemed like several pints of blood spit into the sink. I was trying hard not to get any blood anywhere on the carpet or bedding at my mother in law's house! So at 7PM that evening, my sweet husband had to drive me back to the doc's office to get 7 more stitches in my mouth. But that by far was the worst part of the surgery. Ibuprofen kept the pain and swelling at bay, and I actually lost some weight due to the liquid diet that I had to follow during the days after surgery.
Gillian says, "Don't drink your calories," but I say, "Don't eat your calories."
And the second surgery I had done was LASIK. I can already see more clearly that I have ever seen before. There was always a smudge or a fleck in my contacts or on my glasses, but now my vision is sharp and clear. The only drawback is in the mornings when I used to open my eyes to a blurry day before putting on my glasses. This would be when I could turn inward and reflect, but now, I open my eyes and BAM! There's your day right in front of you. And it usually takes the form of my youngest son who is always doing something goofy:
Because I am taking a class again this summer and trying to catch up on learning content in an area that I now teach but only took one class in during college, I am really neglecting my husband and kids. But fortunately my husband is saintly in his patience.
When I really think about the job that I have taken on, I realize that I must have been truly unhappy staying home. I mean, I had never taught technology before! But my friend, Deb, said, "You don't have to be that smart to teach at the middle school; you just have to have a sense of humor." That became my mantra for the school year. Because not one time this year did it matter that I could quote Shakespeare or lecture endlessly about theme in Joyce Carol Oates' "A Good Man is Hard to Find." All that mattered was, "Mrs. Demmert, my computer's not working" again!
Today, I went to church for the first time in months. Though I had to leave mid service (to spit more blood into the sink, which stopped to my relief after two small mouthfuls), I began to remember why I like going to church, for the beautiful singing, the message, and an excuse to open the Bible App I put on my iPhone. And most importantly, free babysitting!
Because I have missed so much church this year, it has given me a chance to notice that Jesus is still always there, even though I haven't stepped near a church in ages. Yep, JC is with me always, but I suppose He does say that all the time, thematically as well as contextually and literally throughout his Big Blog.
This summer I had two surgeries in two weeks, back-to-back, but it's not as bad as it sounds. One was periodontal surgery, which was the worse of the two (partly because the doc accidentally, of course, nicked an artery on the roof of my mouth while removing the graft, and we didn't realize this until 7 hours, and what seemed like several pints of blood spit into the sink. I was trying hard not to get any blood anywhere on the carpet or bedding at my mother in law's house! So at 7PM that evening, my sweet husband had to drive me back to the doc's office to get 7 more stitches in my mouth. But that by far was the worst part of the surgery. Ibuprofen kept the pain and swelling at bay, and I actually lost some weight due to the liquid diet that I had to follow during the days after surgery.
Gillian says, "Don't drink your calories," but I say, "Don't eat your calories."
And the second surgery I had done was LASIK. I can already see more clearly that I have ever seen before. There was always a smudge or a fleck in my contacts or on my glasses, but now my vision is sharp and clear. The only drawback is in the mornings when I used to open my eyes to a blurry day before putting on my glasses. This would be when I could turn inward and reflect, but now, I open my eyes and BAM! There's your day right in front of you. And it usually takes the form of my youngest son who is always doing something goofy:
Because I am taking a class again this summer and trying to catch up on learning content in an area that I now teach but only took one class in during college, I am really neglecting my husband and kids. But fortunately my husband is saintly in his patience.
When I really think about the job that I have taken on, I realize that I must have been truly unhappy staying home. I mean, I had never taught technology before! But my friend, Deb, said, "You don't have to be that smart to teach at the middle school; you just have to have a sense of humor." That became my mantra for the school year. Because not one time this year did it matter that I could quote Shakespeare or lecture endlessly about theme in Joyce Carol Oates' "A Good Man is Hard to Find." All that mattered was, "Mrs. Demmert, my computer's not working" again!
Today, I went to church for the first time in months. Though I had to leave mid service (to spit more blood into the sink, which stopped to my relief after two small mouthfuls), I began to remember why I like going to church, for the beautiful singing, the message, and an excuse to open the Bible App I put on my iPhone. And most importantly, free babysitting!
Because I have missed so much church this year, it has given me a chance to notice that Jesus is still always there, even though I haven't stepped near a church in ages. Yep, JC is with me always, but I suppose He does say that all the time, thematically as well as contextually and literally throughout his Big Blog.
Monday, July 5, 2010
Trey's Birthday Vid in FlipShare and File Sharing
My brother-in-law and I spent all day working on my FlipCam video in Windows Movie Maker with no luck. We could never get it to publish. And if you can't publish, you can't upload to YouTube or anywhere or ever have a chance of burning a DVD. So later... at the July 4th parade, I thought, since I was sitting amongst all my very devout family members, that I would pray. So I did. I actually prayed that I would be able to publish, and see! It worked :).
So when we got home, I simply went back into the program that comes with my FlipCam called FlipShare. I figured out how to trim clips multiple times and then save them under different file names. This way, I can get all the good parts from every video clip. I can even add one file of my own audio for background or foreground music/sound. In this video, you can hear the classical selection playing in the background. So I guess if I wanted more than one song, I would have to combine the songs into a single audio file, maybe in Audacity.
Unlike my video production software at home called Vegas, which is extremely complicated and perhaps made for film majors? This FlipShare software is more accessible for stay at home moms and kids who want to do something quickly! You won't have all the bells and whistles that Vegas does, but it's a good starting point for my students. They won't be bogged down by so many options and get bored and frustrated by the process.
Interestingly, it took 4 hours to upload to YouTube which I felt was excessive. And then the quality of YouTube isn't that great. We'll see how it turns out (if it does) in Blogger.
Another thing I learned about during this process was file sharing. So since the router Ry and I hooked up creates a network, we had to use that to copy files from my computer to his. Basically, I had to login to the main server so that he could see my computer. Then I had to copy files to the Public folder so that he could see them and work with them on his computer. We had to do it this way because the video files were so big, and I only had a 1-gigabyte thumb drive. But I think I need to make a trip to Best Buy to remedy that problem!
So when we got home, I simply went back into the program that comes with my FlipCam called FlipShare. I figured out how to trim clips multiple times and then save them under different file names. This way, I can get all the good parts from every video clip. I can even add one file of my own audio for background or foreground music/sound. In this video, you can hear the classical selection playing in the background. So I guess if I wanted more than one song, I would have to combine the songs into a single audio file, maybe in Audacity.
Unlike my video production software at home called Vegas, which is extremely complicated and perhaps made for film majors? This FlipShare software is more accessible for stay at home moms and kids who want to do something quickly! You won't have all the bells and whistles that Vegas does, but it's a good starting point for my students. They won't be bogged down by so many options and get bored and frustrated by the process.
Interestingly, it took 4 hours to upload to YouTube which I felt was excessive. And then the quality of YouTube isn't that great. We'll see how it turns out (if it does) in Blogger.
Another thing I learned about during this process was file sharing. So since the router Ry and I hooked up creates a network, we had to use that to copy files from my computer to his. Basically, I had to login to the main server so that he could see my computer. Then I had to copy files to the Public folder so that he could see them and work with them on his computer. We had to do it this way because the video files were so big, and I only had a 1-gigabyte thumb drive. But I think I need to make a trip to Best Buy to remedy that problem!
Saturday, July 3, 2010
Podbean
I have been working all day figuring out how to allow people to get podcasts from my Blogger blog...sad to say, unsuccessfully. If I knew one person in my life who podcasted, I would have called them by now.
So I went to Podbean.com and started playing with that and have had some success. For instance, if you copy this link, http://eldemmert.podbean.com/feed, and go to iTunes, you can subscribe to my podcasts under the Advanced tab in iTunes. Now, remember, right now, I am merely experimenting and have very boring and silly podcasts with the kids, but at some point I will say, "Hey, Jessika and Becky, the only two people who care, here are some podcasts worth your time!" So be ready.
I am currently dug in to my room right now working, but I can hear Trey out there calling for his cousin, "Amille, Amille, Amille!" Her name's Camille, Trey.
So I went to Podbean.com and started playing with that and have had some success. For instance, if you copy this link, http://eldemmert.podbean.com/feed, and go to iTunes, you can subscribe to my podcasts under the Advanced tab in iTunes. Now, remember, right now, I am merely experimenting and have very boring and silly podcasts with the kids, but at some point I will say, "Hey, Jessika and Becky, the only two people who care, here are some podcasts worth your time!" So be ready.
I am currently dug in to my room right now working, but I can hear Trey out there calling for his cousin, "Amille, Amille, Amille!" Her name's Camille, Trey.
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Trey's Prayer
This started out as an Audacity file which I exported as an MP3 and then made into a short video file in Windows Movie Maker. Then I uploaded it to YouTube, copied the embed code and pasted it into the HTML editor here. Sounds fancy to some of you, but it's actually easy.
So basically I want to learn how to use Audacity which is a free audio recording program. There are many things my students can do with this. We can create podcasts in journalism class, for one. Students can also create PPTs or other media and add their own voice to it. We can't afford Adobe Presenter, so Audacity is it. But I'm finding that Audacity is easy to use. My middle schoolers will probably be teaching me all about its features soon.
Basically, what I'm learning I have to do to post audio to my blog is I either have to store my audio in a host server (I can't quite figure that out yet) or turn my audio into another kind of media file like this "movie" which I can embed.
I bought an MP3 recorder at Best Buy the other day, but I don't really know if I will need that now. I haven't opened it, so we'll see. I have some time to think about it. If anyone has any suggestions, let me know.
So to get back to Audacity...I first uploaded their newest BETA version but couldn't install the LAME plug-in with that which allows you to export the recorded files that you are producing into MP3. So I went back to Audacity's download site and just uploaded the regular version of Audacity, installed the LAME plug-in and voila: I turned Trey's prayer into an MP3.
By the way, this was my first try at using Windows Media Player, and it was so much easier than using Vegas (my Sony moviemaking software)! But Ms. F. says that in her filmmaking class, she has to convert all of her movie files into something else in order to use WMM. I'll ask her about that later. When she told me I had already had a glass or two of wine. So I don't really remember what she said. I think she uses a Sony handycam, and that's the problem.
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