A Family Portrait, Coloring Book Style

Eat your heart out, Olan Mills!

I'm a wee bit addicted to my new favorite iphone app: Sketch Me!  It converts digital photos into sketches. The black and white sketches are nifty enough on their own, but the fun really kicks in when you print them at home and break out the crayons. Hello custom coloring book!

PS: Don't worry if you do not have a smartphone, you can mimic the Sketch It! effect with photoshop, or register at Crayola.com to use their Lights Camera Color tool. 





Months ago, when I committed to assembling a portrait gallery, I decided I wanted this fabulous Olan Mills portrait of my cousins up on the wall. Not just because they are some of my favorite people, and they were really cute kids, but because I have a thing for retrotastic Olan Mills portraits with fake fall scenery. I mean, Hello Awkward Family Photos. 

Wondering when this picture was taken?  Well....

Welcome to the world baby Luke!

So, after converting the photo and printing it out on letter size paper, I took it to my local copy shop and asked them to enlarge it to just over 16"x20", the size of my frame. It cost $5.95, which I probably could have reduced if I had done it myself, but I wanted it to be a specific size and I get mighty irritated when it comes to messing with machinery. Some things are best left to the professionals.

My friend Ann's dog, Cody, posing on the yellow brick road.

Stephanie looks surprisingly good with pink hair....
and as wrapping paper...