Kimler Adventure Pages (http://randsco.com)

Rachel loves scrapbooking and recently made a "100 Things I Love" page, partly using Photoshop. I carried on with Photoshop and made a pure digital version. Also included is a photoshop tutorial for the "text-masking" typographic technique.

Scrapbook Page via Photoshop

100 Things I Love: Rachel used Photoshop to make the text "one hundred" out of all 100 things that she loves. It's a blend of digital and hardcopy scrapbooking, which turned out nicely.

Rachel has been scrapbooking for a few years and she has improved her skills remarkably. Each 12-inch by 12-inch page she does now is a work of art. Most of her pages are vignettes of the moments of family life and - one day - I will photograph and put them in an online gallery - to share and inspire others with their own scrapbooking projects.

In contrast, I scrapbook online, with this blog. (I'm more about the words than the pictures ... but I try!)

Rachel's latest effort is shown here, a page dedicated to the "100 Things I Love". The page is a blend of digital scrapbooking and paper scrapbooking. It's Rachel's first foray into the digital scrapbooking realm.

I found an online Photoshop tutorial that explained how to make text from words, which Rachel then used to make her own "100". I think it turned out really well and thought others might like to learn about the technique. (Of course, because I'm the "computer dude" in the family, I took Rachel's final "100" and put my own spin on a purely digital page, which you can see by reading on) ...

Photoshop Scrapbooking Technique

Rachel reviews "Infidel", by Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Ayaan was raised in a traditional Muslim home in Africa, she experienced an intellectual awakening in Europe and now critical of Islam, living under armed guard. In 2005, Time magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world.

(Non-Fiction)Review of "Infidel"
An Autobiography by Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Infidel: Ayaan Hirsi Ali, author of "The Caged Virgin," tells her unusual life story. From a traditional Muslim childhood in Somalia, Saudi Arabia and Kenya ... to her intellectual awakening and activism in the Netherlands, and her current life under armed guard in the West.

When I finished the last page of Infidel, by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, I closed the cover and commented on what a powerful book it was. Others have described the Hirsi Ali's autobiography as remarkable, amazing, or a a brave, inspiring and beautifully written memoir. All such acclamations are warranted as Hirsi Ali uses clear and descriptive language to tell the story of how she became one of Time magazines 2005 one-hundred “most influential people in the world today.”

Born in 1969, Hirsi Ali was born a traditional Muslim girl. She was raised in Somalia, Saudi Arabia and Kenya, where her family held steadfast to the doctrines of the Quran. Like the 6000 young girls that undergo female genital excision everyday, Hirsi Ali was forced to submit to excision in order keep her pure, as well as other cultural practices requiring her to take a secondary and subservient role in life, simply because she was female.

Click the link below to continue reading my review of "Infidel".

More on "Infidel", by Ayaan Hirsi Ali

I recently published an article about cross-browser font embedding, using the @font-face CSS selector. It turns out that the code I put forth causes a 404 look-up in Internet Explorer. A reader has suggested some superior code, which I put to the test

Paul Irish Sets My Morning Schedule

Geeky @font-face Newz: It's a thumbs up for Paul's "Bulletproof @font-face Syntax"! (Do geeks really look like this?)

Funny how a single comment can change the direction of my day!

Paul proposes two concepts - new to me - in his recent article, "Bulletproof Font Face Implementation":

• Internet Explorer tries and fails to download the TTF file (with 2-selector syntax) even though the 2nd @font-face selector includes a "format" declaration.
• He proposes a single @font-face selector, which satisfies all browsers (obviating the need for two selectors), searches the local computer for the font first and eliminates the Internet Explorer "file not found" problem.

Okay ... this is techie, geeky cool and - for sure - not everyone is going to want to read about this, so here is where you should get off the geek train (if you haven't already).

If you're all aboard, heading for geekdom and want to be cool, then read on brave web-font enthusiasts ...

I'm a Geek, I want More

There's a spiffy-looking CSS Technique that's been getting a lot of play in the web-design and web-development social circles lately. Unfortunately, it's not a CSS technique and even as a JavaScript technique, it's crap! Did you spot it?

"Innovative CSS Technique" Making Rounds is NOT a CSS Technique

Even as a JavaScript Technique, it's Crap

This article, authored by Emanuele Feronato, has been getting some attention within the web-design and development social network recently. I've seen it Tweeted, FaceBook'd, Blogged, Digg'd and included in various "Totally Amazing CSS Techniques" lists.

On his website, Emanuele bills himself as an "Italian Geek & Programmer". Unfortunately, his article demonstrates he knows very little about web-standards, W3C validation, pure-CSS, graceful degradation, cross-browser compatibility, accessibility or white-hat SEO. He says his LightBox-like effect is "100% CSS-based" and that it's made "only with CSS - no JavaScript needed".

No JavaScript needed? What a pile of hooey!

The article is the most popular article on his blog, sporting over 252 comments and it's currently being shot across the design social circuit like it was the newest communications satellite. While some of the commentary points out the shortcomings, most (who don't know better) are lapping up this code - using it on commercial sites and passing it on.

At first blush, the technique seems very cool, but it's not code we would use and you shouldn't either. In a nutshell, out-of-the box it's crap. (Are you a web-developer, designer or programmer? Can you spot the problems?")

To learn more about why this code is crap (and to get an improved version) ... carry on ...

Turning Crapola into Shinola

We just got back from our first-ever sea kayaking adventure, spending 6 days exploring the Canadian southern Gulf Islands. We had a great time and are slowly getting our journal online. We thought we'd post what we have, as family and friends might like to read about the adventure, as it unfolded. Cheers! (Busily working away at spell-checking and such)

First-Ever Kayaking Trip: Canadian Southern Gulf Islands

Descriptive and entertaining entry about how lucky we are to have such a wonderfully diverse, rich and popular sea kayaking destination right in our own backyard. Till such time as I cobble all that together, just pop on in and read about our recent 6-day kayaking trip.

Though we're no strangers to camping, backpacking, cycle-touring and other outdoor adventure ... this was our first time traveling by sea kayak. We can laugh now at some of our mistakes, preconceptions and landlubbing ways, but make no mistake - we had a great time and we're hooked! There will be many more sea kayaking adventures in our future (and Alex's too, though she missed this one, away with her maternal grandparents and having her own summer adventure at Watch Lake).

Route Map: We drove to nearby Saltspring Island without an itinerary in mind. Because it was our first kayaking adventure, we had no idea how far we might travel in a day. We ended up averaging about 15 miles per day, which allowed us to visit the outermost of the Gulf Islands (Saturna Island) and nearly took us into U.S. waters.

Note: The text is a bit raw, at this point, as I've only run it through the spell-checker - still need to go through and finalize it. (Three cheers to Rachel for all her hard work writing the journal!! Yippee! Yippee! Yippee!)

What's Completed:

• Intro Text | Pictures
• Day 0 Text | Pictures
• Day 1 Text | Pictures
• Day 2 Text | Pictures
• Day 3 Text | Pictures
• Day 4 Text | Pictures
• Day 5 Text | Pictures
• Day 6 Text | Pictures
• Slide Show
• Resources & Planning