Working at home

Working at home
Originally uploaded by bobsd46

The day started out pretty well with some problem solving for one teacher, getting a computer back started again for a board office staff member, and some work on an upcoming seminar. Then things started to get a bit more negative and since I had an afternoon online session to participate in, I decided to head home and settle into a more comfortable, quiet, environment. Even looking out on the rain was positive as I wouldn't be dreaming of playing golf instead.

That said, the course I was to take online had some issues with webpages not loading and I spent some time exchanging messages with tech support. Finally, I called it quits and just did a bit of other learning, exploring my google reader, twitter links, reviewing and dealing with backlogged email, etc.

Eventually it was time for dinner and hoping for the day to end on a much better note than it was at some points in time.

Saturday excitement at the mall.

Because I belong to Flickr and a group in which I take a photo a day and post it on the net, I am most often with my camera.

This morning, I went to do some shopping for cooking dinner tonight and did not have my camera with me. In the mall there was a great collection of local artists, crafts people, food makers, etc. and so I had to immediately head home and come back with my camera! The photo above is the ingredients of a wonderful tea I sampled, and then purchased a "starter" set to make at home. Now one might think that being a resident of the Sunshine Coast and a purchaser of beverages at Starbucks from time to time, I might have experienced Chai tea before. Well, never. And, enjoying the sample, I spoke with the creator of this recipe, Annie, and learned a lot about the history of Chai and how it came to be that she produces this recipe. I'm looking forward to trying it out at home.

I also visited the booth of a parent who I met while I was a school principal. I see her goodies at a number of markets and she makes wonderful dips and biscotti and jellies. Always a treat to try out her samples and enjoy her products.

As well, I ran across a teacher I have worked with these past couple of years from time to time at inservice sessions. While I knew she has an interest in photography and that she has also taken up painting, it was wonderful to see her there with some of her work on display and for sale. As she noted in her write up posted on the wall, as a primary teacher with an interest in Art, she has loved to do many projects with her students, and now is extending those experiences with children into a small business opportunity.

Elphi Students work on iMacs and MacBooks

Elphistudents
Originally uploaded by bobsd46

I worked with some Elphi students today, teaching them how to create a blog using Blogspot. I also visited another class where the students were using the computers to do research about universities, colleges, and other post secondary institutions to attend in the coming years.

The other day, a teacher had asked me how to get a jpeg from Pages for Mac. So, I decided to create this collage using Pages. Pages won't export as a jpg, but it will as a pdf. I then opened the PDF in Apple's preview program which allows files to be exported to jpg. Once I did that, I opened it in iPhoto, trimmed off the white margins, header and footer, and voila. Good practice for me, and now to post this on my blog for the teacher to see.