The Curmudgeonly Professor

Quote of the Day on Gratitude: from John Kralik's "365 Thank Yous"

A short time ago I posted a review of John Kralik's book "365 Thank Yous: The Year a Simple Act of Daily Gratitude Changed my Life."  If you just skipped over this post or maybe even said, gee, that's nice, and then forgot about it, you are missing a significant possibility of changing your life and brightening the lives of others.  The idea is to send a simple thank you each day to someone who has touched your life either now or some time in the past. 

Here is a quote from Kralik's book which the author wrote when he was in the depths of despair:

    Then I heard a voice: "Until you learn to be grateful for things you have," it said, "you will not receive the things you want." (at p. 14).

Some people have decided to use some of our photo note cards to send thank yous.  These note cards make a nice frameable keepsake, but any note sent in any form is a welcome therapy.  You can reach me at dmblood@mac.com    

The Curmudgeonly Professor Blog is Launching Our Photo NoteCard Business

 

Ever since I stumbled on to the pre-made templates for assembling our own photo note cards a couple of years ago, we (mostly my wife) have put together several hundred cards like those shown above.  Many we gave away, some we sold.  We have no pretense of making any money at doing this, since by the time we buy card stock, do premium printing of photos, pay for camera and software expense, we'll be lucky if we make a little extra to pay for some of the costs.  However, we love the cards, and my wife loves having something creative to do to help occupy her time while she is largely immobile due to sciatic pain.  We have found that many people who receive these cards frame the image in a 5x7 frame and hang them on their walls.  Others save them as keepsakes, since the messages they contain are highighted by the beauty of the flowers and scenes on the front of the card.  So, compared to buying a card for $3 to $6 or more at the store, which often are saved only temporarily, we're charging $4 per card for gorgeous keepsake cards, plus sales tax and postage.

We don't quite have our system set up yet with PayPal and ordering forms, but can handle individual orders by email for now.  We will also set up card ordering on my Zenfolio photo print gallery, and may list some on Etsy.  Again, we have no pretense of making any money on this venture, since I have never made any money from the dozens of ventures I have tried throughout my life, but the cards do offer a diversion for my wife and for me while we continue to deal with our health issues.  And the people who have thus far used and received them have given us the highest compliments for them.  So this is a preliminary announcement, and I will continue to work out the details.  I have many, many thousands of beautiful images on my hard drives that would make beautiful cards, so we will never run out of images.  Plus, I seem to add hundreds of new card-worthy images each week.  I'll add details about categories of cards, ordering information, and other information as we go along.  If you have any questions or comments, just email me at dmblood@mac.com, or add a comment on this blog.  We love the fact that sharing these cards allows us to share the beauties of flowers and of the world we live in with many others, making us more thankful for and attentive to the great and wonderful gifts we have been given.

Which One of These Photos Should I Put on a Photo Note Card?

 

 

 

Just to have smething to do besides watch Matlock reuns, which I now sleep through since I have them all memorized, I decided to play the game of taking at least one photo a day that is worth putting on a photo note card.  I'll let my viewers vote.  Which of the above three photos would make a good photo note card?  Or none of the above? (Since I know not all photos are created equally).