Friday, December 10, 2010

'Twas the Write Before Christmas...Day 5

I have really been diggin' taking pictures of Churches lately.  Even the simple ones are beautiful..but this one is anything but simple, it's grand.  The details on it are amazing..I will have to go back and concentrate on those next time.





First Baptist Church
5th Street
Winston-Salem, NC

For this shot, I took the original image into Photoshop and auto contrast/color/levels it, then put a texture layer (in overlay mode) over it, I think at around 80% opacity or so, then bumped up the contrast and saturation a bit on the photograph.  I added the border and text on Picnik.  You can find the texture that I used on here, as well as hundreds of others..HERE.  And they're all FREE
 P.S. do you know where else you can find cool, free textures on-line?  If you do, I would LOVE to know too!! :)


and then, she {snapped}



The theme for Day 5 of 'Twas the Write Before Christmas is "Hymn."  I loooove Christmas Hymns, especially when they are sung in a sanctuary full of people.  Away in the Manger is by far my favorite Christmas Hymn, it's so sweet.  It makes me think of how Mary and Joseph must have felt on that fateful night..all the emotions that must have been present.  Excitement, fear, sadness, passion, happiness and maybe even a little bit of anger.  Now that I am a mother myself, the song is even more powerful to me, the words even more beautiful. 
Away in a manger,
No crib for His bed
The little Lord Jesus
Laid down His sweet head
The little Lord Jesus
Asleep on the hay

The cattle are lowing
The poor Baby wakes
But little Lord Jesus
No crying He makes

I love Thee, Lord Jesus
Look down from the sky
And stay by my side,
'Til morning is nigh.

Be near me, Lord Jesus,
I ask Thee to stay
Close by me forever
And love me I pray

Bless all the dear children
In Thy tender care
And take us to heaven
To live with Thee there

Photobucket



7 comments:

Colleen said...

That was my daughter's favorite Christmas song when she was little. We would sing it over and over and over again, but I still love it.

Anonymous said...

That is so pretty! I live in NC also! :)

Alita said...

So beautiful... and I love that song!

Hyacynth said...

That church is magnificent! I love the columns -- I think I have a thing for columns.

That song always makes my heart brim with emotion, too. As a mother, how could it not? Great thoughts and photo today!

rachel said...

great job on the textures! I've just started using them myself and appreciate learning where to get them for free! thanks for linking up this week!

Warren Baldwin said...

I like the pics of the church buildings and the text you have with it. Good art!

Can't remember if I've asked this when I visited here before - do you allow your pics to be used on other blogs if they give credit back to you? I could use these church building pictures to illustrate osts I do on Family Fountain.

Thanks,
wb

Warren Baldwin said...

Thanks for letting me use some of your pics. I'm going to use one of the church pics and one of the decorations. They will not be on my main blog, Family Fountain, but on another one I write for. If you go to Family Fountain, click on Titus 2 In Action. They will post on Monday Dec. 20. Thanks, WB