Words to Live By Wednesday: A new weekly column featured on Kiera Slye Photography’s Blog!

My very best friend, Melissa, is a fabulous quote locator and provides fantastic quotes periodically on her facebook page. I thought it’d be awesome to put her amazing skills to use and provide my readers with some weekly inspiration. Each week, I will pair a quote that Melissa finds with an inspirational photo to match and share it with you. So please do check back often!

Melissa lives in Fairport, New York. She is a wife, a mother of two adorable little girls, an animal lover, and a rock-star Hairstylist at Revelations Design Studio in Fairport, NY. We have been best friends since 7^th grade when Melissa convinced me to become a Hanson fan. Through our joint love for Hanson and our love for each other, we had some fantastic little adventures growing up, and continue to be close today.

The featured quote this week is one that is attributed to the great American writer Mark Twain. I think the words he wrote are so very true. Life is too short to live in anger and regret. It’s important to remember to forgive and truly value the moments in your life that make you smile.

The image I chose is a moment that made me smile both inside my heart and literally behind my camera lens as I captured this beautiful moment between Melissa and her two amazing little girls.

What does this quote mean to you?

“What the heck is Pinterest?”- written by me on January 10, 2012 on Facebook, in response to a post by my lovely Aunt Erin. She had posted a comment on my Facebook wall about a cool photo idea that she had seen while scanning Pinterest. At the time, neither of us were Pinterest members so we couldn’t utilize “The Power of Pinterest” to share the photo ideas with each other. Very soon after this post, I sought an invite and joined Pinterest. Here’s what I have learned so far:

What the Heck is Pinterest anyway?

Pinterest is the latest and greatest image-based social bookmarking tool. Surprisingly launched in early 2010, Pinterest is now gaining massive traction on the interwebs. Today it stands as one of the top social networking websites with over 11.7 million visitors per week- according to Wikipedia!  The best way I can think to describe Pinterest is that it is like an online interactive corkboard or scrapbook that you would keep at home, except minus the ink, paper, time, and space. It serves as an organized online location to categorize some of your favorite things, ideas, and inspirations. One of the greatest things about Pinterest is that when you Pin an image on your board, the original site location where you pulled the Pin from stays with the image. All you need to do to get back to the site where you found the image, is click on the image, and you will be taken directly back to the source. This is an awesome bookmarking technique!

How the Heck Pinterest works:

For starters, Pinterest is currently an “invite only” web service. Don’t let that deter you though. You can either “request an invite” from Pinterest itself or have your friend who is already a Pinterest member (Me), invite you privately. From my experience, it takes a while to get accepted by Pinterest when you request an invite, so please feel free to send me a message on Facebook or an email, or comment after this post if you would like me to invite you.

Once you are signed up for Pinterest, follow the prompts to set up your “Pin It” button for your Internet web browser. Basically what you do is put a bookmark in your web bar that will enable you to virtually “Pin” any picture you find inspiring on the web. Pushing the “Pin It” button on your web browser will then pull up several images that appear on the web page that you are currently viewing. Simply pick the image you LOVE and hit “Pin This.” You will be taken to a box that allows you to choose the category board that you want your pin to appear in on your Pinterest page. Write a cool description to remind yourself and others why you pinned this image, and viola.

A helpful tip for writing descriptions: Choose descriptions that would make for great search terms. For example:

Puppy goes to Polka Dog Bakery and gets a new frisbee

Cool lines at the Christian Science Park in Boston, MA

New twist on bridal nails: white with silver glitter tip gel nails. Neat vantage point for a photograph

Gorgeous bridal bouquet with feathers and gems

Beautiful beading and detail shot of wedding dress

Rockstar Bridal Silver Stilettos with blue "I DO" rhinestone detail

Adorable moment between dog and newborn baby

Powerful idea for a family portrait with a 9 month old baby

Puppy greetings on the street. Cool shadow photograph

Place to check out in Boston: Christian Science Park. Cool dog silhouette

One of the best things about Boston is all the parks for your dog to run in! Great action shot!

This picture makes me laugh when I'm frustrated. This spot is also known to cure New Orleans hangovers if you smack your head where indicated.

Another helpful tip is to use the hashtag (#) symbol in your descriptions to create even greater exposure for search terms and to gain followers (i.e. #newborn). Using common search terms and descriptive words to describe your Pins will help create a better marketplace overall on Pinterest and will allow you and all of us to find better images quicker.

Don’t be shy. After you are signed up for Pinterest, feel free to try your Pinning hand out using images you find on my website. These ones above are a great starting point!

Other Neat Ways to Use Pinterest:

 I am currently working on coming up with more cool ways to use Pinterest, but here are some creative ideas I have come across so far:

 Collaborative Boards: You can create interactive boards on Pinterest where your “Followers” can help you come up with inspirational ideas and vice-a-versa. For example:

-  I use it to show my friend Emily the types of props I am looking for in my dream closet for my photoshoots. She uses it to design and create handmade creations for her crocheting and knitting business and shares her work with me to use as props in my photoshoots;

-  My Aunt Erin can now use it to share awesome photo posing ideas with me;

-  My fabulous friend Megan uses it to share my pictures with the world and I use it to share wedding planning tips and engagement photo ideas with her;

-  I love using my Pinterest board to organize photos that give my followers and clients creative ideas for DIY projects, unique ideas for wedding setups and portrait sessions, and can even use it to provide clients with outfit ideas for their photoshoots.

Mentioning: Another neat feature is when you see a Pin that reminds you of someone else, you can “mention” them in your description using the “@” symbol before their name, similar to Twitter and Facebook (i.e. @kieraslye. This will post a Pin on your board as well as show up in the person you mention’s news feed.

Creating interactive boards and using #hashtags and @mentions are very useful for the following purposes:

-  When planning a wedding or party with your family and friends

-  When re-decorating a room in your house and you want input on what should go where, you can upload pictures of your space and have contributors Pin suggestions of items for the space

-  Planning future blog posts

-  Keeping track of gift ideas for the holidays

-  Organizing craft ideas to do throughout the year

-  Sharing recipes and great restaurants

-  Creating your bucket list

-  Creating a birthday wish list

-  Planning a packing list and/or itinerary for a future trip

-  For Hairstylists: you can create several boards of hairstyle ideas for women and men and allow your clients to post their ideas as well. Gone are the days of outdated 1980’s coffee table books.

This is only the beginning of the super cool ways to utilize Pinterest. Once you are all on and ready to learn more, check back here for future blog posts on: how to find people to follow, getting people to follow you, Pinterest video pins, pinning contests, tips for finding great Pin content and much much more!

In the meantime- Please feel free to pin some of my pictures if you are so inspired and watch how the magic works! Hope you enjoy this new addiction!