If you’re looking for a fun adventure for your kids to do outside in the beautiful weather, then you should consider a photography scavenger hunt in your backyard. This can be a huge amount of fun and can get your kids to better appreciate nature.

If you don’t know what a photo scavenger hunt is, it’s where you give your kids a camera and a list of things they need to find to take pictures of. Whoever, finds and takes the most pictures of the items on their list -wins.

You can do this activity with young children as early as five or you can create teams and include younger children as well. Just remember that you need to have at least one child who knows how to use a camera. And, if a child doesn’t have a camera, you can always use an inexpensive disposable camera.

Here are a couple of things to consider before you start:

1) Set boundaries of where the children can go. In most cases, your backyard can work great. Just remember that safety should always come first.

2) Set rules. Make sure that everyone starts at the same time and place. Also, set a specific ending time (even if no one wins) and a place where everyone must return to. Another thing you should consider is that each child knows that they shouldn’t take too many pictures of any one object. Try to have them take no more than 2 -3 pictures of each item on their list.

3) Give each child or team, a list of 10-15 objects to find. Give a mix of items so some items are easy to find while others are more difficult. For each item on the list, assign a point value to it based upon the difficulty of finding the item. While making your list be thinking of items that are fun to find and help educate as well.

If you need ideas for your list, here is a simple printable scavenger hunt list that HP put together that’s really cute if you want something that’s ready to print.

And don’t forget to take pictures of your kids on the scavenger hunt, so you’ll have something to put in a decorative picture frame to remember this fun day!

If you love taking pictures and want a chance to win a trip for two to Athens, Greece for 9 days then you should consider entering National Geographic’s Energizer Ultimate Photo Contest.

As a fan of  National Geographic for years, it only seemed natural to spread the word.

Although it may seem like a photo contest for professional photographers, anyone can enter (as long as your 18 years or older). All you have to do is submit your image (digitally) before June 30, 2010 and have it fall into one of the following theme categories: animals/wildlife, nature, people/cultures, travel, weather, action/energy.

And if you want to increase your odds and have even more fun, you can enter up to 6 of your pictures if you enter each one into a different category.

So, visit their website and check out the contest rules and then start taking pictures. And whatever picture you don’t submit to the contest, you can always keep it for yourself and frame it on your wall.  Just remember that when framing landscapes or captivating scenery, generally you want a simple metal or wood picture frame that won’t overpower your image.

If you’ve seen the “Kaboodle” button on our product pages and wondered what that was…now is your time to find out.

Kaboodle is a social shopping website that allows users to bookmark their favorite products. Kaboodling is a fun and easy way to create a list of products that you love so you can share it with others. It’s great for creating a special wish list for birthdays, weddings, baby showers or any special occasion by being able to identify all of your favorite things in one spot.

After being kaboodled by many of our customers, we finally created our very own Your Picture Frames Kaboodle store . You can check it out here and be sure to “become a fan.”

On our kaboodle store you’ll see that we’ve added a couple hundred of our favorite frames and organized them in a selection of easy to use lists so it’s easy for browsing.  It’s just another fun way to shop across the internet and share your great finds with other people with similar taste.

Don’t forget to check out our picture frame kaboodle lists and fan us 😛

Did you know that May is National Photo Month?

It all started back in 1984 when Ronald Reagan started a week long celebration of photography called the American Photography Celebration that ran from May 7-14. But  then in 1987, Congress recognized May as National Photo Month (NPM) in the hopes of promoting the joy and benefits of photography to all Americans.

So, for an entire 31 days, remember to get out your camera and have fun taking pictures.

And when you take a picture that you really love, go check out some of our matted picture frames and gallery picture frames so you can proudly display it in your home or office.