How can I transfer photos from Icloud to my laptop?

I would like to put photos in my Pictures folder, and Adobe Photoshop, but don't know how to get them there. Is this possible without the purchase of some kind of program? My photo stream is not working automatically like it should. I have to send them to photo sharing folder, than I wait for them to transfer and they don't come to my Dell Laptop. We do have an iPad, which they go to automatically from the iPhone, but then I still don't know how to get them from there to my laptop? stumped? I had an iPhone 4 for 2 years, and it did this automatically for me. Now I have an iPhone 5C and it doesn't work.