Exciting New Adventure!!

I have some really exciting news to share with ya'll. Author, artist, and speaker, Karla Dornacher, has asked me to work with her to create digital downloads using her artwork!! Basically I will be using her original art and turning it into digital scrapbooking kits, and downloadable - printable projects. I'm so honored that she has asked me to do this for her. I'm also feeling very insecure and intimidated at this moment. I will have a handful of learning curves to overcome in order to be able to do this, but she is willing to work with me and help me through those learning curves.

Karla has been blessed with some amazing gifts and talents. More than that she is an incredible woman of God. For that reason I look forward to working with her, learning from her, and gleaning Godly wisdom from her.

Visit Karla's website to view her work. Her books, stationary and other items make great gifts! Especially with Christmas just around the corner!

Jewelry Tags

My mother-in-law has been making jewelry and selling it. She's been doing quite well acutally. Her hubby's nickname for her is George. I still don't know why. But anyway, she calls her company Gems by George. So I was given the task of creating the logo as well as the price/info tags for the items.

Here is the logo:

This is what the detailed info is on the cards. She has created several different "series" lines based on the colors of each piece. Each line coordinates with a word and scripture from the bible. For example: The pieces that have white or clear beads is in the Purity Series.
Here is a pic of one of the necklaces with the tag attatched:

So that's the project I've been working on recently. I'd direct you to my MIL's website to buy her jewelry....but she doesn't have a site yet. I'll let you know when she does!

Sports theme Birthday

I'm currently working on a project to help my friend Vikki with her son Luke's bowling theme birthday party. So come back in a couple days to see my bowling themed cupcakes.

For now I thought I'd show you a few pics from my son's sports themed birthday that we did when he was 2 years old.

For the invites I designed them and then printed them out on simple white cardstock. To create his name in that "baseball jersey" style I downloaded a free font from dafont.com The font name is marcelle

Then I used this really cool paper that I got at my local scrapbooking store. The paper is textured just like a basketball. I cut the paper so that it folded into a 6x6 square and then I drew the black lines (like on a real basketball) I adhered the printed invite to the inside.



For the cake I tried to incorporate a couple different sports...basketball and football
I made the top of the cake look like a basketball. I even used the textured paper to add texture to the top of the cake. I waited until the frosting had set a bit in the fridge and then put the paper on top and lightly pressed down. I added pre-made footballs to the side and added a grass border to the bottom.


I used the design that I did for the invite and printed it out on an iron-on tranfer and made my son a t-shirt to match to wear at the party


For the food we totally played up the sports theme and went with traditional ball park foods. We did hot dogs, hamburgers, and nachos. It was a fun casual party and we did it in our own backyard.

More Fun with Design

I designed a blog for my sister's good friend Dena who has become one of my blog buddies. Check it out HERE

Fun with Design

So as many of you noticed I recently re-designed my blog. I've taken one class in HTML coding and it gave me enough info to figure out how to alter some of bloggers existing templates.

I love being creative and designing stuff like this. So I re-designed a couple of blogs for my friends. Check them out:
Michele at Woodland Countrylife and Beckie at Infarrantly Creative

I created the headers too.

Seattle.....The End

This is my last post about the weekend in Seattle.

We spent Saturday out shopping at Bellevue Square. During our shopping day everyone is suppose to find a $10 gift for a gift exchange that we do each year. And of course we shop til we drop!

In fact my sister and cousin even went to sharper image at one point and just sat in the massage chairs for awhile.


We had lunch at this AMAZING pizza place called Pagliacci's Pizza. I'm serious is was SOOOO YUMMY! If you are in Seattle you MUST go there!

Then after more shopping we went back to the house and had dinner. My mom prepared a fabulous meal. I actually even enjoyed the couscous. Who knew?

Next I presented everyone with the final gift for the weekend. It was a family calendar. Each month had a picture from a previous Girls Getaway on it and then if it was a day of someone's b-day it had their pic and same with anniversaries. So basically is was a complete family birthday and anniversary calendar.


This is what the cover looked like...

These are a couple of the month pages....


I created the calendar from scratch (without a template) using Adobe InDesign I use this program for a lot of the stuff that I do. It was a fun project to create for my family.

It was our last night and there was only one thing left to do...Gift Exchange. Everyone really did a great job picking out gifts this year. The most "stolen" gift was a mug from the Original Starbucks that had the original logo on it. Did you know that in the original logo the mermaid had boobies? I didn't. But I do now!

So all in all it was just a great weekend! It's so great to have this tradition and get together with all the women in the family. I love that someday going to this weekend will be my daughters "right of passage"!

Next year my Aunt Patty, and cousins Emily and Allison will be hosting GGW at their summer home in Nantucket! So basically what I'm saying here is that I'm looking for side jobs because I have to start saving my money NOW!
Later ya'll

A project here and there

Several posts ago I mentioned that I was working on some graphic/layout design projects. This is one of the projects that I did. It was a 30th birthday invitation. The hubby wanted it to look like the cover of Triathlete Magazine, because his wife is a triathlete. So this was the final outcome. I couldn't post it sooner because it was a surprise party and I didn't want to ruin it!

Girls & Pirates

I have a couple events coming up that I've been working on. One is my son's 5th birthday party. This year the theme is Pirates. These are the invites I'll be sending out.





I made a "label" for the water bottle, and then I have a mapstyle invite rolled up and placed inside with some sand on the bottom. We will hand deliver the invites.

The next event is the "Nannual Girls Getaway Weekend" that we do every year with family. This is the 5th year we've done it. "Nannual" is in honor of Nanny, my grandmother, the matriarch of the family. Any female who is 18 or over gets to come. There are usually anywhere from 10-12 of us. It's always a blast. I began the tradition 5 years ago because I wanted to have a "right of passage" and family tradition to pass on to my daughter. This year it is my year to host again, along with my mom and my Aunt Judy. We are headed to Seattle where we will be renting a house for the weekend. These are the invites I've designed and am mailing out.

They are double sided. One side it a panoramic pic of Seattle and the other are pics from the last 4 years.





So many more details to plan out for both events. I'll post pics from the events after we've had them.