Photos attributed to: Big Stock Photo (see right hand column for links and info).
I designed both of these mockups for a client recently. We were feeling green. So — which cover do you think my client chose? The one with the girl or the one with the leaf? Vote for your favorite by leaving a comment and then we’ll compare those results with the one my client actually chose! Could be interesting…
Just received my latest issue and it’s always a lovely surprise in my email. I have been subscribing to Before & After for a very long time. It’s cheap ($24/yr for the online version) and short (easily read!) and is usually stuff I already know but presented in such a way that it gets the creative juices flowing again. This mag would be perfect for any kind of designer: print, web, scrapbook, fabric, you name it! You can check out the mag here and the design blog here. Bonus - the blog is holding a design contest for a boring book! Check it out. It’s all about the ideas, baby…
I meant to post this in March but just ran across it today. Gabe is so sweet. He was turning 7 when he wrote this note. I should be glad that HOME even made the list with competition such as Noah’s Ark, Mahoney Park and Chuck-E-Cheese. I do believe we took him up on the HOME option as well. The year before he was spoiled with an all-class-and-neighborhood blow up event so he should be good for a decade, right?
I love entering giveaways online so I thought I’d finally host one of my own. BLISSFUL BROWNIES is a fabulous cookbook, published in 2007. More imporantly, here are some of the different types of brownie recipes: Chocolate , Fudge , Pecan, Double Chocolate, Sticky Chocolate, White Chocolate, Chocolate Chip, Cappuccino, Mocha, Ginger Chocolate Chip, Sour Cream, Walnut & Cinnamon, Banana Cardamom, Black Forest, Toffee Apple, Rocky Road, Apricot, Marbled Chocolate Cheesecake…just to name a few. It also includes an entire section at the back on bars, e.g. Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars, Almond Bars, Macadamia Nut Caramel Bars, + MORE! All you have do to be entered to win is leave a comment on this post before midnight on Sunday, October 19th. The winner will be randomly drawn from the comments. Oh, and, shipping is on me (contiguous 48 states, please).
The woman behind this design blog is incredibly, well, inspiring. It’s called The Inspired Room. Love at first site…I mean sight.
These white pumpkins are creepy - and kinda pretty. I found the pic and ideas at homemadesimple.
Okay - I couldn’t find my mummy cupcakes (they were like Kara’s except the lines were mostly horizontal only having chocolate cupcake underneath and leaving a swath where the eyes would be so you could just peek at the cupcake and then having red dots for the eyes). They were cute but I have no witnesses - sorry!
I did find an old mummy cheese log surrounded by crackers that I had made for a church event. You can make any recipe cheese log you’d like. Pre-made and purchased worked great for me. Just make a savory cream cheese based dip, fill your piping tube and mummify the orange cheese. Olives for “eyes” and other veggie accoutrements work great, too. Use your imagination!
One of my favorite magazines for a Mom with and a home based business is Working Mother. I no longer subscribe but they have the best time-saving tips, recipes, etc. I think every Mom should read it - just to save time (isn’t every mother strapped for time?). I don’t think I got this costume idea from there, but…one of the easiest, cheapest and cutest costume ideas I’ve ever seen was this mummy - this was Jack in 2006. So very scary. Ah, the memories…they are growing too quickly for sure!
I was out to lunch yesterday with a friend and we stopped by the bookstore to look at some quilting and knitting and design books and she said, “What is up with cupcakes? They are everywhere these days!” and I’m not sure what I replied but I wholeheartedly agree. They are everywhere - and for good reason. It’s the perfect little sugar package.
Fast forward to this morning, I open my email and another friend, Kara, has started a new blog. Kara is the sweetest (and one of the prettiest) girls you’ll ever know. It makes complete sense that everything she makes is ultra sweet and adorable. She had more talent in her pinky toe when we met (she was 10 and I was 20) and she still could teach me a few things. Anyway - her new blog is all about cupcakes and I wanted to share her beautiful creations with you! There’s some adorable Halloween ideas here. I made the mummy cupcakes a couple of years ago - I’ll see if I can’t dig out a picture of my own from way back when!
Another Beautiful Set of Cupcakes…
Another adorable blog that is one part sugar, one part presentation is Amy Atlas. I do not personally know her but wish I did!
I haven’t ordered from Deseret Book in forever. I’m years behind on my EFY cd collection. So what made me place an order this morning? This t-shirt. Adorable. Cute for boys, girls, men, women (yes, they have all those styles). It comes in heather gray and pastel ribbing, too, if you’re so inclined…and it’s half off. About $7 per tee. Now that’s a bargain! If you can’t read the picture, the t-shirt says, “give” — the Little Stream. One of my favorite Primary songs - hooray!
We came across this really neat monument on our weekend camping trip a couple of weeks ago - it is fun to find history you didn’t even know was there! I spent many years in the Jesse Knight Humanities Building (aka JKHB) at BYU and 15 years later here I find out he is Newel Knight’s son and they both have very interesting stories to tell - give ‘em a search at www.lds.org and you will be inspired. That Jesse sure was a character!
I guess he was really hungry for pie. I thought he’d had enough while we were at Nan’s house watching general conference — maybe not!
It’s blurry because I didn’t realize you have to focus BEFORE you push record. Let’s hope I don’t make that mistake again. The video of his lower belt below that he had to remember and redo is a bit better!
He was hoping to not have to do yellow but, unfortunately, it was one of his two random older forms he had to remember in order to pass off his red belt. He hesitated but did a great job (especially for being sick for two days home from school!). We are truly proud of him - he persevered even though he didn’t feel his best.
Cole should be getting his brown belt a week from today. He did a great job with his red belt testing on Friday night. At this level, they have to choose two random previous forms to pass again also. He chose orange and yellow out of a bag which were the 2nd and 3rd ones he’d learned a LONG time ago and he was really nervous. Next is black and we have to try to rush through that before we move because his teacher here in Gretna, Rick Staack, is absolutely the best! We don’t want to fool around with starting over in Texas.
I know, I know, it’s early for Christmas…but my fabulous artist friend Traci Osborn sent me this she has been working on and it’s beautiful! I wish I had her talent…but I know I don’t have the discipline necessary to get there. She even sent me the outlines I could have worked with on the computer to create something but, alas, I couldn’t have even envisioned it as well as this. Hope it puts you in the Christmas mood like it has for me. It’s coming up fast, you know.
Hooray! Two new magazines being published and I like the looks of both of them. Let’s hope the STITCH magazine from Quilting Arts can stay fresh (the other magazines looked a bit old fashioned to me but this Stitch one has potential - I’m definitely going to check it out!). 10% discount on this subscription if you order soon.
Another new magazine: Women’s Running. Can’t wait to check this one out, too! I just love to flip through magazines - snippets of info you can keep one in the car without getting the least bit upset when it’s crumpled and smashed by kids and/or dogs. FREE (actually cute) t-shirt when you subscribe.
