What I Designed Today: Jesus is the Living Water water bottle labels

Wednesday, January 15, 2025Wednesday, January 15, 2025 by Sparkbark | Leave a comment

*Tifanni Maddox used the “Jesus is the Living Water” water bottle labels at her event!*

Last week, a reader asked for the Jesus is the Living Water water bottle labels and before I had a chance to respond, she’d found them on Flickr (via the original Sparkbark post), printed them out and replied by sharing the following pic of her event.

I may not visit or update this site often but it’s fun to see old work being used and still helpful to people. The older I get the more the little things make me happy. Seeing her picture and the fact she cared enough to share it with me made my day! Well done, Tiffani. I hope you’ll look at my other water bottle labels Armor of God.

Finally! Shareable version of the infamous Ward Mission Plan . . .

Wednesday, December 11, 2024Monday, January 6, 2025 by Sparkbark | Leave a comment

In 2015, I posted about a non-profit client I did some graphic design work for both a ward mission plan and a stake mission plan (links to old posts). Over the years the ward mission plan has generated thousands of requests for an editable version from me for the layout design. I’m excited to announce that today’s the day an easily editable version of the ward mission plan is finally here.

I’ve created a new ward mission plan in Google Slides so that anyone with that free software can modify it for personal use to create a ward mission plan of their own.

A Canva version of the ward mission plan may also be on the way but, for now, this 8.5 x 11″ sized Google Slide will have to do. Since the original was in Adobe InDesign and used custom fonts, the new one uses Cloud fonts that should be universally available in Google Slides.

To download, I’ve created a link that will make you force a copy to your own Google Slides. You”ll see this image after you click:

Happy creating!

Lizabeth

Custom Youth Game Sheets for a Church Activity

Friday, June 7, 2024 by Sparkbark | Leave a comment

It wasn’t exactly part of my role to design these since I managed the welfare requests in an entire region — and training the trainers about welfare resources and self help groups. But since I had the skills, I helped a Springfield Missouri congregation create this game for their youth. There are different versions for youth brackets, missionaries, college edition etc.

I don’t have the game rules that were used nor did I attend the activity but here’s the sheets! Reverse engineer if you will…

Price is Right Game for youth – MiaMaid and Teacher edition

Price is Right Game for youth – Beehive and Deacon edition

Price is Right game for youth: college edition

Featured Artist: Juma Chomba aka “I bought a piece of artwork from Tanzania!”

Tuesday, November 7, 2023Tuesday, November 7, 2023 by Sparkbark | Leave a comment

I know, I know . . . it sounds like a scam. But my son was a missionary in Tanzania for almost 3 years and this young artist, Juma Chomba, is someone he knew who is earning money on the side to likely pay for schooling. And I really loved the picture! It will arrive through a mutual friend who is traveling to the USA. Will it be slightly complicated? Yes. What if I never get it? Possibly that’ll happen, but not likely. I’ll post again once it’s arrived and framed but, in the meantime, reach out to Juma Chumba on Facebook Messenger if you’re interested in his other artwork. We used SendWave to complete the transaction securely.

What I Designed Today (way back in 2015): Pro Bono Funeral Program Layout and Social Media Icon/Logo Graphic Design

Monday, October 23, 2023Sunday, October 22, 2023 by Sparkbark | Leave a comment

What a tragic thing to have to highlight some of your best work. One of our son’s friends was killed in an ATV accident and I had to do something — so I did what I do best — created a logo in his honor and offered to do the funeral program. I was able to create the layout and donate the printing for the funeral program for the Bartlesville, Oklahoma service and provide a digital, print-ready funeral program for the service in St. George, Utah. This kid had THE BEST smile. I hope you’ll find these graphics inspiring.

The circle social media icon / logo above was made into stickers and used for social media profile pictures by Burk’s family and friends to honor him.

The program used in Bartlesville, Oklahoma was printed 4 over 1 (CMYK/Black) on house stock by a local printer (yes, again with Bartlesville Print Shop’s Shawn Roberts — simply the best!), and donated to the family in honor of Burk and his friendship with our son for his funeral. The version above was the print-ready copy for the St. George service that had a few different speakers and participants.

What I Designed Today (er, 2020): Digital Religious Stake Fasting and Prayer Invitation Graphics for Social Media

Sunday, October 22, 2023Tuesday, October 31, 2023 by Sparkbark | Leave a comment

⏰ One of the things it took me far too long to learn 🎓 is that 🔥 “done” is better than perfect 🔥 . . . except for maybe brain surgery and rocket science. If I could go back and redo this pro bono 2020 religious invitation for a special day of prayer and fasting (needed now even more than during the pandemic!) I would absolutely request higher-ups change the verbiage to “It consists of abstaining from . . .” but likely they requested it and I was preoccupied with my full-time humanitarian role. Does the message get across? ✅ Does it still bother me it wasn’t perfect? ✅ Can I live with that? ✅

Two prayer and fasting invitation options below that I had designed for the Bartlesville Oklahoma Stake of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) below.

Religious invitation for day of prayer and fasting during Covid 2020

What I designed today (November, actually) – it’s been a busy year!

Wednesday, January 3, 2018Saturday, August 15, 2020 by Sparkbark | Leave a comment

Most of you know I’m working full time for a “higher cause” this year and haven’t been doing much designing at all but was asked to put together some possibilities for a stake logo for church. Oklahoma City had designed one for their stake — story has it from a reliable source that the stake executive secretary just did it one day and it was quickly adopted — and it’s a great logo. The Bartlesville Oklahoma Stake, however, doesn’t lend itself to easily using an acronym for a logo. Pitfalls include derogatory connotations of letters similar to BOS, etc. ad nauseum. At any rate, one hasn’t been chosen so maybe they’ll pursue other options but here’s the contenders and a flyer that was created for a stake conference around the same time. Skills are rusty – it’s amazing what a year off from designing can do for that to happen! It took me twice as long as it should have to come up with these passable designs…

What I Designed Today: 2015 Bartlesville Oklahoma Stake Women’s Conference Invitations

Monday, July 13, 2015 by Sparkbark | 8 Comments

These invitations use some lovely artwork of a young woman in armor originally created by Judy Cooley. She graciously gave us permission to use them for our stake events (auxiliary conference and women’s conference) this year. I love the ENLISTED adaptation of her work. You can find more of her work if you search for Judy Cooley Deseret Book and Altus Fine Art.

I’m excited that the service project this year is collecting or creating slippers for women at the Claremore Safenet Shelter (for women who suffer from domestic abuse or sexual assault).

Quotes about the Holy Ghost

Tuesday, June 23, 2015Tuesday, June 23, 2015 by Sparkbark | Leave a comment

I had used these quotes a few years ago for a youth conference talk and I resurrected them (Ha! See what I did there?!) for a Relief Society lesson this past Sunday. Just thought I’d share them online, mostly so I don’t have to hunt them down on my hard drive if I ever want to use them again.

What I Designed Today: Stake Conference Invitation

Tuesday, May 12, 2015 by Sparkbark | 3 Comments

I designed this stake conference invitation for the first semiannual conference of the Bartlesville, Oklahoma Stake! So nice of the stake presidency to put out an official invitation like this. I hope it helps boost attendance and clarifies meeting times, attendance and info for all involved. I tried to make it match the ward mission plan and the stake mission plan that I had created earlier. I’d better watch out or the stake will have inadvertently created its own press kit and style guide soon! Kidding…

What I Designed Today (a few weeks ago): Put on The Armor of God for Stake Auxiliary Training

Thursday, April 23, 2015 by Sparkbark | Leave a comment

I used the floral artwork from lenlis at BigStock for the flowers and then added the “Put on the Armor of God” text and made a few changes to use for a themed presentation at auxiliary training. It was so cute, I left it up at home for a week after the event! I’m including pics of the wonderful cookies with labels and chocolate covered strawberries served. I don’t know if anybody else liked it but the strawberries alone were worth it for me!

What I Designed Today: 2015 Stake Mission Plan

Wednesday, April 1, 2015Wednesday, April 1, 2015 by Sparkbark | 1 Comment

The 2015 Ward Mission Plan was such a success, I got roped into creating a Stake Mission Plan. The text wasn’t as conducive to a great layout but I think it’s nice enough, anyway.

What I Designed Today: Armor of God Water Bottle Labels

Friday, February 20, 2015 by Sparkbark | 1 Comment

One of my most popular posts is a Jesus is the Living Water Bottle Labels here. I’m not sure I quite understand the craze of custom water bottle labels but they are kind of fun! Here’s an Armor of God water bottle label quoting parts of Ephesians 6:11-17. Just print, trim, wrap on the bottle and tape. Enjoy!

What I Designed Today…er, in late May: Article of Faith #4 for Ben’s Baptism Program

Thursday, January 15, 2015Thursday, January 15, 2015 by Sparkbark | 26 Comments

Ben’s baptism was a rushed one. We had a small crowd for our last baptism but it was beautiful. He is such a one-of-a-kind kid. He chose the 4th Article of Faith for his favorite “scripture” and so I quickly typed it up a little bit prettier than average for the program. I am offering it here as a FREE download for your personal and church use, should anyone be so inclined.

What I Designed Today…er, Last Month: 2015 Ward Mission Plan

Thursday, January 15, 2015Monday, January 13, 2025 by Sparkbark | 2 Comments

UPDATE: THIS POPULAR MISSION PLAN HAS A NEW, DOWNLOADABLE VERSION IN GOOGLE SLIDES. Because I used Adobe Creative Suite to make the original and most people don’t have access to the custom fonts or software, I created a user-friendly version for download. See the new post here.

I have projects to design pretty much every day. Unless something family, church or kid-related has taken over. But usually one or two projects is hanging over my head just waiting to be done. Right now, I’m procrastinating a cute little custom drawing for a local festival that works with kids. I have time to get to that yet today (that’s what I’m telling myself, anyway!) but I wanted to share this 2015 Ward Mission Plan that I drew up for our local church congregation. It was so easy — mostly because they provided me with perfect text. I mean absolutely-perfectly-clean-never-happened-before-especially-in-church-wonderful text. Hallelujah! Seriously, people, knowing exactly what you want to say before you send it to a designer is a gift. One design rule to follow: the more concise the text, the better. If only I could follow that for a blog post, right?! I know, I know, but this blog is my therapy therefore I can ramble and nobody has to read it. It’s a win-win.

Anyway, 2015 is the year where I will catch up on some online posts of what I’ve designed but, realistically, it will probably NOT be something I did just that day but in weeks, months and years past.