Thursday, March 22, 2007

Untitled


Good morning all! I was so excited last night. I was watching "Bones" which is a favorite TV show of ours and the "victim" in the show had Nail Patella Sydrome (otherwise known as Fong Disease). They discussed it a bit on the show and my husband and I looked at each other in amazement because that's the affliction I have (as do other members of my family). It's very little known to the public and occurs 2.2 of every 100,000 people. You can learn more about it here. Anyway, it was a "wow" factor to actually see it on television since most people have never heard of it. Kind of cool. (in its own way) I'm enjoying working in my newly clean office. Now, I'm inspired to tackle my part of the bedroom where I've managed to pile clothes, magazines, books, and doodads. Time to pick up! The image posted today is of a cool pen cup that used to be my Grandfather's (Bumpa). He died around 17 years ago and my parents took in his desk. This cup was in it and contained old elastic bands, a compass (the kind you use in geometry), a magnifying glass, old pens, a rubber thumb, and some other odds and ends. I have since taken the cup and it sits on my desk now. I still have the original compass and magnifying glass in the cup. There are still the little odds & ends at the bottom as well. I like mixing in my current collection with his; it feels like family. And the cup has a great vintage look to it that has a lot of character on my desk. Have a great day everyone!

Wednesday, March 21, 2007

Spring



Happy first day of Spring! It's still very snowy here, but I'm thinking springy thoughts. I cleaned out my office today since I had piles of things everywhere and it became too unmanageable. It's back to "working" state now and I'm happy! I bought some fabric from Purl Soho and put it behind my computer screen/desk for a shot of color and interest without having to paint. It's bright and cheery and just what I needed. I hope you all have a fabulous start to spring. New beginnings are on the way!

Monday, March 19, 2007

Spring? I think not.



Last week we had this amazing day where it was 70 degrees. Here in New England, in March, that is very rare. It was so exciting! The next thing you know, 2 or 3 days later, we are buried in the most snow we've had all winter. I don't have photos of beautiful spring growth to share (like everyone else seems to have on their blogs lately). I have piles of snow mounded everywhere. No budding plants. No warm breezes. I'm so jealous of the people who have bits of plant growth to photograph. That won't likely happen around here for another month or so. It will come soon enough I suppose. The up side is that daylight savings has given us longer evenings now; I feel so much more alert when it's like this! Not much new going on here. Yesterday we organized our pantry...it had looked like a bomb went off in it. After watching some Style network home shows we got inspired and off to "The Container Store" we went. We got a great "over the door" storage unit for our pantry door that freed up a lot of space. A few hours later, we had reorganized our pantry AND went through our old crappy "Glad" containers that needed to finally get thrown out. You know...the pile of containers and lids that spill out of the cabinet and you go crazy trying to find the matching lid when you need it... Well, we went through and fixed the problem. With our new pantry space, we put the lids on the nice food storage containers we wanted to keep, and stacked them all on the bottom shelf so we can see them all and never struggle with lids again. If this is the biggest triumph of my week, I'll still be satisfied. I'm now off to tackle some work...I'm designing a wedding invitation, a baby shower invitation (with matching thank -you cards), and some other projects. Have a great day!

Monday, March 12, 2007

One Year!





Hello everyone!
I've officially been freelancing/working for myself for a year now. The time has flown by! I've loved every second of it. I'm much more relaxed in my life now and I don't have that tight/angry feeling in my chest I used to have when I worked my 8:30-5:30 job. My goals have been evolving over the year and I'm feverishly working on wedding invitation designs and birth announcement designs for the new "launch" of my business. I'm doing a few different projects for clients right now that will serve as great portfolio items to show my design styles and capabilities. I'm having so much fun! On another note, I have attached a photo in this post of a blank wall in the upstairs of our house. It's a huge wall and it's screaming for some design action. But I have so many thoughts that they are running together. I'm overwhelmed! I'd love ideas if anyone has them for this wall. The aesthetic I'm going for is transitional...I'm open to something "different" and I'm trying to avoid just hanging a bunch of photos there. Some ideas I've thought of are using wall decals, a big giant painting, a "mosaic" of small photos, one huge photo, blown up and tiled...see what I mean? But the wall is so big that I feel like one idea won't fill the space well. An ongoing battle I think. I feel defeated before even beginning. I've also attached a pic or two of part of my design studio space where I keep some books and inspiration . I like eye candy. I have some decorating work to do in the office, but I'm gathering ideas. Slowly but surely. I hope everyone is well and has a great week ahead! I'd like to start posting more frequently...but I can't make promises (as I've learned.) Be well!

Friday, March 09, 2007

Rolling along...

I just got word from NA Graphics out in Colorado that they can replace my 3 rollers, give me all new trucks, and send everything out soon. Yay! I guess the rollers will take around 3 weeks to get; and I'm grateful to be getting them. I will be using rubber rollers this time around on my press instead of composition. Supposedly they will be much more consistent and easier to work with. (Thank GOD!) It also turns out that my roller trucks were off from each other in diameter, so that was leading to inconsistent ink distribution as well. I feel like starting from scratch with new rollers and trucks will really help me out in the long run. I'm so excited to sort of start over again the right way for how I work. Plus, since the basement is chillier, the rubber rollers won't constrict so much and cause me trouble. The down side to all this is the expense. If you haven't seen the 80's movie "The Money Pit" yet, I highly recommend it. It's hysterical. And it really encapsulates how I've been feeling with my letterpress stuff. I know it will get better and I will stop hemhorraging money to it. Eventually. Been working on lots of wedding invitation designs and birth announcement designs and am excited to debut them. I'm also working on a new website design for Megan creates. All will be shown in due time. My goal? To have things up and going in by June. Hopefully sooner than that. I guess we'll see. Have a great weekend everyone!!! Hopefully it will be above zero degrees this weekend around here so we can actually go outside without having the lungs freeze up. Last, but not least...my cousin found out she is having a boy!!!! It's the first child of my generation on that side of our family and we are all so excited. I'm sending good thoughts and prayers each day to her. Now, I need to come up with some cool baby shower designs for her! Be well everyone!

Monday, March 05, 2007

Polaroid love




Hi everyone! I'm back in action working at home again. This month I am designing concepts for a wedding, an adoption family album, a birth announcement, and a baby shower/thank you notes set. All of these are the most fun kinds of design and I'm excited to get started! I've decided to spin my business more in this direction (and still offer corporate design too). I'm thrilled about the future! I tried to do some letterpress work this past weekend and it just won't work right now. One of my freakin' rollers melted (long story) so I have to try and order all new rollers. ARG. I will order rubber rollers this time and hope that they are consistent and work. Letterpressing has been very frustrating for me so far. But, when it worked (however briefly) I loved it. I just have to keep at it and know that it will work out for me soon. My parents visited me recently and Dad brought me his Polaroid Land Camera (230). He got it when he was in Vietnam for the war; from a general store for the soldiers. He says a guy called Smitty helped him get it going. I love that. Circa 1968-1969. The battery (probably close to original) is corroded inside the chamber so I have to try and clean it up and then locate a new kind of battery to use. I'm excited to get it going and I hope it works. I'll post on it, of course, once I know and I'll be sure to show the photos. This weekend I actually didn't work. My friend Sue came to visit and the three of us went snow-tubing at Nashoba Ski area in our town. It was so fun; as it was my first time. As a child I always used a plastic rectangular sled on our hill at my parents' house. On occasion I'd go with a friend to some "extreme" hilly golf courses and sled there too. But those were more like cliffs; so I called it "extreme sledding." The snow tubing park had very particular lanes and the hill was long and high compared to what I was used to. I about had a heart attack on the first run since it was so icy and fast. Once I got used to the speed I had a blast. We're definitely going back! As the time went by, the slope started getting a bit melted from the balmy 48 degree weather so the sledding got a bit slower. We're looking forward to it getting a little colder outside so we can go back and have prime speed. :)