Jul
Recent Logo Work
I wanted to share a couple of logos that I had the pleasure of working on recently.
Some friends of mine here in Jeffersonville, Vermont started a great Mexican Restaurant in the old Red Fox Alpine Lodge on Edwards Road in Jeffersonville. They asked me to create a logo for them and I have a soft spot in my heart for Mexican food, so I couldn’t say no! The food is absolutely delicious. Here is a link to the El Zorro Facebook page.
This is another logo I worked on recently. Peak View Eye Care is located in Vergennes, Vermont. They needed a new logo and I was happy to help them out. Look for their new sign the next time you drive through Vergennes!
Jun
Bear Stitches
BearStitches.com went live recently and I wanted to share this with you, not only because I designed the look and feel of this site and logo, but because this company is based here in Vermont and does VERY cool work. They are located in Newport, Vermont and they create hand-sewn products that make traveling easier. Just a few things that they carry are Nook and Kindle cases, Laptop cases, tote bags and phone and camera cases. They try upcycle as much as possible and they do that without compromising quality or beauty. Click here to check out some of their products!
Jun
Toddler Room Makeover
I wanted to makeover my daughters room since she is going to be turning 3 at the end of the summer. She is no longer a baby and is no longer in her toddler bed. After taking the crib/toddler bed out of her room it looked all wrong without the bedding being in there to tie things in. We had a great crib bedding set that was pink and brown with paisley. I loved it, but it was getting tired. It wasn’t as “babyish” as some other choices, but still needed updating.
The first thing I did was searched online for the right bedding at the right price. I found a fantastic set at Overstock.com for less than $65. I was looking for something that was NOT Disney characters and bubblegum. I wanted something that she could grow with and still love. This twin bedding set that I bought had a sham, comforter, sheets, pillowcase, dust ruffle AND a fleece blanket. I am very happy with it. It is a bit light weight, but kids don’t really need a lot of fluff on their beds. I know that my daughter throws her blankets off during the night if the comforter is too heavy. When this set was delivered I started brainstorming ways to tie in the artwork on the comforter with the other things going on in her room. She has 3 frames over her bed and 2 horizontal frames over the rocking chair and changing table that is now the baby and bear collection area. I desperately wanted to reuse these frames. I took the pillowcase to my computer and took a picture of the pattern and traced over it in Adobe Illustrator. I liked the ABC idea, which was something we had adapted for her other pink and brown crib bedding so I stuck with that same theme, but updated it with the pattern of the new bedding.
Hummingbirds have always been a thing I associate with my daughter. The summer I was pregnant with her I saw SO many more Hummingbirds than I have ever seen before. I looked up what Hummingbird meant to the Native American’s and I found out that it means “joy”. So fitting for my little girl. She is our precious joy. I incorporated Hummingbirds into the horizontal frame design. I used my Canon i860 photo printer and photo paper for printing the pieces. The horizontal frame was larger than 8.5×11, so I did that in 3 pieces and taped the backs together. I made sure that the colors were super close to the bedding. Yes, I am picky like that about color. My printer is luckily quite good at matching Pantones. I am amazed every time I use it how accurate it is.
I still have to put up a hummingbird watercolor that I painted a while ago. We just got it framed and it is still sitting on the floor. Hey, give me a break. At least I got it framed. It was unframed for 10 years (at least) before this month.
For someone who is NOT a Graphic Designer this same idea could be achieved by using scrapbook paper and cutting it down to work within the frames. You could even do the same ABC idea by printing out a stencil and cutting out the center of the letters over the pattern of your choice. I hope you enjoy!
Jan
School Desk Before and After shots
Well, It’s been a while since I have posted and I really have no excuse. I am working full time now at Terry Bicycles as their one and only graphic designer, so things have been quite busy. I love my job!
I wanted to show you the before and after pics of this fun desk Eric picked up this summer. We have it in our basement and it fits perfectly with the decor. Savannah likes eating lunch at it on occasion.
Aug
Arthur Singer Portfolio of Bird Prints
This is another find from Nana’s camp. I saw potential in these. Now I just need to find some nice frames to put them in. There is a set of 8 here and they were in the original folder. The folder says “Portfolio of Bird Prints Painted by Arthur Singer for American Home.” I looked these prints up on Ebay to see what people were selling them for and it really varies. They are on average $30 per print unframed. The framed ones are going for an average of $90 each. The copyright on the prints says 1977.
Arthur Singer was an amazing artist and illustrated more than 20 books. Read more about him here. I really like the composition and layout of his prints. The colors are very vivid and these prints in particular are in great shape.
Here are a few of my favorites from this collection.
I love this picture of Arthur Singer illustrating out in the field. It looks like he enjoyed getting up close and personal with his subjects.
Tags: Art, design, Illustration, Interior Design, vintage
Aug
DIY Scrabble Letter Coasters
When I was helping my grandmother clean out her camp I found 2 Scrabble games that were in rough shape, so she decided to give them away. I decided I would try doing something with the letters. I found a couple of examples online of other scrabble letter coasters, so I thought I would give it a try.
- I bought a ROLL OF CORK that is sold to use in the bottom of your kitchen drawers.
- I used HOT GLUE to glue down the pieces on the cork.
- An X-ACTO KNIFE to cut the cork.
- MOD PODGE to make everything stick together and give the coaster a finished look.
- HIGH GLOSS SPRAY to make the coaster water resistant.
It was a fun little project. Eric is always putting my glass in the dishwasher, when I intend to reuse it throughout the day, so hopefully this new coaster with my name will lay claim to my glass and save us some water!
Aug
Antique School Desk
My husband and I have been watching American Pickers quite a bit lately. It is such a great show! It has apparently been having an amazing influence on Eric! He spotted this desk on the roadside the other day. He came home and consulted me before picking it up. I had no idea it would be this cool OR this old. From what I have read this is a 1920′s school desk. It is in pretty rough shape, but we intend to paint it and fix it up for Savannah. As you can see she already loves it to pieces!
I searched around and found this same style desk selling on Ebay for $200. He seems to think his is from the 1940′s. However, this company has a similar desk that they are saying is circa 1920′s. Wikapedia says that the ballpoint pen was not invented until 1938 so children were most likely still using ink wells in school up until the early 1940′s. This will be a fun little project for Eric. I will let him join in the fun of showing you AFTER pics when he is finished.
Aug
DIY Wedding: Anniversary Edition
It has been 3 years since Eric and I tied the knot. Our official anniversary is the 19th, but I thought I would put together a little blog post about some of the DIY moments and graphic design pieces that went along with the wedding planning. We had a spectacular day for our wedding. It was almost a little chilly for August. I think I prayed so hard that it wouldn’t be too hot or rain, that I made it cold. I didn’t mind the chill in the air because we had an English Tea reception and hot tea was waiting for our guests after the ceremony. Our wedding was very unconventional. In all honesty it was to save money! We had our wedding on a Sunday. We got married at the Ye Olde England Inne in Stowe, Vermont. They have a perfect spot there to have a small reception and they even have a banquet hall in case of rain. It was very affordable and working with Chris and his staff was great. We had scones, tea, finger sandwiches and other assorted finger foods. I really didn’t miss the sit-down meal and I don’t believe my guests minded too much. We had music and “cake” from Mirabelle’s Cafe in Burlington, Vermont. They made us chocolate torte squares that are to DIE FOR! No cake?! I told you my wedding was unconventional! The little treats worked out great since we had a lot of other sweets there for the non-chocolate people.
I arranged all of my own flowers. I bought them wholesale and spent the days before the wedding trimming and arranging. This was a huge success for me. I didn’t know if I could pull it off, but it worked out so well, that I would encourage any bride to do her own flowers.
My Mother-in-Law, Sue Small of Sue Small Bridal made my dress and did alterations on my Sister-In-Law’s dress. I loved being able to work with her on exactly what I wanted and it was everything I could have hoped for.
All photos are courtesy of Closed Circle Photo. Kelly was amazing and was such a pleasure to work with.
I designed and printed all of the invitations and programs for the wedding.
I designed and printed all of my wedding paper at home using a photo printer
and special ordered paper from The Paper Mill Store.
I was so pleased with how my DIY bouquet came out.
I did loose leaf mint tea and chocolate biscotti for favors with a sticker
on the inside that said “mint to be together”.
The kids favors were purple and lime green jelly bellies.
My Dad made a cupcake stand for the chocolate torte squares.
I got these beautiful glass vases for free and spruced them up with ribbon and river rocks.
Unconventional guest book. I put all of the well wishes into a scrapbook after the wedding.
Our card box
An English Tea reception was perfect for this chilly August day.
Happy Anniversary to us and many more to come!
Aug
Back to School Small Byte: Easy Washable Labels
I can’t believe it’s already August! All of the recent back to school talk has inspired my post today.
When Savannah was an infant, I made her baby food (for another post) and sent it to daycare with her in little containers. The school fridge was a bit of a cluster, so I was sure to label everything VERY clearly with her name. My husband is the manager of a sporting good store that specializes in hockey equipment and one day I asked him to bring home some of that cute pink hockey tape I saw hanging behind the register. I figured that tape must hold up to getting wet really well and must be fairly durable. Little did I know it would become an EXCELLENT solution for labeling all of Savannah’s things! It goes through the dishwasher with no problem. Here is how I use it most:
Hockey tape comes in all different colors and can be found at sporting good stores. Labeling sticky suntan lotion is so much easier with this tape, label your kids shoes (put on the inside tongue), label tote bags and so much more!
Aug
Glider Before and After
This is a chair that was given to us after my Grandfather passed away. My Mother-In-Law, Sue Small reworked the cushions before Savannah was born because this chair went in the nursery. I painted this chair because it really doesn’t match anything in her room with the light wood and the finish on the arms is wearing off and has gotten sticky over the years. The task of painting this chair was overwhelming to me because of the all the moving parts and tough to reach areas on the bottom. I sanded, primed and spray painted it. I ended up deciding to spray paint after seeing that there were impossible areas to reach while I was priming. I think it came out great and I am only a little dizzy from the fumes. I wore a mask, but that stuff is pretty toxic no matter what you do! The good part about spray paint was that I was done in about 20 minutes. This is a chair that we will have for a while, so I am glad I was able to psych myself up to tackle it.
I have a love/hate relationship with the ottoman. It is a little tough to justify the space it takes up, but sometimes it is just nice to have something to put your feet up on.
