onesie decoration

My friend since sophomore year English class, Laura, is due next month with a baby boy. Words cannot express how excited I am about this. New baby smell! New baby snuggles! I get to go home after a visit and sleep soundly through the night! It's really a win-win for me.

Laura's mom and four of her friends (including me) worked so hard to throw her the BEST. BABY. SHOWER. EVER. And it was! Truly. Delicious food, great people, amazing cake, and hard cider! Yum!

Inspired by this post (after googling "onesie decoration that doesn't suck") I convinced my fellow baby-shower-planners to let me set up a onesie decoration table. It was AMAZING. They turned out gorgeous! Everyone had fun!

This is Mary. You can tell she's having so much fun. She's also super ultra smart. 

This is Kim. You can tell how proud she is of this newt onesie. So very proud.

The process involved using peel and stick fabric fuse to turn quilting squares into stickers. I made stencil shapes in cardstock ahead of time - hearts, moons, animals, etc. - to help give people ideas and a starting point. To create the onesie you just trace a shape on the back of the fabric sticker, cut it out, and stick it on. It is really that easy. 

I also had fabric markers and lettering stencils for anyone who wanted to write a message or draw free-hand. By using a mix of colored and white onesies of varying sizes, we ended up with a very unique collection. 

It was so fun to plan this and have it executed exactly the way I envisioned. So many sweetly designed, homemade onesies that are beautiful to look at! 

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

greeting cards

Check out these empathy cards by Emily McDowell. She is a cancer survivor who was inspired to create cards with these spot-on messages. They are honest, funny, and sometimes heartbreaking. Perfect for anyone going through a very hard time.

They're beautiful and I adore the hand-made feel. You can buy them from her website and be sure to check out her other gorgeous items!

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

history of typography

Take 5 minutes and watch this video by Ben Barrett-Forrest. It is superb. Cut paper animation! The history of typography! What's not to love?

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

book signing

Last night I got a chance to meet Gabrielle Blair (Design Mom) at her book signing in Boston. I've never had a book signed before and I wasn't really clear on the point of it but I'm so very glad that I went. 

I enjoyed hearing Gabby and Christine Koh (Boston Mamas) do a Q&A - we got to hear a few behind-the-scenes anecdotes about the book writing process. And when it came time for the signing I was thrilled to have a chance to talk to Gabby.

She is just as delightfully warm in person as she is online. It was a great experience! (Special thanks to Laura L who insisted on taking a photo!)

If you don't already have it, you should buy her book!

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

framing

I was so inspired by Design Mom recently. I took photographs of some of my artwork and got two pieces beautifully framed at Framebridge.

They turned out so perfectly, I am kicking myself that it took me this long! Do you have things lying around that you would like to frame? Do it! They will help you mail in original artwork or work with photographs to get a beautiful, professional, finished look.

And a hand-written thank you note. Amazing!

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

logo design in 15 minutes

This guy. Come on! If you have 15 minutes and you want a peek into logo design, watch this video.



In his interview with lynda.com designer Aaron Draplin describes his process for exploring a new logo design. He's insightful and inspirational.

Enjoy!

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

cookie cutters

You. Guys. There's a shop on Etsy that sells cookie cutters. Amazing cookie cutters. Letters in different fonts!

Buy them for the type-lovers in your life. (cough cough, hint hint)

Aren't they amazing? I'm sure you love them as much as I do.

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

jack-o-lanterns

Happy Halloween!

I'm sure I'm not alone in celebrating that this pumpkin-carving chore comes only once a year. It's fun but I'm happy to be done until next time!

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

new website

Hooray! It's done!

I rolled out the new website design last week and so far it has gone very smoothly. Take a look and let me know what you think.

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

website overhaul

Big News! 

I am working on a very exciting project. A long-overdue website overhaul! Hooray! 

The good part is that I'm really excited about it. It's going to be mobile and tablet-ready and gorgeous. 

The bad part is the blog. I am unsure if I will be able to bring content over from this blog to the new site. This makes me sad (but not sad enough to be a dealbreaker). I will see if I can find a solution. Otherwise, I will start again with a clean slate on the new site.

Keep your eyes on www.leafprintdesign.com! It's going to look so fabulous.

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

Mandela sculpture

This is a sculpture by Marco Cianfanelli of Johannesburg. My dad sent this link to me. The photos below are from the site.

South African artist Marco Cianfanelli has constructed a monument to recognize the 50 year anniversary of peace activist and politician Nelson Mandela's capture by the apartheid police in 1962. Mandela's profile spans 50 steel columns measuring 21.32 and 29.52 feet (6.5 and 9 meters) high, each anchored to the concrete-covered ground. The shape and form of the sculpture are representative of the leader's 27 years behind bars for his efforts to bring equal rights and governmental representation to the once racially divided nation. The statue of the nobel prize winner has been erected in Howick, a town located 56 miles (90 kilometers) south from the city of Durban in the countryside of the southernmost African country.

Unbelievable!! I am blown away.

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

baby colors

Did you know that Pantone published a book for babies about color? So brilliant! It is blatant self-promotion but it's executed so beautifully.

Lovely illustrations and (of course) colors. Well done!

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

comfort

What is more comforting than a chocolate chip cookie?

I know this is a design blog but hear me out. I'm kind of an expert in chocolate chip cookies. They are my go-to treat for parties, gifts, and general consumption. My life changed when I saw a design mom post on the nuance of the chocolate chip cookie. Adding extra flour has made my usually flat (but extremely tasty) cookies into little works of perfection. I exaggerate but yesterday was cookie baking day (for teacher presents and santa, of course) and they turned out so beautifully. All thanks to a shift in the brown-white sugar ratio and a little extra flour. Perfection.

Also of note, my oven (in my new house which I love!) has a cancel button next to the timer button. More than once I pressed it to turn off the timer and, in fact, turned off the oven. Not that easy to bake cookies when the oven's off. Especially if you don't know it. Suffice it to say an emergency trip to get more butter and chocolate chips and extra hours into the night to work on batch #2 is what really made this endeavor a success.

Please remind me next year that gift cards are the way to go. Except for Santa. He needs chocolate-based fuel for the long night.

Happy Holidays everyone!

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

skeuomorphism

I just read a great article on Slate about the debate at Apple over skeuomorphism (Steve Jobs was a big fan, so was Scott Forstall who was recently let go). 

Who knew there was a word for this - skeuomorphic design is interface design that references elements in an older device that were necessary for that device to work. There are many Apple designed apps that use this technique. Some more successfully than others. 

For example, I greatly prefer the calculator design by Apple (on the right is Microsoft's stripped-down version). Am I comforted by the illusion of 3D buttons? 

The problem with replicating older objects in modern UI design is that things can quickly get hokey. I'm not a big fan of the tape-deck imagery on the podcast app. It seems outdated and unnecessary. 

What I'm getting at is this... design is hard.

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

elegant pumpkin

Before I miss October all-together, I wanted to say Happy Halloween!

This image is (of course) from Martha Stewart. Like you even had to ask.

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flash cards

For the design-nerd in your life. Enjoy!

I saw these on Design Mom.  They were illustrated by Emma Cook of Behance. So fun!

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

sweater weather

So I may or may not be currently homeless. Remember those posts about good and bad real estate photos? Well, we're still in the hunt. All this to say, I'm essentially living out of a suitcase and I can't find my sweatshirts. Also, it's September.

What is a typography nerd to do when it gets cold and she's hoodie-less? Design her own on cafe press of course!

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

travels

I know. It's been a month. What can I say? I'm busy. Like everyone else in the world. Happily, I was busy going on adventures! OK, one adventure. But still. Fun!

My husband and I went away for 4 days alone together to San Francisco and to a wedding in Cloverdale. California is awesome! I have developed such a crush on San Francisco in particular. I adore the cool weather, the environmental activism, the gay-friendliness, and did I mention the weather? If you're cool and you need to escape the fog just go 5 minutes out of the city and boom. Sunny, warm, and dry. It's almost unfair.

Anyway, here are some instagram photos from the trip. Enjoy!!

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photographic memory

Prepare yourself to be amazed. This artist, Stephen Wiltshire, is autistic and can draw city skylines after taking one helicopter tour! Unbelievable, right?! These photos show him working on the New York City skyline.

I have seen this pop up on facebook recently but the article I found was from 2009. He has done this with Tokyo, Rome, and Hong Kong. I am seriously in awe!

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.

heaven

You guys, it's that time of year again. I am leaving tomorrow to spend a week in heaven. I am a truly lucky woman.

See you in August!

If you need a creative designer to improve your graphic identity, contact me for a consultation.