A little something to top off a gift....

I am attending my girlfriend's son's 4th birthday this weekend at the local fire department.  A firetruck party!  Fun!  I guess they are going to have a firetruck pinata, and the kids get to tour the department and meet some firemen.

She is doing favors that are frames for the kids to decorate.  In her thank you note to the kids, she is going to enclose a picture of the kids from the party to put in the frame.  Cute!

So.... I knew she needed a thank you note that was big enough to house the 4x6 photo, so I designed a little something and whipped it up for her.

I don't typically do single layer cards, but I didn't have time or materials to do what I wanted that way.  So, I used my favorite program (photoshop!) and just did something simple.  Oh, and this was a fun way to make it cute - I added a colored border on the edge.

I designed and printed a custom return logo on the back of the envelopes, as well!

I think it will do the trick and fit the theme appropriately!

Pierson's Birthday Passport Invitation

If you know me, you know I have been planning Pierson's 2nd birthday since before his 1st birthday party!  I have a huge, HUGE list of things to do for the party, but I thought I would start by posting one of my favorite parts of parties - the INVITATION!  It sets the tone for the party, and I think a GOOD solid and unique invitation is so important! ;-)

We are doing a transportation themed birthday party because Pierson seems to be just as equally into cars as he is trains and planes!

Here is the cover of the passport.  Its a custom passport for each child to come to Pierson's Transportation Party!  I just fell in love with this color scheme!

The little retro car in green has embossed wheels that feel bumpy to add dimension.

Here is the whole set.  I explain details below!

Below is the inside of the front cover.  The actual passport.  Each was personalized with the guest's name and their birthday was in the coding at the bottom line of the passport, like a real passport!  I included a photo of the child(ren) that were invited.  There are some hidden symbolisms on the page, too.... like the passport number is 2- 1 30 2008 (2 for Pierson's birthday age, 1 30 2008 is his real birthday), etc...

I will use the little passport logo throughout the party.

Here are 2 views at the very inside with the details of the party.  On the vehicle logos it says "FLY, SAIL, RIDE or DRIVE" to.... etc

I also have a custom map that has a legend with all the vehicles.  I put the train where our local train station is, the airport where that is, and a boat near a lake.  Then I put a 2 logo where the party is and a car on the street where the party is.  I am assuming everyone will be coming by car ;-).

Notice below how the passport is bound.  I SEWED the pages on my sewing machine!  I loved doing it!  So fun! Orange, too... can't beat that color!

Here is a view of the very back cover.  I really didn't have any information to put on this page, so I just made a little RSVP logo!

Here is a look at the passport with the envelope.  I designed a little return address logo for Pierson as well with an adorable little retro car in the center.  I also put a lineup of vehicles on the front.  I like the varied colors on the to address lines.

This shot includes the custom lining that I used on the envelopes.  Pierson's name scattered with fun icons of vehicles and a muted light blue polka dot background.

A closer look at the custom return address seal:

Below is the whole set including part of the favor that I finished.

I made custom luggage tags for part of the party favor for the children.  The front incorporates the lineup of vehicles and the back has their mommy's name and phone number.  I LOVE luggage tags for kids!  I put them on Pierson and Jeffrey's school bags, lunch bags, gym bags.  Such a great way to personalize the favor and in a REUSABLE way!

The favors are in process of being wrapped and personalized, so you will be seeing photos of the whole scheme soon!

Here is another photo of the luggage tags.  I had them laminated with really thick coated laminate so that they are study and can take the wear and tear!

You can see the luggage tag back details here:

That's it for now!  Here is a subset of the batch I created!  What a blast this was.

Some Firsts

I had NEVER used Photoshop to edit photos, let alone create layouts for cards.  I have lots of experience doing cards and invitations using real materials, and typically don't like "one layered/boring cards" but thought I'd switch it up this holiday season.

A great friend of mine, Lori, asked me to take her family's photographs for their Christmas card this year.  I happily accepted and here is a glimpse of what came from the day.

I'll post some of the individual photos later (I'm at my parents house in Michigan)... here is the card I created from the photography session:

THEN, I attempted to take my OWN photos for our Christmas card.  Pierson was not the best behaved, but I was able to get a few cute ones.  Then, I designed a photo card using my favorite pattern.... houndstooth!

Here are some more shots from the day...

Amazing Interior Designer and Adorable Room!

Ashley Whittaker is an amazing interior designer that I had the pleasure of working with on a piece for a little boy's room in the upper east side of NYC.

The room is red/white/blue and totally patriotic!  Check out the artwork that I did for the room.  My signature paint chip art in the design of the American Flag.  Since I did this piece, I have had a few other requests for this piece of art by people who saw Ashley featured in House Beautiful Magazine.

Ashley's website is:
http://www.ashleywhittakerdesign.com/

Her work is so inspiring and I really enjoyed working on this project!

This pic is taken from her website.  I hope that is okay!

Amy's Baby Shower Unfolded

So finally, I get to post details and pics of Amy's fun girlie baby shower!  I had so much fun from start to finish with this one!  Green and Pink was our theme...

We'll start with the sweet stuff.  I made homemade sugar cookies (my mom's irresistible recipe) and frosted them green and pink. Bibs and baby carriages.

I then packaged them 2 per cello bag and tied them shut with pink and green paper raffia.  I also added a tag, but not just ANY tag.  I made hard laminated luggage tags for each guest.  So fun!

"Silverware" was pink, napkins green.....

Red Pink velvet cupcakes with pink and green M&Ms adorning the puff of cream cheese frosting.

I even made a "pregnant" cupcake for the guest of honor, Amy!

Its mum time of year, so I cut fresh pink mums and put them in several vases on each table.  They lined up perfectly along the wrapping paper runner (green and white houndstooth (my signature OBSESSION pattern))

One of the games was guess the number of (pink and green, of course) jelly beans in the baby bottle.  We had funny guesses - like 100, and 500 ;-)  500 jelly beans would have to be pretty mini to fit into that bottle!

A couple other games were played, too:

1) Baby Price is Right (Guess the cost of each baby item without going "over")

2) Baby Animal Name Game (match the baby animal name to the mama animal)

3) Yarn around the belly estimate (cut a piece of yarn  to the length that would fit around Amy)

Here were our prizes (7 prizes given out for the games):  Its a pyrex glass oval dish that has little embossed polka dots around the edge.

Here were some of the fabulous guests.  These are Amy's neighbor friends:

Here is Amy's family (mom, mother in law, sister in law and niece... and Amy at the center of it all!)

Here are some of Amy's fabulous friends!

I didn't take pictures of the food, but you can see on each guests plate in the pic what the course looked like.  We had chicken crescents, mandarin orange almond salad and homemade cranberry sauce.  Pink lemonade punch, wine, etc... oh, and appetizers that were cheesy artichoke quiche.

It was SO sweet! ;-)

Amy's Baby Shower Invitation

I had SO much fun doing this invitation.  I could not wait until Amy's 18 week checkup so we could find out if I was going to be throwing a blue and red shower, or a pink and green one.... SO excited to hear that its pink and green this go-round!

After I heard the news that its "pink", I darted to Hobby Lobby to get some ideas for the invitation.  I knew I wanted a diaper pocket invitation.  This is what I came up with.  (Alissa helped do wording because I could not get my writer's block to loosen up! Thanks, Alissa!)

The colors are hard to tell for some reason, but the pink is a bright pinkish (not Pepto Bismol)/ more raspberry pinkish color and the green is a limey green.

I created the diaper pocket, then created an insert for the invitation details that has "lace" trim around the legs of the "diaper".  The wording pulls out and the diaper is nicely secured shut with the green and white gingham diaper pin.

The invitation envelopes have a fun polkadot border around the invite name.

Stay tuned for the complete shower get-up! (Oct 18th!)

I'm already bad at this...

I am already behind on posting, but thought I'd do one quick before bedtime!

I'll change it up a bit.  I'm going to post a piece of art that I did recently.  I have an obsession with children's "things".... everything from their clothes to their rooms, playrooms, etc etc.

I did this little monkey for Jeffrey and Pierson's bathroom.  They love it!  I also did one for Kristin's lil boy, Jude.... similar styles, different colors.

FUN!