Nursery Trees

Trees for the animal room!

I alluded to the nursery design in my last blog entry.

Here are a series of photos depicting our before and after of the nursery wall with the trees.

Before we reveal the rest, I need to clean up a bit more and hang the curtains!  I also wish I had taken photos with some other device other than my iPhone - sorry for the graininess.

 PINK!

 BYE BYE PINK!

The color is rightfully named 'SQUIRREL' for our forest animal room!

 Nolan, happily cutting out some shapes!

Painter's tape goes up along with the shapes.

 It all gets painted white.

 

The RESULT!!!

Google Reader

Good morning.  My name is Camille and I am addicted to Google Reader.

I use Gmail for my email and I LOVE it.  Yes, I love my email!  I use the calendar and reader features to keep up with friends and family and I constantly recommend Gmail to EVERYONE. 

Google Calendars can be shared with other Gmail users; so currently I know the schedules of three of my closest friends, my husband, and possibly you – if you’d like to share your dentist appointments with me!

Beyond the calendar function, Google Reader has changed my life in the last year or so.  The reader is a page accessed when you’re logged into your Google account that lists your blogs, news and RSS feeds you subscribe to.  I constantly change my blog list – usually adding than subtracting blogs – to fit my current interests.  I love when friends recommend new blogs to read.  I have friends who have turned me onto design blogs, cooking blogs, wedding blogs, and NOW – baby blogs! 

Since getting my iPhone – I am even more dedicated to reading because I can access my  expanding list of new postings ANYWHERE!  I usually begin reading my list when I get on the train in the morning and usually browse through the listings as I check my email at work.  Harmless, right?  Before you answer the question, look at my list of subscriptions below.  I don't read every single post but it takes a while even to read their headlines because a third probably post more than once a day.

If you’re thinking of starting to use or adding to your Google Reader, here are my current subscriptions, categorized even! (Some blogs are listed twice b/c they fit more than one category)

Design (Home, Stationery, Decor)

Annette Tatum  

décor8  

Design*Sponge

How About Orange

Project Nursery

Oh So Beautiful Paper 

Ruffled

Queen of DIY 

Lovely Morning 

The Scoop 

Queen of DIY 
Jessica Hische 

Friends Blogs

Jax…Locked up abroad and Loving it! 

The Durtty Bride

The Roberts Family 

The Little Blogdorf
be good and you will be lonesome
Danielle Brown Fine Art

News

CNN 

Baby

LilLuxe

Lovely Morning

Project Nursery

Annette Tatum  

BabySteals 

The Durtty Bride

Being Pregnant

My Chicago Mommy

Weddings and Parties

Ruffled 

The Budget Savvy Bride 

The Durtty Bride

The Scocial Secretary 

Oh So Beautiful Paper 

Wedding Bee
From "I Will" to "I Do"  

Food/Cooking

Smitten Kitchen

For Fun

The Blogs at HowStuffWorks

Happy Reading!

When going to a Spain - ask your friend if she plans on moving while you're visiting!

What better friends could Jackie ask for but ones that fly 7+ hours to help her move!

While we were in Spain, Jackie moved from her familiar family in Haro to the city of Bilbao.  We took a bus for a few hours then a subway, much like the L in Chicago to reach her new home.  She was quite familiar to this new home as she lived in the same apartment in the same room nearly 5 years ealier when she studied abroad!

Bilbao was a great experience.  I was able to see how Jackie lived 5 years ago and know how her life has changed over the last few years to bring her back to the same place she spoke so fondly of.

We wasted no time getting in and aquainted with the public transportation and city itself.  While Jackie unpacked, Shorty napped (she loved the siesta!), Aubs and I went into downtown to look around (which I will feature in another post).


That afternoon we met up with Jackie's boyfriend, Sergio who graciously drove us North to the Bay of Biscay where we could hike to San Juan Gaztelugatxe.   If you have the opportunity to visit and hike this - DO IT!  Jackie was so inspired the first time she went, she decided it is where she'd like her ashes spread - so yes, when we're all old and wrinkled she wants us to do this hike and spread her ashes... hmmm?

Describing the hike just doesn't compare to the photos we took.

Above is the hiking path.  We parked high upon the hill because they only open the road to the base of the walkway when there is a special event going on, like a wedding.  So we hiked down the dirt path (in red) first to arrive at the road (in green) to eventually arrive at the stone walkway only to ascend 200+ steps to the church!  We picked a great time to hike - right at sunset!

Our initial descent.

 Smiling because we haven't really figured out how much further we still have.

 Finally to the stone walkway!

 We have a bit still to go...

 

Finally the church, if you look to the left of the photo under the awning, there is a white square.  Below is a bigger version of what it looks like.

I have been in school since being back from Europe, one of my classes is Digital Illustration where I used the church as my inspiration.  Below is my illustration.

We captured some spectacular sunset photos on our hike back - oh and remember we still had the reverse hike to do, down then back up.  I feel like I am mimicking a parent telling their child, "I had to walk to school up hill both ways!"  Well we really did go up hill BOTH ways!

Sunsets are my favorite!

And then because the sun was setting we had to watch out for these squishy suckers!

 

I still have the rest of Bilbao, San Sebatian, and Paris to deliver so, stay tuned!

Making our House a HOME - an update

So a while ago I had talked about how we've spruced up our place, creating little areas to work, relax and eat.  We got some fabric turned table cloth (thanks Kerrie) at IKEA, finally hung our plates to create a fun wall, and made our place fit us. 

If you remember my plate wall inspiration here, below you can see our end result that was official quite some time ago! 

Before you see our plate wall, you get to see what could have been - plants on the wall.  It started with sconces with clear jars that I planted succulents in. 

 

DOH!

 Then there was only ONE plant - I still haven't taken the other empty sconce down in hopes that I will fill it one day!?

Teamwork and some creative compromise proved to work in making our plate wall.

 We used masking tape to create a shape on the wall, then started to hang plates within our shape.

 Our end result 

We've even added a few plates since this photo - a lighthouse plate we got from my Great Aunt Pat when we visited Denver.


The wall that faces the plates was feeling a little bare so we put up our Chicago watercolor (a wedding gift from Nolan's parents) below our Didgeridoo (a wedding gift from Nolan's cousin).  Both reflect our home's fall color scheme!  Side note: I was pretty surprised that Nolan and my style meshed so well; when we started combining our stuff most of it turned out to be primarily brown, red, yellow, and orange! A sign?  I like to think so! 

Judge a book by its cover

Delightful Packaging – when was the last time you bought something because it looked good?

One of the things I love that influences my many purchases (call me your sucker consumer) is a product’s packaging.  WINE is a perfect example of this – their labels and names can make it or break it!

Before I give you the goods, add a fun veggie pun to this post: Veggie Inspired

Remember, if you’re the 10th comment, you receive a little present!  A veggie inspired set of greeting cards designed by yours truly!

So back to wine...WINE packaging completely persuades me to buy and DRINK their product!  Wine labels are my version of filling out a college basketball bracket based on the team colors and mascot. I've included a few examples.

 

Smoking Loon- I tried their Syrah

Fat Bastard Wine Company

Giant 47 Pound Rooster Pinot Noir

Mommy's Time Out Pinot Grigio! 

AWESOME NAME!

I found a couple websites that are fun to drool over too.  They include all sorts of packaging from crayons to milkshakes!

Lovely Packaging, a fun blog devoted to packaging a great source of inspiration.  They even include student work. 

The Die Line, a creative blog with many resources including a job board!

Design*Sponge included a great post today about how to design your own packaging.

Tool Kit is another source for small businesses.  They have some recommendations for packaging too.

 I would buy these items if I saw them in the store: 

Milkshake cartons

 

Crayon/Marker Box

Pain Pills!

Fabric embellishments for our home

 

Before I show you my completed projects I'd like to say there have been 6 comments on my last blog post – thank you to everyone who shared their great veggie inspired puns. The cards are currently being designed and remember the 10th person who comments will be getting a set of cards when they're printed! SO - GO COMMENT!

I’ve completed a few projects while Nolan’s been on the boat these last 2 weeks.

Below are a few photos so you can see the improvement the fun fabrics have made in our home.

Curtains to hide the storage wall

Before

After

The fabrics close up

TV Stand Dust Cover - just an "after"

We chose to cover the TV Stand to hide the ridiculous amount of dust it accumulates. This is an Ikea piece and its finish like much of their other furniture attracts dust. It is something to keep in mind when purchasing an Ikea product. We love it even more now with the Ikea fabric on it!

I have one more piece of fabric lying on the table waiting to be used. It will eventually be a tablecloth. Since I have a puzzle on the table, I have put this project on the back burner.

I have collected 5 more plates for our plate wall - that will be my next update if you're curious to see how it turned out! 

FYI – all of these items above have "no sew" hems – meaning I love fabric glue secured with iron heat!

Veggie Inspired!

You may think this is about eating healthy – WRONG!

 Fabulous Dish Towels from To Dry For

Today I want to get some reader/friend/family input – yes even from you who read and don’t comment!

Today I am inspired by eatable plants – mainly from my new favorite blog, Design*Sponge.  They include a couple posts a day that inspire apartment decor and design, stationary, city architecture, all delicious things that deter me from work!  Today they included dish towel designs, a LOVE I inherited from my mother who send me towels for most holidays – these towels are from To Dry For.

So what I need you for is this idea I’ve cooked up in my head!

I am going to design a fun collection of cards featuring your ever lovely vegetables; radishes, rutabagas, celery, carrots, beets, squash, etc.  I will be taking care of the illustrations if you can help me with the words!

If you think of a clever saying including a vegetable or a reference to vegetable (and fruit, I don’t discriminate) then I want it!

Need an example?

• Orange illustration – “ORANGE you glad I didn’t say Banana?”
• Grapes illustration – “Love you BUNCHES!”
• Celery illustration – “I’ll be your stalker.”  (Okay, so that’s not the greatest – this is why I need you!)

I will send the 10^th person to comment a free set of cards when they are printed – a potential Mother’s Day gift!!

Back to school.

We're going back to school. That’s right, both Nolan and I are heading back to the classroom to get learned.

The US Coast Guard accepted Nolan’s application last week for a merchant mariner’s license.  Meaning he’ll be traveling to Memphis, Tennessee to study at The River School for a series of tests that will result in his Steersman of Towing Vessels  - Western Rivers license, the first license in a series he’ll need before making Captain!  His classroom work will take place the week leading up to his tests, a total of four scheduled for May 6^th and 7^th.  The River School’s website says, “The River School focus[es] on providing individual rivermen with personal support in dealing with regulations, applications, and examinations.”

I too was accepted into school at the Illinois Institute of Art – Chicago.  My first of two classes was yesterday, Computers For the Arts, a computers based class focusing on software and programs used in future art classes.  Photoshop will be the primary program we’ll be tested on.  Other skills I hope to learn include web design and some HTML code which I am excited about.  So begins my first quarter back to school!  It only took about 10 minutes for my nervous butterflies to escape.

Meanwhile, I am in full swing of stationary design.  On my plate are two wedding invitation suites along with some Mother’s Day cards and Baby Announcements!  What a life I live while Nolan’s on the river!