New Adventures: LambDesignGoods

 

 

After years of saying I wanted to, I've opened up an Etsy shop with a focus on digital downloadable designs. LambDesignGoods. Sometimes it takes us a while to get where we want to go ; )

With a few of my own Valentine's designs from recent holidays pretty much ready, it gave me the extra push. So I pulled them together over the last few weeks in time for this year's Valentine's Day. There is a handful of card options to purchase for digital download, but I'm hoping to expand my selection of other ideas and designs in the next few months. Stay tuned for more.

https://www.etsy.com/shop/lambdesigngoods

A-mazing Valentines

 

 

In honor of Valentine's day, I'm digging back to last year's cards to kick things off. L was heavily into mazes. He plowed through every book we gave him and then he asked me to make new ones by hand. Usually while we are out to eat. So when I saw this idea floating around the internet, I knew we found our project.

I created a heart shape in Illustrator and then repeated the shape inside it to build the maze channels. I placed it four up on a letter sized page each with a different path. To do so, I began cutting out openings and creating blocks with additional lines unique to each of the four.

I selected different shades of red, pink and orange paper to form the backdrop of the cards and to cut down on ink. Once all the cards were cut to quarter of a page, two slits were made with an X-acto to hold the pencils to the cards. I found some cool two-sided pencils at a local art shop, which I thought made it even more fun. 

These were fairly quick to make. The most time consuming part was creating the artwork for the cards at only about 1.5hr. Then copying and cutting only took another 1hr with the little guy's help. He was so excited to craft his Valentine's cards.

Color Palette: Koi

I loved the colors of the Koi at the Japanese Garden so much that I thought I'd try to paint them rather than just put a color palette together. I haven't been illustrating or painting enough, so this gives me the excuse to dust off my brushes and get the kinks out of my system.

Valentine's past

 

So...I've been a bit absent lately. I had hoped to kick off the new year with great gusto on the blog but here it is almost the end of February and here I am. I thought I'd catch up with some of my recent craft/design projects that have been keeping me busy and happy in my free time.

First off, Valentine's Day! You've got to love all the great ideas being pinned lately. My little guy has been running around retelling the "Orange you glad I didn't say banana again" knock knock joke for months. So this idea seemed to fit just great.  He also woke up one Saturday morning saying he wanted to make hearts for the treat bags. About 100+ hearts later we were good to go. That coupled with orange slices and a custom label and we had our valentine's set.

Wine Magic: A 60's guide to drinking

Magic in Your Glass: An Introduction to Wine, California Wine Advisory Board, 1966

It's seen better days, perhaps worn in from those testing out the information. It includes an introduction by Vincent Price. How could you not love that? Hand drawn textures and illustrations appear throughout....slightly wonky but full of personality. Text and charts are enhanced by the graphic layouts.

Color Palette: Higher Marks

How to Get Higher Marks in School by Harry Shefter, 1968

This color and type treatment caught my eye in a stack of dusty books...especially the two paragraphs of copy on the cover. Who does that anymore? The repeated outlined logo pattern on the back adds extra pop with teal against charcoal gray.

Vintage: Social Studies

Speeding Away, 1968

Love the illustration on the cover of this vintage Social Studies book.

Color Palette: Nautical Commute

Thanks to some really bad traffic, I ended up with this amazing route home on a sunny day. I really need to do this more often. It's hard not to be inspired by this view and fresh air. Oh yah, Go USA! It's Olympics time after all.

Color palette: Poppin poppies

I can never get over how vibrant poppies are. I got to see so many of them today on a walk through the neighborhood. Some of the flowers too saturated with color to even capture them realistically. Most of the red ones were almost fluorescent. These are two of my favorites. The vibrant oranges with their dark warm centers and the super delicate pinks that seem so fragile but yet hold themselves up proudly.

Color Palette: Evening Containers

The worn shades of the shipping containers blend to create a fabulous family of colors as seen from my bus window each evening.