Choosing a way to go

Greetings. It has been so long from my last post. I had vacation, then family, then some advertising to set up along with recreating my site due to my html editor crashing. Thank you for being patient with me and know that I am back now for more regularly scheduled postings.

Here is an article that I am working on.

Choosing a Designer for your Invitations-Custom Design or from Templates

With any special event or celebration, after making the decision to have it, comes letting everyone know about it.
The most common and effective way to achieve a large response is by sending out your invitations.
Where to begin can be very taxing along with many other decisions to make in order for the event go your way and be perfect.
Choices for creative and attractive invitations are in abundance and can be quite overwhelming. There are the quick "do-it-yourself" programs and websites. They are very useful and as they say, easy and quick.
There are the Card companies that provide templates for you to choose from.
Then there are your select companies that will design the invitations to your liking.

Let's look closer at your choices.
When you want to use the computer home programs available, you should be sure of the templates that are provided in this program. You may be a bit limited by what editing can be done. There again is the frustration involved in trying to achieve this task on your own. If you choose this way of designing your own invitations, use every help method available to speed up the process and make your time more efficient. If you enjoy the thought of designing it all yourself, this is a great way to do it.

One deciding factor as to what approach to take for your invitations is if you want a more traditional style. This style can be provided by most card vendors and it is easy to process. These usually are your text with the ceremony information with a mention of a reception to follow. This style has been the tried and true for many weddings and other formal events. If this is your choice of style, then get with your local card company or a website that will have this selection available.

When you are at a point to where you have decided to use a graphic designer to design your invitations, the possibilities can range from simple, elegant, fun, expressive, retro, and other themes and styles that may not be available through the before mentioned approaches. Your designer will use whatever information you provide, to design a very personalized and custom-made invitation that suits your every wish. Having it done this way allows for you to talk with the designer about your ideas, what you do or don’t want the invitation to look like and more specifics on colors, styles, and size. When choosing a designer, you will also have to consider the printing of the cards. Some have a printing company they use on a regular basis, some will refer you to a printing house and some will do all of the leg work for you including stuffing and mailing.

All of these factors will be best decided upon while in a very relaxed and non rushed state of being. Take your time and either do your own homework or allow a family, friend or event planner to take on this task to alleviate some of your worries. When the day comes for your celebration, the preparation process would have been a nice memory but nothing in comparison to the beauty of the event.


Thanks for any advice or suggestions you may have on this article or any other ideas for me to post about.

There requires alot of research on my part to keep up with the current styles or design, different approaches, new color schemes and so on. I come across numerous web sites and businesses in the local area that choose to stay very plain with logo designs or the layout of a site. I appreciate a creative "plain" but some are just painfully plain and nondescriptive in their design.
Something so simple as using all lower cases or periods to separate words and other remedies http://www.listrak.com/clickzwebsitewhitepaper that can easily and inexpensively set them apart from the mundane of the typical Arial typeset can bring more attention to their business.
Understandably, some customers want the no fuss no muss but at that point why not design it themselves and save money in doing so. That is what everything in life tends to come down to is the money involved. I find myself majorly undercutting the going rate for design work to get more word of mouth going and making more contacts. This is not always the case but it does help sometimes when wanting to keep a good client.
This time of year there are weddings, graduations, vacations and so much to do outside that I am excited for the beautiful and long days here. My daugter likes her "pool" so we are outside alot of the day while she plays and I read. I will not leave her unattended at all so I look forward in the evening to getting back to work and checking in with everyone.
For any regular readers, thank you for being so and sorry that it has been so long since my last post. lisa

What else?

I say bring it on. I have gotten pretty busy these past few weeks with work and personal life. My 4 year old decided that it was time to get her ears pierced. I was a basket of nerves until she actually went through with it. My stomach is sick from so much mother pride right now. They grow so quickly.
Next year she will officially be a member of society with beginning her first year of structured schooling. We haven't decided on public or private schools yet. I like private for the uniforms and smaller classes but that is all that I know about them. How do I compare curriculums with being ignorant to either? With private there is tuition and taxes and with public just the taxes. School supplies are quite scary. I know folks that end up paying around $200 just at http://www.walmart.com/ for supplies then there are book fees, etc. Good gracious alive. I know when I was in school, supplies were a few folders, a pack of pencils and pens, erasers and notebook paper. The rich kids had the big http://www.officeworld.com/ Mead folders and such. Backpacks? My stuff was carried in these massive arms of mine and I was lucky to have a pencil holder. If not, my ear was always available. Anyway, we are very excited for her and it is so cute to see her little ears with those pretty little flower starter earrings.
As for work, all has been awesome as usual. Networking and doing cold calls still seem to be the way for me to make contacts and possible clients. I have completed my yearly volunteer campaign with http://blondechampagne.blogspot.com/ It has been an awesome proces and all go to buy something at the Cafe Press http://www.cafepress.com/blondechampagne

I have received good responses from some cold calls that I did. Thanks again Joan for contacting me at Ithaca Press http://www.ithacapress.com/ and a few other inquiries. Keep 'em coming.

My thoughts lately about design have been about using typography as the main focus for the design. I really enjoy working with logos and other designs with the challenge of typography as the only element to work with. I have noticed with some projects that being able to add a simple straight line can TOTALLY change the dimensions, look and specs of it. The process may seem very simple but the things that have to be considered is mind blowing at times. Consider http://desktoppub.about.com/od/logos/ss/logobasics.htm this article about shapes and such.

"Be aware of what the shape of lines can convey. Sharp edges could indicate tension, crispness, hardness, formality, or high tech. Soft edges and curves may be softer, flowing, more casual, or more personal.Even small changes in line thickness, endings, or shape changes can alter the look and feel of a design. "

Like I said there are many things to consider about the simplicity of a logo. With just the typography and one line to work with, the possibilities are numerous.

Thanks again for reading and please send your comments anytime.

Mother's Day

So many things are out there about Mother's Day. I have my own mothers so I of course make them their own card according to their personalities. I love doing this and it brings them so much joy also to see the time and thought taken to make them. Remember when you were a kid and made mom the cards in school? I poured my heart into those things as I still do but hopefully now they look ALOT BETTER.

The Unit

I got to see the show called "The Unit" tonight. From what I understand, one of the advisors for the show wrote a book or two about The Delta Force. Serious stuff.
Today is my anniversary. I am married to an amazing and supportive man. I can stay home with our little girl and do work that I so much love to do.
I have gotten some good reviews on my blog from family and friends. http://chumneyvisualdesigns.blogspot.com/ If you feel the same, even if not, go ahead and leave me a comment and pass on my blog to folks that you know.
Business is a bit slow right now but no matter how much work there is to do, I just love whatever challenges are given to me.
There are many aspects to designing. An interior designer has to consider so many things that a graphic designer, engineer, or commerical designer may not have to. A graphic designer has much more computer concerns to deal with whereas the interior designer has to consider more 3 dimension elements and how the items come together and http://www.waverly.com/ what spaces are left to fill. The graphic designer client can be more elusive as to what they are considering as a final product. The interior design client can help in that they can say where they want something placed in a space, or whether this item or that will be part of the room. I also feel that our challenges do parallel in some ways. We consider colors, shapes, item placement, relativity to other elements involved, and the final outcome of course. All in all, the client has the final work on the product and it is our duty, since they did hire us, to give them exactly what they want. I have learned that it isn't wise to try and sway the clients ideas. It is wiser to listen carefully and make a professional assesment of what the client is trying to convey.
It is a great reward for me to have a client say that they received exactly what they wanted in the design. It is also wise to realize that after a few consults and edits, if it is not coming toghether the way the client wants, I advise them that it may help to describe it a different way or allow me to put toghether 3 or 4 mockups and see if any of these resemble their idea. The goal is to have a happy person on the receiving end of giving http://1stholistic.com/Prayer/A2004/hol_giving-and-receiving.htm .
Take care and I do hope that you won't be shy in giving me a comment on my blog site or this specific blog.

Mine, all mine

I just came across a blog of a lovely young lady and her beautifully large family. She has 8 children all from the same man that she is still married to. How great is that. Not knocking other people that don't fit this scenerio but it great to see that some traditions still exist in the US.
This is the latest design that I have been working on for http://blondechampagne.blogspot.com/ The writer of the blog is a great girl. Her writing is fun and full of witty sarcasm. Check her out.
My days have been full lately with hotel cost comparison for my overseas business trip, gym visits, entertaining my daughter and other research attempts on various issues including freelance jobs.
With being a freelancer for hire, it can be very difficult to find business that will trust work that comes from a small design company. We are certainly as capable as any employee with any large design house we just avoid the hassels of commuting, daycare, getting to daycare on time! and other hassels of working away from the house. We are just, if not MORE committed to our work since it is MINE, not someone elses, business. It makes every customer that much more valuable and precious to us. Keeping it short tonight. More to do before the weary can sleep.

Precious Moments

Ok, I have to be sappy for a little while and I will add in my designer mind when applicable. Today was my daughter's birthday. My one and only precious little person. We had a wonderful day, it beginning with her waking me in the morning and asking "Mommy is it my birthday now" and I replied yes. She wanted homemade pancakes for breakfast, some cartoons and for lunch she chose http://www.chick-fil-a.com/Home.asp sandwiches. The best sweet tea and chicken sandwiches.
From there we picked out what style of cake she wanted to celebrate with and she chose cupcakes. One for me and one for her. She wanted the one with the pink frosting and I got the yellow frosted one. When we got home, I put the number 4 candle on hers and sang Happy Birthday to her. We then endulged in our cupcake eating celebration of her being born 4 years ago. It was priceless I tell ya. She has been attempting all day long to prove to me (or maybe herself) that she is a big girl now. No more baby stuff. Too many examples to explain but it was great. She is trying to do alot on her own and be a "know it all" in a good way. Then we went on our nightly walk where I usually put her into the jogging stroller and we take one of the dogs with us. Tonight she decided that she wanted just the two of us to go and that she didn't want to be in the stroller, that she wanted to ride her little 3 wheeler. She did it, the entire 1.6 mile walk that we do. I was totally amazed.
After dinner and her bath, she was playing pretend tea time. She has always liked to play like she is serving me some tea or food of some sort. So I asked her if she wanted a tea time for real http://www.tea.co.uk since she likes to imagine using my own tea sets. She was very excited to be having a real tea party with mommies tea set. That is where we are now in our day.
As for designing, my thoughts wondered as I was making the tea, about how beautiful the artistry is with a good tea set. My British friend gave me a real tea pot from England the last time that I visited and it is a treasure to me. It is so beautifully hand painted. http://www.rushgideon.com/index.cfm
While out shopping for the cupcakes I was noticing how unfriendly the packaging for the cupcake is. The girl put them in the plastic store bags to carry out and the minute I picked it up, everything tilted and messed up some of the cupcakes frosting. I had bought a larger package for her birthday party. Small things like that I notice. I am very detailed oriented and notice alot of things that other people don't necessarily. Still at the store, I wanted her to have a balloon so she picked out a beautiful one shaped like a butterfly. http://www.balloons.com/ There were other shapes of a dragonfly, hearts, Care Bears and so on. How do they make the shapes for balloons? I have wondered about that before.
Who came up with the idea of giving out gift bags at birthday parties? When I used to go to parties, any gifts that were given were to any kid that won a game that had a prize with it. Oh well, my pet peeve I guess.
There were so many precious moments to today. Me and my girl had a great day together and I pray for her to have many more.
I encourage anyone's feedback on my blog as well as any insight to my web site at www.chumneyvisualdesigns.com I appreciate you taking the time to read my thoughts and for giving me any advice on the blog or my site. Thank you.