Blue Sky Hello

Hello all you wonderful people!! Did you have a wonderful turkey day? 

I unplugged last week and spent the week holed up with Z and Punky - it was pretty quiet and uneventful - my idea of perfection. It is important with as much as we are connected these days to take a moment and allow yourself to enjoy the sun shine, blue sky, and family.

Did I get done all I planned and hoped to - no, but it's ok because I was able to catch up on a few things and I am not going to dwell on what I didn't do. I am feeling quite energized and with the semester end a mere two weeks away I hope this feeling lasts. 

photo by Angela

Did You Hear?

We FINALLY have some pillows on our couch. Only two for now but I think we have a nice direction - black and white graphic prints and bright solid colors. We purchased one and made the other and well Alfie ( our frenchie) enjoys them just fine.

I also just realized this may be the first time I have shared a peek at our humble abode.

Getting In The Spirit

Yesterday we finally had a chance to head up to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art to check out the Tim Burton exhibit that has been going on since the spring and will end next weekend - nothing like waiting till the last minute.

It was well worth the trip!! I love getting a peek into the process of creative people, how their minds work, and how they develop ideas. No photographs were allowed in the exhibit itself, but they did let you snap one as you entered, hence the photo above. It was a great collection that spanned his entire career from his very early work, to sketchbook doodles, to notes regarding his work on Beetlejuice and Charlie and the Chocolate factory to name a few. 

We also made it a point to visit the California Design 1930 - 1965 exhibit. I snapped quite a few pictures to capture the layouts of the printed materials from this era that I am always drawn to, as well as some of the great fashion pieces they had on hand. 

All in all a perfect Sunday if I do say so myself.

P.S.: I am considering purchasing a domain name that I like in case I ever get the nerve to start doing design work on my own (eek).  

All In A Days Work

Have you ever noticed that when you work on multiple projects they all seem to be due at the same time?

I have 2 exams and 1 design project due for school tomorrow, 3 seems to be my lucky number lately. I am scanning in some of my sketchbook notes to share with you all - they are not drawings but I am putting something down on paper, it still counts in my opinion.

Back to the books!!

pattern source

Time Out

Last week I decided to unplug a bit. Sometimes you need to do that for your own sanity- especially when you sit in front a computer most hours of the day.

I was feeling a bit uninspired and overwhelmed trying to spin multiple plates at the same time so I refocused, reorganized and gave myself some time to renergize. Lots of "re's" going on there.

I no longer feel like this - and that is a good thing!!

                             Source: flickr.com via Angela on Pinterest

Bought, Read, & Watched.

I am happy to say after a heavy duty round of antibiotics I am finally back to feeling almost human again. Being sick, having a heatwave and the power outage that San Diego experienced had left me feeling  - well BLAH!! But this weekend I woke up with some energy, our perfect weather was back and I was pretty tired of laying on the couch being a grumpy mess.

I had to get out and well I found a couple of fun purchases...

Is there anything better than office supplies?!?! I have been enamored with them since I was a little girl and I always find an excuse to buy them even now. My new glitter composition book, gigantic eraser, and Micron pens will all be getting put to good use - I just know it!

I also started reading...

I was first grabbed by the cover design to be honest, I am only in the first chapter, but so far I love it. The idea of trying to define my personal style seems like a project I would like to accomplish. I have been feeling in a bit of a rut lately to be honest - do you ever get in those moods where you hate your hair, your clothes all start looking the same, and your closet is a sad mess - well that's where I am at. Hopefully this book will shake things up a bit, I will have to keep you posted.

I also decided to start a Hitchcock movie fest. One classic film a weekend (I love horror/thriller movies) until I get through them all. First up...

The Birds. It was a perfect blend of creepy and suspenseful, plus Tippi Hedren had an amazing wardrobe.

That was my weekend in a nutshell - what where you all up to?

Movie still source, all other photos by me.

And It Went A Little Like This

My weekend was sadly not spent being fancy like I had hoped, but it was productive - so still a win in my book.

It went like this...

I am taking an illustration class this semester, which may sound like a blast, but drawing is really hard for me and I have a hard time being able to turn off my brain and just sort of let go (I told you I have some perfectionist issues). I am hoping to conquer that this semester and learn to enjoy the process of drawing rather then be so critical of myself. I have been looking at lots of different illustrators lately, so I am sure I will end up sharing my favs as I navigate through this course.  I ended up being OK with my dog ear (if you were wondering what it was that you are looking at) the rest of the dog well he could use a bit more work.

I also got to draw letters, which was very fun. Give me a ruler and a grid any day, it makes me happy. The assignment was to draw 100 thumbnails of the letter of our last name. By the 75th Q, ideas were short, but it was a good way to push yourself creatively.

And of course we had to get all packed up for 5th grade. Out with the chipped blue glitter nail polish - in with the very strict school dress code.

So was your weekend fancy, productive, or both?

That's A Wrap

This is officially the last weekend of summer in the Q household.

Punky will be saying hello to 5th grade on Monday and my semester is filling up quickly with projects. Did I mention I am only a week in? We have had an amazing summer and I enjoyed the time I spent with my girl. The decision to take the summer off seems to be just what I needed to keep myself motivated. 

I think I would like to spend my final weekend of summer being all fancy perched on that big floating swan, how about you?

image source

Figuring It Out

It is hard to believe that in two short weeks this little ol' blog of mine will have been around for an entire year. It started out as a something else entirely and morphed into a place where I met great people, shared bits and pieces of my life,  and most of all as a place where I could slowly try and define my design style.

When I began this journey I told myself I would do it for 1 year and now that the deadline is slowly approaching I am not sure that I am ready to give it up. 

Confession time: I often feel like a terrible blogger. I do not post as much as I would like and it bothers me, honestly. There are days when I have thousands of ideas and just not enough time and then there are the other days where I  have all the time in the world and nothing seems to be working how I envisioned it. I don't want to post something that I don't love, and being a perfectionist often gets in my way more than it should. Also I am terrible about writing ideas down, Z keeps telling me that's why people have sketchbooks to keep track of those type of things for the days where staring blankly into space is about as creative as it gets, but that is a whole other issue entirely.  You my friends have stuck around through all this and I greatly appreciate it. I look forward to the process, to sharing ideas and getting feedback, and as an extremely private person it has been nice to open up and share my happy little family with you all. If I were to stop now I would miss it dearly.

So that's where I am - still trying to figure it out. 

image source

Already

Good Morning friends!! This week is a special week in the Q household as Punky turns 10 on Thursday. I always get a little emotional during this week, but for some reason this feels like a big birthday to me. 

We went to the Selena Gomez concert last night and it was GREAT. We saw her before in a small venue in Arizona, but this had more of a concert feel and the crowd had definitely grown some. Our seats were perfect, there were some Disney Star sightings from the show Shake It Up (side note - I had no clue who they were) and that Bieber kid even showed up as a surprise at the end of the night. I am having a bit of ringing in my ears as I forgot how high pitched screaming can disturb one's hearing.

Here are a few iphone shots from the night. My old point and shoot is just that OLD. I think I may have to break down and buy a new one since it appears my iphone is better quality, but not having a zoom was disappointing. Any one have any suggestions?

The best part of the evening would have to be once we got home. When Z and I tucked in our favorite girl she looked up at us and said "Thanks for everything you do for me, I love you guys."

Source: I don't have one for the of Vivien Leigh, I have had it for a while. Sorry. 

Weekend Stories.

In high school I had a history teacher my junior year who would start off every Monday by asking if anyone had weekend stories to share, random piece of information I know but I thought I would share my weekend story with you all. Punky was away at camp all weekend so it was just Z and I. After we dropped Punky off we decided to be adventurous and head on down to the San Diego Fair for some grub. It was jammed full of teenagers and fried food (do these two things go hand in hand?), we looked at the adventurous items like deep fried Snickers (just reading those signs makes my arteries cringe) and settled on something a little more friendly to a couple of 30 year olds. I will say we did have some funnel cake, it was the fair after all. Saturday headed down to a Japanese market to grab some supplies for making our own sushi thanks to a fun little gadget we grabbed at the fair. The marketplace located in San Diego was incredible!! I did get my hands on Vogue Japan and although I have not one clue what any of it says, the pictures and layouts are eye candy for sure!! Sunday we went for a hike with Phoebe. Note: I tend to jump at every little sound convinced that a mountain lion is going to devour me for any given meal or that a rattlesnake is just waiting for someone to bite at every corner. Z finds this half amusing half ridiculous, but thats what you get when Mr. Outdoorsman marries Mrs. I Like To Stay Inside With Air Conditioning and Domesticated Animals. We ended our weekend by dining at the Flying Pig Pub and Restaurant in Oceanside. Cool fact not only is the food delish but their menus are in old album covers, I got Oklahoma.

Does anyone else have fun weekend stories to share?

Don't Worry Baby, It's Friday.

Summer is my favorite time of year. I look forward to it mostly because things seem to slow down a bit. This weekend looks promising -  filled with surfing, lazy afternoons, cool breezes, and maybe even cupcake making. 

Punky has two new boards on loan for the summer that she is itching to try out so it looks like a majority of our weekend will be spent on the beach, no complaints coming from me. 

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!!

Airstream for 3, Please.

I am already thinking about summer vacations and long weekends away when this campaign for Airstream sent me into full on wishful thinking mode.

 Lenlee Represents asked four of her photographers to shoot a campaign for Airstream using their own unique style. While each campaign is beautifully done the work of Wendi Nordeck made me long to hit the open road and embrace a gypsy lifestyle, if only for a short time. Delicious food, cold drinks and cool breezes all sound like perfection to me.

The companion printed pieces, which I believe are letter pressed, were created by Ian Nordeck. Pretty awesome, right?

Now if I could only convince Z that we need/ have to have one of these beauties so all our summer wishes will come true.

If you would like to join me on my Airstream day dream check out the entire series here.

11 Things To Do In March.

Continuing on my 11 things to do a month here is my list for March. January - check, February- wait did we have February? When I was creating this list I realized I never bake outside of the Christmas season so I should bake some cookies just for the heck of it. My living room lacks any sort of color or personality, I have the hardest time trying to put rooms together, I know what I like just never know how to get it. I still need to mail out school picks from months ago, ugh! I also thought I would try and banish a couple bad habits - saving everything onto my desktop, both at work and at home, and my minor addiction to Diet Coke, Z tells me constantly how terrible it is for me and my joke that I am saving him on embalming costs doesn't seem to be as funny to him as it was 4 years ago. It could be a long month.

How about you all any fun things to cross off your list this month?

Can you take it from here Lynda?

                                                                    

Ok friends,I feel I need to pull the curtain back a little. I am one of those type of people who moves a break neck speed, you know the type always doing something at 100mph, coffee in hand and bags under our eyes. Not only do I need to do everything but it has to be perfect, I tend to ignore the flashing lights and sirens and the sound of doom overhead.

As I am getting older my body doesn't seem to like this pace anymore, it is telling me "Stress is not our friend, and we don't want to play with her anymore!" So this week in the midst of school projects and work projects and family projects I hit my wall. I realized I am not Wonder Woman, and it was a bitter pill to swallow. I decided that I need to slow down. I am no longer on anyone else's timeline on where my life should be. I will finish school at a pace that does not destroy me and where I can enjoy the process of becoming a designer. I will enjoy the small amount of time that I have left with my daughter before she no longer finds me as cool as I think I am. I will allow sometime for myself to be creative and healthy.

So Lynda Carter I am backing down, but I would still like to keep the outfit.

Happy V-Day!

Image courtesy of: Life

Happy Heart Day to all you wonderful people!! I know people either LOVE or HATE this day, but I always think any day you can spread a little extra love around is a good thing. Z and I decided to celebrate this weekend and since it was "date night" anyway we thought we do it up fancy. We headed down to the Gaslamp and dined at the Palms Restaurant, I may or may not have devoured way too much cheesecake, then headed to see the San Diego Ballet Company perform Romeo and Juliet, and still managed to be home by 11. Every time we think we may make it a late night we are home no later than 11. Oh well being a homebody isn't so bad. Tonight we decided to make Punky her favorite dinner (pasta of course) and have some yummy chocolate cake.

Are you all planning something fun this evening?

I made Z this valentine and sent it off to him via email this morning just to say "Hi, I like you lots!", then I realized I may be doing too much math homework since apparently Venn Diagrams are showing up in my Valentine design.

January Wrap Up.

Well it is that time to check in and see how we did on our 11 things to do for the month. Overall I would give myself a B+, didn't make it to the Tar Pits, but we have it on the schedule for next weekend, but I did take in the sunset (see I have the proof). Also I am planning on celebrating the end of the month this evening with...CHAMPAGNE!

I have been taking my daily photo with my phone and am thinking I will do a weekly wrap up here to share them with you all. (Oh yeah that was why this blog started.) The above photo was taken with my phone using the Camera Bag app and I did not retouch it. The sky was glowing above the water, amazing!

I will post my 11 things for February this week if you would like to join in. If you did follow along how did you do, will you do it again this month?

Hello Stranger

Hello strangers!! Hope you all didn't miss me too much, well maybe just a teeny tiny bit, absence makes the heart grow fonder right? I do apologize for the brief lack of posts last week, I felt terrible not visiting with you all.  I started spring semester and I wanted to make sure that I had all my ducks in a row and had my plan of attack somewhat formulated so I can get back to the fun stuff here.  Also have you ever noticed that in 1 week there is so much to catch up on, my blog reading is way behind and I feel like I have missed out on tons of goodies. 

I love this picture I came across on the Life website. I highly recommend taking an afternoon and browsing through all the great images they have, so much fun and I even on occasion learn something, added bonus.

Image courtesy of Life.

I Would Like to Thank....

I am super excited to announce that last week the lovely Jenn from A Home in the Making was kind enough to nominate me for The Stylish Blogger award, say what?!?!

I am always so excited when one of you lovely people decides to stop by and see what little me has to say in this big ol blogging world so to be mentioned on another blog that I enjoy visiting was just BEYOND!! Thank you so very much Jenn, you are the best!! Please make sure you head over and say hello to her, you won't regret it.

So in order to get this thing rolling I felt I should dress for the occasion:

Just a little something I had sitting in my closet. Much better, right, hehehe.

So here is how it works... 

In order to receive the award you complete the following:
      
1. Thank and link back to the person who awarded you this award. Of course!! Jenn you rock as does your blog!!

      
2. Share 7 things about yourself. Why not.

3. Award recently discovered great bloggers. Easy peasy.

4. Contact these bloggers and tell them about the award! On my way.




7 Things about me:

1.) Since high school I have been told I look like Lacey Chabert, it use to really bother me cause I wanted to be Sarah from Party of Five not Claudia.

2.) At 28 I decided I wanted to go back to school to finish up my degree in graphic design. There are many days when I am sitting in a room with very talented 20 year olds that I think I will never cut it in this field. I am in constant doubt of my abilities, but I keep going.

3.) It is my ultimate goal to become a free lance graphic designer. Someday I tell myself someday.

4.) I eloped in Vegas at 18 with my best friend, I still wake up to his handsome face every morning and I couldn't be happier about it.

5.) I have decided to determine how am I doing as a parent not based on what others say or think, but based on whether I would want to hang out with my daughter if she wasn't mine. Truth is I would think she was pretty awesome even if I wasn't her mom.

6.) I love bad reality TV, it is a sickness that I am convinced I need help getting over.

7.) I am addicted to McDonald's Diet Coke. I am convinced they are putting something in there that makes it so addicting delicious. Honestly why is it so good?




Awesome bloggers I'm passing this on to (in no particular order):

latebloomerbuds 

SpiralStyle

MerissaCherie

EverKelly

Kalanicut

badhausfrau

So go check them out and say hello, they will make you laugh, give you some crafty ideas, and be some of the greatest blogging friends you can meet.

I Scream. You Scream.

Happy Monday Everyone, hope you all had a fabulous weekend.!!

I wanted to share with you all this fun carnival style branding/packaging combo that I came across last week while visiting Lovely Package. These fun little treats were developed by Wink for Honey & Mackie's Ice Cream Shop which is described as "an ice cream shop for kids that caters to parents."

Images via Lovely Package

I think everything from the colors that they chose, to their use of typography, to the silhouette's on the cups help make this feel like a place that I would love to visit with my daughter (and probably snap a picture or two - I am dyeing to know what this place looks like inside), plus the fact that everything is homemade with locally grown ingredients makes it a double winner in my book.