Wallpapering, amongst other things

Is wallpapering a thing? I have a nasty feeling that it's a euphemism, and I'll now suddenly attract 4,000 views over night. Anyway.

I think I got a bit excited that what with the new blog, I can post other less professional stuff here, and with my avenues wide open with grand possibilities, I didn't do anything.

In the meantime, however, I started following She Reads Truth, which came at exactly the right time for me (i.e., when I was grousing that I wasn't reading my bible or praying enough, but not actually doing anything about it, typically). They have this thing, which is an awesome Sunday School throwback, of memorising bits of the bible, and to help, created phone lock-screens and wallpapers with the verses on, which  I know sounds lame, but they're not. Honest.   

It has now got to the point where I so enjoy having something worthwhile reading when I pick up my phone (invariably to google who the guy is on the television, or watch the Lizzie Bennet Diaries on youtube), that since they haven't done one yet, I've had to do one myself. Plus, it's a really good discipline trying to fit something attractive, with text, into a 480x800 pixel area. Or at least, that's what I'm telling myself.

Drink tea. Watch the Olympics. Think about God. Try not to think about how easily someone could die in most of those sports.

Oh, oh, exciting

OK, so here's the thing. I'm trying to make a go of it in the graphic design biz. And I did some work for a friend the other day: I fancied up a poster for her, which, along with one I am doing, will be part of a display of a whole bunch (specific, right?) of posters to illustrate what the churches in our area do, shown at this enormous fair type thing in the summer. Once I have the green light on them, I'll put them on here. Anyway, she was so grateful (this was before she even saw it. Nothing to do with my skills) that she said she'd tell anyone who asked who had done their poster, and that I should give out business cards whilst working in the said display at the said fair. And then I told my Mum about it, laughing, and she said that she thought I should too.

So. It rather put a fire under me to finally decide what I was going to call this thing I'm doing. I mean, rather than 'Design by Mary'. Or something. Which would have been fine but a bit of a snooooze. So I made a decision. And I made a business card.

And I fuzzied out my details for reasons best known to my paranoid self (yes, I know, everyone reading this knows where I live and has a good knowledge of my dental records). And I'm super jazzed. And then I realised that rather than rambling like this on a blog that I could put on a business card, I should either stop that, right now, go back and re-edit all my old posts, or set up another one for the actually businessy type stuff. So I did that too.

Oh boy, oh boy.

The really jaunty thing is now, I can do stuff on here that I never really intended prospective employers to see. Like cake. And the frozen cookie dough balls that I intend to make soon. And my ukulele. And my views on all kinds of stuff. Not that I haven't been doing that all ready, but you know. Exciting!

So here we go. New adventure. Starts today. I feel like Carl Fredricksen. I'm going to go and buy me some balloons.

Seriously not good at this blogging lark...

So it has been, what, two more months? Shame. Never mind. Here's what I've been up to:

What's that? Actual genuine money you want to pay me? Oh, uh, OK. I kind of wish it had been for something that was a bit more me, though, but I was pretty pleased with it. It's one of those things that was about five times more work than it looks, but still. I love me some embossing.

I'll admit it: I'm mad-proud of this. All except some of the text spacing. But anyway. I owe everything I have learnt about creating fractals from Mr Richard Lyall and I'm very grateful. Him, and the freaky geniuses who created Apophysis 2. Also, to those kind people who create free fonts that I can download, all the while wishing that I had a spare bajillion pounds to buy the necessary software: thank you.

I feel like a teeny tiny bit of a fraud posting this one because in truth, the poster that was printed had black text. I just feared that it wouldn't be terribly visible so I swallow my artistic integrity. Unfortunately, the blue printed darker than I expected, so when I turned it into fliers, I felt justified in going with my original and most beautiful plan. Again, it probably took double the amount of time that it looks (fish background removal, fancy fractal creation, blah, blah blah) but I liked it.

 This one (and the next) seriously honed my speed-crafting skills. And it's quite me. I love a curlicue, not to mention serifs. I love serifs. And I love that using the word 'curlicue' makes me think of this. It's so gloriously darkly inappropriate for children.

And finally. This printed up beautifully. I was so jazzed. And I was very glad that I went with my decision to not try and make each letter as if it was inside a strawberry. This came out much more elegantly. And Bookman Old Style is such a great font. Seriously. Who doesn't love a good serif?

That's it for now. Have a lovely Jubilee. I might do some Queenly crafting. Between painting my kitchen, that is.

I will never get paid for this...

I think people who make a living from blogging probably post more than once every other month. Although technically, since I'm squeaking this into March, it's one a month. Just.

So. Since I last posted, Spring happened. I'm sitting here looking at blossom. And readying myself for the apple tree to kapow into bloom. And wondering whether it is actually quite warm enough yet for flip flops, because my feet are kind of cold. But never mind. Because Easter is just around the corner.

We changed the name of our Sunday School at church. I, however, keep referring to them as 'Pleasure Seekers' which apparently, isn't very helpful. This is a combination of two different elements first designed by my friend and fancy artist, Grace Wallis (whose studio you can check out at the Mistley Quay Workshops, next to the Mistley Quay Cafe which is so great I can't even tell you). We sent each other about 4 million emails over this. It's pretty jaunty though, which is really what I was going for.

 I've been working on this for ages. Not that it has really taken all that long. I just kept doing things, and then not doing anything with them. However, I was hurried along by the fact that the church APCM is this Sunday, which is, yes, April 1st. I suspect this might have been a massive error in scheduling. We shall see. I do love a good twiddly bit of writing. And acorns. And, more specifically, whistling in their cups. It's a life skill, people.

This was one of those projects where my remit was both vague and yet very specific. It was a bit of a Hail Mary play from those organising it, and they asked me to do it, kind of last minute. I was sent all of the emails between the organisers, plus several text files with slightly differing versions of the above. And the fact that there was to be an image of hands. And the image at the bottom. Neither of which I had. Or was sure of. So I guessed. The hand border sort of happened on its own, coming from a combined need for the (mysterious) hand image and something to finish it off. I'm not sure that it isn't very slightly creepy. Like some of the Russian clay-animation I watched at university.

This was one of those incredibly maddening projects where it turns out, many hours in, that you didn't think it through well enough at all. This seems to happen most with me when wrangling with a particularly tricksy noticeboard that stands outside of Mistley Church.

Here. Thanks to Google Maps I have found it. It looks innocent enough. It is, however, my kryptonite. It happened once before, at Harvest. This was, at least, on the computer, so rewrangleable. But still. Maddening. I somehow forgot that the poster had to fit in this noticeboard, therefore necessitating four landscape A3 posters. Which could also be used in other places. So it also had to fit on one A3 poster. And as this noticeboard is only readable from the pavement, it had to be bright enough to make you come and look at it. And, since we're trying to promote a 'One Church, Two Locations' message, it had to include all of the services for both places. Oh, and since we're a church, I also needed to include something of the actual message of Easter, rather than my first attempt which was a very nice sunrise. It might as well have been a jolly Easter bunny. And chicks. And eggs. Anyway. I'm over it.

I do, however, really enjoy writing like this. I'm particularly pleased with the Sunday text. And the benefice name came out really nicely. I'm not so sure about Friday. It seems a bit squashed up. Given some more time, I probably would have taken another go at that one.

So. I now need to turn these into service sheet covers. Which will, no doubt, take about fifty times longer than I think it will. Oh joy. Never mind. I'm having my hair cut later. It'll give me some kind of reverse-Sampson strength. Hopefully. Enjoy the daffodils!

Marathon failure

I've been busy. And it has been snowing here. Which naturally means that I have to play outside rather than sitting in front of the computer. So I've failed spectacularly at the marathon. Maybe next year. Or I'll designate March. Or July. Or something.

I did this yesterday though. And I liked it. I think I might need a copy for my kitchen.

Right. Off to achieve. Ticking off to-do list and all that. Make a snow-angel for me.

Indecision

Snow has stopped play. Or rather, the thing I normally do on a Thursday has been cancelled because it's too cold and the heating wasn't working. So. One whole day in which to do several actual work things, and then maybe, maybe, see if I might have time to draw a Picture Book. We shall see. Until then, you should watch this. I saw it yesterday. And was frozen throughout. And learnt some very useful lessons about wolves. So. Just in case it gets even colder and wolves reappear, arm yourself with a knife, broken whiskey miniatures, gaffer tape, and trees. Please, please, climb trees. They can't, you know. You, however, can.

Catch up

So Picturebookruary begins on Wednesday. And I have only just started to think about it. And it feels like it has come round alarmingly too soon. Except, of course, my god-son, born on the 31st of January, is about to be 1. So to him, it has been a while. A lifetime, if you will.

So. While I think about that, pondering whether there really are enough hours in the day to do this again, I'll catch you up with some of the other designage that has been going on here.

 What's that? These are all remarkably similar? And isn't that the angel from the Messy Church poster? Fine. Dag nab it. Yes it is. But I was going for a theme. And those angels took hours. My only regret really was that on the above poster, the snowflakes didn't quite work. That's what you get for crafting individual snowflakes. A proverbial slap in the face.

I really liked this colour palette, though. And it really wasn't my own idea. I took a whole heap of inspiration from the murals of David Hetland, about whom I can find next to nothing. The only thing I could find was this flash presentation on the Minnesota Public Radio website. Given how beautiful they are, it's a crying shame that there aren't better quality photos available of his work.

The minimalism of this poster was necessitated by a) my hatred of the kinds of posters you see outside churches (small children, gazing wistful, lit by candles. Meh) and b) everyone having forgotten that this poster needed doing. Never have I worked so fast.

Oh, and having left it so long, now there's another Messy Church poster:

 Yes, it's about one degree outside today, and yes, snow is forecast, and yes, I still have paper snowflakes up in my windows (it's Winterval, don't you know), but as the nice man decorating the bathroom right now said, people are fed up of winter. So I embraced spring. And what is more springy than lambs and swallows? I'll tell you: nothing. Except maybe rabbits.