DIY: Gift Bags

Jessica Jones over at How about Orange came up with a very creative way to transform envelopes into gift bags. Her step-by-step tutorial can be found here.

This is brilliant! I love that you can run the envelopes through the printer to customize them, before converting to bags. Jessica provides some free templates for the A2 and 6x9 envelopes with the tutorial, or you can make your own.

Freebie: Mini File Folders from WhiskerGraphics

Earlier this month, WhiskerGraphics offered up a free .pdf template for mini file folders that are very cute, and surprisingly useful. See what other folks are using them for here and here.

For more downloadable mini file folders in other styles, check out WhiskerGraphics etsy store.

I'm planning to use them to help sort my photos and also my ideas for the national stationery show. What will you use them for?

Owen Says Blogging about NSS and including me!

Jennifer Erts over at Owen Says compiled a list of tweets about the National Stationery Show and included one of my tweets! It is interesting to see where everyone is in the planning process, thinking about shipping options, booth give-aways (me!), booth designs (me, next weekend!) and pr/marketing opps. There's a hash tag for the show if you're interested in listening in or joining the conversation -- #nss. And, thanks Jennifer for including me! Follow her @owensays.

Etsy Round-up: Gift Tags

Spent the evening admiring these lovely gift tags on etsy:

Personalized Giraffe Favor Tags by Perideau Designs

Traveling Soul Tags by IamBlessed


Spring Tags by jellybeans



Little Red Riding Hood Tags by CrowandIris

Little Bird Tags by deejann

Reminder: Postage Hike

Attention Brides! Just a friendly reminder that postage rates are scheduled to go up on May 11th from $.42 to $.44 for one ounce. New stamps won't be on sale until May 11th, which leaves a tricky situation for those ever so important RSVP/reply cards.

USPS has a variety of options, but your best bet may be the forever stamp. It costs $.42, and will always be valid for first-class mail regardless of future postage hikes.

The increase is affecting other postage rates too, please visit USPS for more information.

DIY: Wine Labels in Illustrator

I stumbled across this great wine bottle design tutorial on worldlabels.com over the weekend, and it had my mind swirling with ideas:

- Wedding favors or at the bar

- Table numbers for dinner parties

- Corporate events

- Wine tasting party

- Hostess gifts

- Girls night-in

- Birthday or holiday gifts

The tutorial is easy to follow, providing step-by-step instructions and resources to get the project started. For color palette ideas, don't forget about ColourLovers. And, istockphoto.com has tons of options for background designs and patterns.

How have you used custom wine labels?

Biz Talk: Twitter Benefits

Earlier this week, one of my LinkedIn groups had an interesting discussion about the pros and cons of twittering for businesses. Andrew Ballenthin culled through the 120+ comments and compiled a list of the top themes, which I've included below and are available on his blog. While a lot of companies are struggling to understand what twitter is and how they can utilize it to build business, more than 80% of commentors agreed that twitter presents a lot of opportunities.

Here's how companies have benefited from twitter:

1. Build relationships with people they would have not met before
2. Exposure to lots of new business thoughts, technical ideas & leadership styles
3. Finding new clients by commenting back on others’ tweets
4. Access to thinkers and doer’s one wouldn’t normally interact with
5. Can follow businesses you want the latest updates from with less effort
6. Clients have asked for accounts to be opened so they can get regular updates
7. Can assist Google rankings, sometimes it gets first page results
8. Can assist in getting real questions answered real time during the day
9. Been a great way to gain interactive access with new clients by following their tweets
10. Received access to publicity: radio, TV, press, speaking engagements
11. Allows leaders to connect to followers on a personal level
12. Without being pushy, it can generate buzz/talk about your company
13. Great for bringing traffic to your site if you offer truly valuable information & links
14. Provides a premier marketing tool when used correctly
15. Can be a great resource for getting push information versus searching the web
16. Can act as a news wire for journalist who are looking for story content
17. Can save time by getting the latest news without having to go search for it
18. Enables expansion of your database by removing budget or geography barriers
19. It can increase your market reach if you actively promote your presence on twitter
20. A great way to showcase your expertise & differentiate from competition.

Great list! How are you using twitter? What would you add to this list?

Feedback Please: Photos

I can't decide if I like the way these photos turned out?! In person, the contrast between the iceplant, flowers and cards looked sharp and I liked the texture. I'm not sure it translated well in the photos though. What do you think?

National Stationery Show : Pre-show

Yikes, has it really been two weeks since I last posted?!? Sorry folks. As you may know from my profile, the National Stationery Show is coming up in May and Kelp Designs will be making its debut this year (Booth #2070)!! I've been a busy bee preparing for the show -- working on pre-show marketing opps as well as prepping my papers :)

Anyone else going? What booth are you in? Would love to hear about what you're doing to prepare! My to-do list seems to be growing by the minute, although I'm enjoying it :)

Design Tutorials: Illustrator

Lots of design resources out there on the world wide web... SpoonGraphics recently compiled a list of '50 illustrator tutorials that every designer should see'. Some good stuff here if you're interested in stretching your Illustrator wings -- tracing vectors, blending options, creating logos, how to make a map in illustrator, among others. Any others you would add to the list?

Pantone's Fall 2009 Fashion Color Report

Pantone's Fashion Color Report for Fall 2009 came out a couple of weeks ago and is available for download free on their website. I was excited to see the warm autumn hues that are in store for the fall and enjoyed reading about the designer's inspiration.

According to the report, the top 10 fall '09 colors for women are:

PANTONE 19-1759 American Beauty
PANTONE 18-3520 Purple Heart
PANTONE 16-1143 Honey Yellow
PANTONE 18-1306 Iron
PANTONE 13-1006 Crème Brûlée
PANTONE 16-1212 Nomad
PANTONE 17-1544 Burnt Sienna
PANTONE 17-1929 Rapture Rose
PANTONE 15-0646 Warm Olive
PANTONE 19-4125 Majolica Blue


In terms of clothes, I can see myself heading towards the majolica blue. For my design work, Iron, Nomad and Burnt Sienna are some of my new favorites. Look for them in upcoming designs :) Which are your favorites?

Biz Talk: Pricing Design Services

One of the toughest challenges as an independent designer is figuring out how to price your products and services. Jacob Cass of Just Creative Design tackles this age-old debate, offering a variety of resources and solutions, in his article "How much to charge for design work". Worth the time to read... enjoy!