Long Time, No Talk

I've been terrible about updating my blog. It's not that I haven't wanted to. It's just that I'm going through a bit of a rough patch. That and the crazy busy schedule that my life is currently subjected to is overwhelming me at the moment. It's not a bad busy, just busy.

My youngest son has been preliminarily diagnosed with dysarthria, a motor speech disorder. I say preliminary because it's not an official diagnosis yet, though the speech therapist is pretty sure that's what we're dealing with. For a long time I didn't think Lincoln looked, acted, or spoke like his age. I hate to be right in this case. As a mother, I want what's best for my children, and I'm constantly berating myself lately. Was that fall down the stairs what caused the problem? Was it because I chose to do my graphics business or dishes instead of sitting on the floor playing with him? Was it something I did during my pregnancy? I hate the what ifs. Right now they're tearing me apart. I could have been a better mother to him, I should have gotten him the help sooner, I shouldn't have taken the doctor's assertions that he was fine at face value. I've got to pull myself together and be better for him. He deserves it.

Peeps Bag Topper - Free Printable

Easter is fast approaching and that means it's time for a freebie! This time it's a baggie topper for treats, specifically Peeps treats. Since I live in Germany and apparently all the Peeps are already sold out, I had to photography my baggie topper with cute chocolate bunnies.

Just purchase some Peeps (easier said than done here in Germany), a ziploc baggie (I used sandwich sides and tucked under the extra to make them shorter), and print out the toppers and affix them with some strategically placed staples. Voila. Instant cute treat!

Here's the non-photographed version:

Just imagine them with some cute bunny Peeps.

You can download the single baggie topper HERE

or the PDF sheet of two toppers tiled HERE

Please feel free to pin, tweet, post about these toppers, but please link back to the original posting (ie: this blog post) so that I may receive credit. Enjoy!

A Few Favorite Fonts

So as a graphic designer, I have an affinity for fonts. I LOVE them. Probably a bit too much. I go into restaurants, read the menu and can tell you what fonts they used. It's that bad. My husband likes to tease me about it. I also get quite a few questions from customers about fonts (everyone loves a good font apparently!). So I thought I'd share a few of my favorites. Here's a few of them, in no particular order.

Adorable can be found HERE

Champagne & Limousines can be found HERE

Contribute can be found HERE

Pea Breathe Easy can be found HERE

Japan can be found HERE

Sketch Block can be found HERE

Anderson Four Feathers Falls can be found HERE

Just Me Again Down Here can be found HERE

Cookies can be found HERE

Circus can be found HERE



Monday Musings

So I've been absolutely terrible about writing on here. Which is sad. I really like opening up and posting designs and "meeting" wonderful people. There's such a wealth of information on the internet and I meet some of the most amazing people through here. At any rate, things here have been hectic. I guess that goes without saying. I've had two sick boys, a sick husband and a sick me to take care of. You can guess which one got put on the back burner.

I know my last message was kind of dark, well, really dark for me, but I guess you could say I had the world's most horrible birthday. It was pretty awful and I guess the real problem is that I had expectations. Whenever you set yourself up like that, you're bound to be disappointed. It wasn't that I wanted anything amazing or outlandish; just to be recognized. Without two sick kiddoes would have been great too. I hate when my babies are sick.

Speaking of sick, we're finally (KNOCK ON WOOD) over everything, I think. Maybe. Possibly. Hopefully. Took Link to the doctor today to check out his rash; in my opinion it should have gone away and not gotten worse over the weekend. They were calling it a medicinal reaction rash, but if that's true and his last dose was Wednesday, why was it so bad on Saturday and Sunday?!

We took him to the doctor today and he's not convinced that it's a medical reaction but he's not convinced otherwise either. Very helpful. (sigh) It's actually looking much better today so we're just keeping tabs on it. The doctor says that it most likely isn't anything else since he just had strep throat and scarlet fever so he shouldn't have any other bug. To me, that's ridiculous logic. I would think that his immune system would be compromised so it's perfectly logical that he could have something else (like fifth's disease). But our doctor is mostly..well, I won't go there because it just makes me upset. Going to go online today and request a new doctor. That should fix atleast some of our problems! Hopefully you all had a much better week of things!

Birthdays

So today's my birthday. I didn't plan on posting anything since the entire household has come down with strep throat and/or scarlet fever and things have been a bit hectic to say the least. That and I don't want to seem like I'm begging for sympathy or just wanting people to say "Happy Birthday." But my husband, who is in Italy for work, was sweet and left me two birthday cards. One was signed by the kids and one was signed by him. The one signed by him read, "You're an awesome mommy and pretty good wife." Am I reading that correctly or am I reading into things? Pretty good? Isn't that like getting a C in a class? You're pretty good, but you're not great. You're not terrible either, just pretty good. I can't say why, but this is just breaking my heart today. Maybe it's everything else compounded on the issue, but the "pretty" is like the proverbial straw breaking the camel's back. Or it was the dam holding back the tears. I'm not really good at analogies right now. This is what dictionary.com had to say about the definition of pretty:

pretty: [prit-ee]  -ti·er, -ti·est, noun, plural -ties, adverb, verb, -tied, -ty·ing.

adjective: fairly or moderately: Her work was pretty good.

Is that the way you would read that? Or am I reading into things? I know I'm not the best wife in the world. I wish I was, but I know I'm not. But isn't it pretty crappy to be reminded of how utterly lacking you are in that department on your thirtieth birthday? Someone please tell me I'm crazy and reading into things.

Valentine's Freebie - Printable

With the passing of the Christmas and New Years holidays, there's not much to look forward to here except for Valentine's Day. It's not a major holiday, of course, but I have fun letting the kids color and create Valentines for their little friends (and their family). I created these valentines for them last year:

They had a lot of fun coloring them and I love the vintage or cheesy sayings.

Here's the already colored version:

Now I'm sharing them with you! You can download the already colored in sheet by

CLICKING THIS LINK.

You can download the coloring sheet version (black and white) by

CLICKING THIS LINK.

I hope to have a newer Valentine's printable soon so stay tuned!

New Designs in Store

It's been awhile since I've posted here. Oops! Things always seem so hectic and then I'm not even sure where all the time goes. At any rate, I've posted some new designs in store. I'm really excited about them.

Have a little one who loves all things that go? I know I have two like that. By plane, train or automobile, however you go, invite your guests in style!

Cookie Monster! How cute is this invitation? I think it'd be really great to actually cut out the top left corner of the invitation, just like he had taken a bite out of it.

Wild thing in your house with a party coming up? Invite your guests with this rockstar inspired design. 

I love this western and rustic invitation. Great for a cowboy or cowgirl.

Have a zoo of a party with this safari animals invitation. Design features giraffe, jaguar, monkey, zebra and lion.

I finally got around to designing an owl invitation. I know the owl theme is really popular so I'm a bit behind the times with just now listing it, but oh well. Better late than never, right?

Also, I just have to say, the first five designs have photos of my boys. Aren't they gorgeous? Yeah, I'm that mom. The one who's always bragging about how beautiful--inside and out--her children are.