created with 7gypsies trousseau collection, 7gs tryptic arc kit, 7gs embellishments, hambly clear overlay, ranger crackle paint & stains, vintage findings + book papers + other odds and bits from my stash.

charming is one of my fav’s

i’m so excited because i can finally share with all of you the Trousseau collection that i designed for 7gypsies back in october/november. This was such an amazing experience, challenging and exhausting (I had walking pneumonia during the entire process.. yikes!) something that I had been secretly wishing for for a while. Dreams come true my friends, they really, really do!!

Please check out the line, posted here and let me know what you think. I’ve been playing with all of it in real time for the last three weeks and it’s always such a proud moment when you’re holding in your hands something that you spent weeks & weeks perfecting. My art direector Paula was amazing btw, a true kindred spirit and so helpful when we were fleshing out which designs were keepers and which just didn’t make sense cohesively.

Alos, be sure to pop on over to Deb & Paula’s blog as they have the entire new winter release up including the Postale collection that Sande designed, which is amazing!

Happy Beautifully vintage Wednesday & come back, because i have some divine show samples to show tomorrow!

recognize the french parchments on the b side of True from my aria trip finds?

cabinet card photo paper and i’m going to using alot of dearest

how amazing would it be to paper quilt with the mini stacks?!

Paper tapes and my favorite Strawberry image ever :)

i’m going to need about 10 sheets of those stickers!

the journal pages are probably one of my most favorite items. love. love. love!!

scallop tags

(i didn’t design these, but they go great with the scallop tags)

tag envelopes, these are small and so cute irl

a second alternate set

and we now have coordinating mists with tattered angels. yay!!

working | on more and more designs. finding that not everything is publish worthy, but enjoying the work and enjoying the weeding process of what i keep for future releases and what i chuck or save for a later kit. yesterday i chucked so much i felt a little defeated at the end of the day. today, so many saves! :)

listening | coldplay : mylo xyloto : moajor minus (major fav album right now)

seeing | a pile of my almost finished first two weeks of pL. downloaded these really fun freebies this morning. love love!

eating | spinach salad with feta, egg, mesquite turkey, sliced almonds and brianna’s new american salad dressing.

wearing | sweats and my favorite slippers. it’s 12:30. i guess i have to get dressed soon.

loving | my will power. i’m already down almost 15 lbs. i’m ready to start my 40s this summer happy, fit & healthy. thank you ww.

excited | to have some time this afternoon to work on more samples with the line i created for 7gs. the wholesale catalog was released to retailers yesterday and i keep going and looking at it. beaming with pride here. :)

happy friday!
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i’m spending alot of time growing my “design” skill set. i’ve been proficient at photoshop for quite a few years now. i’ve designed papers before (2007). i designed this here website. i designed all of the exclusive stamps i sold through the kR kit club and of course i design all of the kR digital kits at two peas. but, there was a very important design program i have always wanted to learn. the big one. it’s a doozy that big one…

illustrator.

when i took on the design job back in the beginning of november i dabbled a little bit in Ai as i was working on some sticker sheets, but i didn’t know much (maybe actually i should say i knew how to open a new doc… LOL). that became so incredibly clear. not. much. at. all. but throughout the project, the more i used it the more things started to make sense. i googled some simple tutorials for the bsaics that i had to know at the time. i asked a fellow designer friend some simple questions for the other things i had to know. both processes helped, they helped quite alot. but i couldn’t ask mr.programmer extraordinaire (ie: the hubs) as this is beyond his knowledge base. and that. is. weird.

i’ve always been a hands on kinda girl. the more i can do something to learn it the easier it gets. reading about it is difficult. i have to do it. so this week, when the littles headed back to school so did i. i’ve been going through the program picking things to learn and fielding my way through more tutorials. i’m slowly but happily teaching myself something i’ve wanted to know for ages. i taught myself photoshop (with backup help from the hubs) back when i opened the online vintage shop i used to have (somewhere around 1999). it was fun, and very very useful. but this has been incredibly exciting.

i’m making things and doing things i had no idea i could do. making a commitment to myself and to a passion that’s been slowly growing over the last few years. and the best part? i’m savoring every moment.

happy friday.
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i started on january 1st. i know what triggered it, some self loathing on dec 30th or 31st as i looked in the mirror or when i stood on that yuck inducing scale. but i think the thing that really drove it home, the thing that really made me realize that i have to do this now, that i can’t wait any longer, i can’t wait and just think about it any longer, is the fact that this july i’m going to be 40.

four. zero.

thinking about that has also led me to i realize that i have spent the last twenty years wishing i was on top of my health. i have spent twenty years wishing that i would get back in the water and swim like i did the first twenty years (well, the first 14 anyways). 14 years of that first twenty were spent swimming competitively, butterfly & long distance freestyle being my passions. i was good. i was fast. i was an athlete and i was really, really fit. then i left college and i stopped getting in the water. but i kept eating like i was still swimming. and although there have been times over the last twenty years that i’ve been fit and times when i lived my life and my weight wasn’t a battle i was waging in my mind, they were in fact, years that were too far apart.

i don’t want to spend the next twenty years fighting. i want to spend them doing everything that my heart desires, not thinking “what if”.

so i’m remodeling myself. inside & out.

the new earrings were just an added bonus. ;)

happy wednesday!
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