a little bit of everything

I was busy finishing up Suz's baby shower invites when my neighbor had me do some bridal shower invitations for her which I've just wrapped up. In between, I've been working on putting together some christmas cards and cards with the milk bands (for nursing). I had a few bites for the letterpress holiday card on etsy but haven't had a sale yet. I've also been perusing ebay and briarpress for a tabletop letterpress from heaven! After one workshop, I'm hooked and hope I can get a press of my own one day and do more letterpress!!

I took the handmade pledge

I took the handmade plege on buyhandmade.org!
I've just finished some wedding thank you cards for a former client, some baby shower invitations for one of my best friends and hopefully have a bridal shower job coming up.
I am hoping to keep busy and always thinking of new ideas. Looking for a good supplier to offer purse valets with paper detail. Also will be trying to launch some cards with milkbands. So lots going on and lots of fingers crossed!

Letterpress

Last weekend I attended a letterpress workshop with Railway Station Press in Alexandria, VA.

Stuart Bradley was great and the experience was awesome! I learned about the letterpress process and the C&P pilot tabletop and made some holiday cards!! They are on crane lettra paper with an ink we mixed to be a blue/grey and also did a blind emboss for the ampersand and "white."

Cards!

Surgery went well and I've been back in the basement making some new cards with seed paper and some coffee cup shaped/themed thank you cards for my nurses. I wasn't able to use the cricut to cut the seed paper which is a major bummer, but you can cut any shape out of cardstock and just use as a template for hand cutting. A marvy uchida large punch did work on the seed paper though so that's also an option for some projects. Here's a few of the images:

Plantable Seed Paper

I just ordered some plantable seed paper so it should be on its way shortly! I have experimented with some sample sheets and was actually sending out "free" bookmarks with my company info on them with all the books I swap with paperbackswap.com. I've recently pposted more books which are flying off my shelves but no more paper so no more bookmarks. :(

I'm also going to incorporate the paper in some holiday card ideas I'm conjuring up!! YES the retailers are already preparing for the holidays, can you believe it?! Although I am usually a summer gal, I'm kind of looking forward to the cooler weather. I think it's because I don't feel well with my arm/neck and just want to wear big comfy clothes and hibernate!! Surgery is on Thursday...

Wedding Favors - chair boxes

Just finished up a wedding favor project - chair boxes. The couple customized the color of the chairs and the ribbon, we also recreated a mongram which had been incorporated in their wedding invitations. I am not sure what they are going to fill them with, but I referred them to http://www.candywarehouse.com/ which is a great source for bulk candy and you can search by occasion or color! I am selling the same chairs and other favors on etsy right now at: http://www.inervainvitations.etsy.com/ but once these listings are over, will be moving to dolceinvito.etsy.

Professional and Personal ~ Dolce Invito

New name and hopefully new clients in the near future! I came up with Dolce Invito which is Italian for sweet invitation. It sounds nicer than Minerva and is not in use by others like Carta Bella was. SO I'm testing it out. Once I would open a brick and mortar store, I have visions of cotton candy machines and cupcakes with custom invitation orders.

On a personal note, recently, I haven't been able to use my right arm which is causing a little bit of trouble for working on projects and even blogging. I have another herniated disc. I already had a discectomy and fusion at C5-C6, C6-C7 in November of 2006 but it looks like I've got to go back under the knife. :( I had the x-ray and MRI on Friday and will see the Doctor again on Tuesday to discuss surgery and scheduling.

Hope til hope endures... hopefully from this suffering good things will also come my way.