Summer Reading

Hello Everyone,

I made you a little something. If you have readers or are a teacher, this is for you. It's a summer reading log to keep track of the books your kiddos are (hopefully) reading over the summer. You can grab it here or on the right under "Freebies." Enjoy!

See you tomorrow!
H

My Favorite Quote, Free for You

Hi Everyone,

Well, as of today I've finished two more items on my 40 x 40 list. The first is #11 - Learn the basics of InDesign. InDesign is a magnificent program that makes creating books, newsletters, and brochures simple... Well, simpler than it would be if you were attempting to typeset traditionally or even using Word. It's a complex program but it is very good at what it does. I'll be reviewing InDesign 101 with Nicole's Classes soon.

The other item that I've checked off is #30 - Make a picture of my favorite quote to have & share. The other class that I just finished was Typography for Beginners at Nicole's Classes. I learned tons about typography and the homework lessons, which were both useful and relevant, allowed me the opportunity to make a picture of my favorite quote. I'm going to have mine professionally printed but I made one for you to print if you like it too.



This is the last stanza of Robert Frost's poem "Two Tramps in Mud Time."  The poem is about Frost, who while chopping wood, is approached by two tramps who indicate that they think he should pay them to do the thing that he loves:

"Nothing on either side was said.
They knew they had but to stay their stay
And all their logic would fill my head:
As that I had no right to play
With what was another man's work for gain.
My right might be love but theirs was need.
And where the two exist in twain
Theirs was the better right--agreed."

Then begins my favorite quote:

"But yield who will to their separation,
My object in living is to unite
My avocation and my vocation
As my two eyes make one in sight.
Only where love and need are one,
And the work is play for mortal stakes,
Is the deed ever really done
For Heaven and the future's sakes."

He was saying that work for love is just as important as work for money. (That's EXTREMELY over-simplified, but it's the gist.)

However, this speaks to me a little differently than how I think Frost intended. I'm trying to make a living doing a thing that I love. I truly am trying to unite my avocation and my vocation and if I am successful in the unification, then my work will be play. It's also a aspiration of mine to learn to enjoy the mundane, homely tasks and to treat them with the care and importance they deserve. It has multiple meanings for me. 

If you like it, you can download it here or grab it from the "Freebies" list on the right. I hope you enjoy it!

I'll see you soon,
Heather

Class Review & A Very Special Printable

Important Announcement: Home Again Jog will be going offline in the middle of October. This printable is now available on Heather B design on the right under "Freebies" Thank you! H.

I am made this poster for my daughter, using techniques I learned in the classes.

Hello Everyone!

First of all, I made another printable to share. As some of you know, we're almost finished with Lucie's room. I wanted to make her a quote for her wall. She's fast approaching her teen years and I wanted something to help remind her, in the midst of all of the pressure to be pretty, to focus on who you are, not just what you look like. So here's a quote from Audrey Hepburn that I hope will help keep that in mind. The one I'm making for Lu is 18" x 24" but I made one for you that is 8" x 10." You can get it here and over on the right under "Freebies." Enjoy!

Now, onto the review!

I just finished two fabulous classes with Nicole's Classes. One was Illustrator - Making a Pattern and the other was Illustrator - Ornaments & Embellishments. *Funny aside, when I told Hun that I had signed up for the classes he was a little annoyed. He said "You don't really sew and why would you want to take a whole class on making ornaments?" He thought that it was sewing patterns and Christmas tree ornaments...*

This is Alma's site where she features
her amazing work. Have a look!

Anyway, these classes are fabulous! They are taught by the uber-talented Alma Loveland who is an Illustrator guru. Both classes are just packed with information and both could be subtitled "Easy Ways to be Awesome at Illustrator" because she shows you so many simple ways to accomplish really cool effects. I have been working with Illustrator for about thirteen years now but I spent a large portion of time saying "WOW! You can do that?!?!" *record scratch* "Hey wait, you can do that? I can't believe I didn't know you could do that! I can't believe how many hours I've spent doing that the long way!" (I think it's best to just get off that thought train right there - no need to tally the hours spent doing stuff the hard way). It's truly amazing how there are shortcuts to making almost anything in Illustrator... Well, except for those "soul sucking" swirly flourishes that our instructor so graciously taught us despite hating them passionately ;-)

In the patterns class we learned how to make simple repeat patterns, random repeat patterns, geometric patterns like honeycomb, diagonal lines, wavy lines and squares, and the coup de grace, damask (this is mine). Alma shows you very precise methods for getting the repeats to work. Some of the patterns are not at all intuitive, like the honeycomb. So when she showed us how it was done, I couldn't believe how simple it was, but I realized that I never would have figured it out on my own. Nothing is quite as cool as working with a design, creating a swatch and having the pattern actually work! I kept celebrating... Hun was not quite as excited as I thought he should be when I showed him the damask. "You don't understand, I DID IT." "I see that." He'd say... I wanted him to clap at least, or something, geez.

In the ornaments class we learned how to make symmetrical objects and tons of different flowers (freehand, live trace, polar grid, etc..) She showed us how to create all of the different brushes, including the pattern brush with the start, end, and both corners (yes, there are two). She opened our eyes to the wonders of the Appearance Panel and how to use it to create graphic styles. You know all of those cute frames that you see everywhere? This is the class where you learn how to make them. What you can do with the pattern brush alone will amaze you! The fancy border, the dotted border, and the flowers in the printable above are all made using the pattern brush. It looks like it takes forever but it's really quick!

Every class has materials that are incredibly useful. You can open all of the documents and see what she did to create all of the different things. She even gives you artwork to use if you don't want to make your own. Alma also critiques your work and is always available by email for questions.

There is one thing that is very important, you must have an understanding of Illustrator to take these classes!  Alma is really wonderful about explaining everything that she's doing, but you will get more out of the class if you don't have to learn the basics. They say this right in the class descriptions, DO NOT be tempted to ignore it. Sign up for Illustrator 101 first.

The only wish that I have is that the embellishment class had some written instructions. The pattern class does, and you can save it all to reference later. The shear volume of information (which is awesome!) does make it difficult to remember. I took lots of notes but the instructions for the patterns class are concise. If they ever make a textbook for these classes, I will buy it immediately!

I loved these classes and I recommend them highly! I am hooked on Nicole's Classes! I'm signed up for a bunch more and I can't wait to take them. The only downside is that now I really want Adobe CS5... hmmm... And I want to redesign this blog (again) ;-)

Oh, and since I didn't take Illustrator 101, I'm ordering their textbook so I can be ready for Illustrator 102 later this spring! Their textbooks are wonderful too!

See you tomorrow!
H

A Paper Ball Ornament from How About Orange

Here is a super-cute ornament from How About Orange. When I saw them I had to make them!

Cute huh? Jessica not only gives you instructions but she actually gives you PDFs with the shapes already set up, so you all you have to do is print them out on pretty paper, cut them out and put them together! She even has three different sizes including one as large as a basketball. I may need to make a basketball-sized one as a permanent decoration. My mum made the basketball one!

Here is one of ours. We made six for the tree!

We used card stock in three colors. They are a little fiddly to put together, make sure you cut the slits at least halfway. Jessica suggests putting the string in first if you're going to make them as ornaments, which is exactly what we did, and it worked very well! Just print, cut and start slotting them together until there are no slots left!

Jessica also has a bunch of other ornaments to make. 

If you want to make your own, head over to How About Orange and start! I love them! The rest of the tuts are on the left side. I may have to try the Spiky Modern Ball too.

Until tomorrow,

H

Paris Party Printables

Update: Here is a (bad) picture of some of the printables. I found my camera charger. Go me.

The topper, banner & wrapper.

Well here are the Paris Party printables as promised. There are thirty-two(ish) pages which include an invitation that you can fill in, cupcake toppers, a complete upper and lowercase alphabet that you can use to make banners, cupcake wrappers, stripes that you can use as envelope liners, a "Menu" card and... and I think that's it.

Here is what the invitation looks like:

And here are what the toppers look like:

You can grab all of them here: Complete Paris Party Printables or on the side under "Freebies."

So, I have this cute little vignette set up on my table, with a cupcake in the wrapper with a topper and a banner saying "YUM". It's all ready for a picture. Yep, all ready, except I can't find the charger for my camera battery. I hid it on myself. I do things like that. It had been plugged in, in my son's room, for months now. I moved it because it didn't "belong" there (to my way of thinking) and now I have no idea where it is. I'm so annoyed and it's my fault. OY! 

Well, I guess I'm off to look for it and when I find it I'll snap and post that picture. It's cute... I guess at the moment you'll have to take my word for that.

Enjoy & see you tomorrow,

H

Another Printable?!?!?!

"Children are made readers on the laps of their parents." 

— Emilie Buchwald

Oh yes, another printable! See how much I love you?

OK, this one is a back to school printable for teachers, parents, or homeschooling parents of readers. It's a reading minutes tracker which I made in five colors (because they are picky little people, I know because I'm the parent of one). The fifth color (page 5) is gray so it can be printed on a photocopier for a classroom. Here it is in the different colors:

Actually, I just realized that parents and teachers of non-readers could use it to the track minutes they read TO their kids. Gosh this is useful! ;-p

There are fifteen weeks of tracking per page so teachers of small classes could print them in color without continually using all of their ink.  What's the quote? It's "So please, oh Please, we beg, we pray, Go throw your TV set away, and in its place you can install, a lovely bookshelf on the wall." from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I think it's the part when the Oompa Loompas are singing to Mike Teavee. The book was better, of course.

Note: It's a BIG FILE, I used the high quality setting so give it a minute to load.

Here is the link to the printable: Minutes Tracker, it's also on the side of the page under Freebies.

Please share this with any and all teacher and parents you know who might enjoy it!

Until tomorrow,

H

I Made You Something!!!

Update: My friend has calculated the cost and it's $.08 per load. Eight cents! Sweet! (I vacuum at least that much in pennies every week... I suspect I'll regret that one day.)

This is one of the many times that I have more month than money. Tomorrow is payday (hooray!) and boy howdy am I looking forward to payday. Earlier this week we started to run out of stuff, like we do, all the time, and this time I ran out of laundry detergent. I did not run out of laundry. I can't think of a non-apocalyptic reason why I would ever run out of laundry, it multiplies like rabbits, I swear the laundry in this house is sentient, it hides behind doors and under beds waiting to surprise me after I think I grabbed all of it. Tricksie laundry.

Anyway, I used to make my own laundry powder and I stopped, for no good reason other than it's easier to buy it. I have all of the stuff to make it I just didn't do it... but desperate times call for detergent making so I thought I share the recipe with you. NOT JUST ANY RECIPE, but a cute one that I designed which you can print out along with a label to put on the jar. Follow the link to print out your own Lemony Laundry Powder recipe and label.  Here's the label, below.

Cute huh?

So here's the recipe and some stuff you should know when you make it.

Lemony Laundry Powder (Formerly Sayward's Homemade Laundry Detergent)


1 1/4 cup white vinegar
1 cup baking soda

1 cup washing soda
1 cup borax
1/4 cup liquid castile soap

15 drops lemon essential oil 

Mix all in a big, non-reactive bowl. (AKA NOT Metal). It will need to dry in the bowl overnight. It is a moist, lumpy powder when it's finished.
Use 2 Tbsp per normal load and ¼ c for extra dirty loads.

Here's the bad news. This mixture will likely seize up on you and turn into a block. It is possible that the seizing could be avoided if you were to stir it until it begins to dry. I never do that so it always turns into a block on me. To undo that, run it through a food processor, scrape it with a spoon, mash it with a potato masher or break it up with your fingers. I'll admit this aspect is kind of a pain in the neck but it's worth it.

Why is it worth it? Three reasons. First, the initial ingredients are cheap, (unless you buy Dr. Bonner's castile soap but even then you get a lot of bang for your buck) and they make TONS of powder. Your cost per load is pennies, literally. Second, this stuff cleans better than anything on the shelf and it is very gentle on your clothes. Third, it's easy on the environment and on the skin. You can use it for babies clothes and for people with sensitive skin. I have a child with excema who can't have anything harsh but he is fine with this.

Here are some sources:

Lemon essential oil - Rose Mountain Herbs 

Castile soap for $6.00 - $8.00 for 32 oz. Iherb.com

Washing soda can be found at Hannafords if you're in New England and hardware stores.

Borax is at hardware and grocery stores as well.

Get the big boxes and a large vinegar because you can make everything you need to clean your house from these items.

So, here's my jar of Lemony Laundry Powder, complete with label.

ta-dah!

Enjoy & see you tomorrow!

H