Computer Banning

I have made a huge decision this week.  Since Mr. Fantastic has been away, I have been reluctant to start very many projects, let alone finish any of the ones that I had on my list to finish while he was away.  Part of it is loneliness and part of it is laziness.  My school work has been suffering as well.  Most of the time it is because I don't feel like doing much.  I don't like that one bit though.  I need to do stuff.

Now, I have done stuff, but it is not what I want to actually do in the long run.  In other words, I have been the worlds biggest procrastinator!  No good.  What have I done to procrastinate, you ask.  Well, I have an addiction.  Dun, dun, dun!  I am addicted to the internet!  Yuck!

So, my biggest hugely big project starts today, April 15th.  It is called "THE COMPUTER BANNING PROJECT"  *gasp* Yes, I am actually going to do this, and not just for a week either.  I am banning myself from the computer from now until Summer is over!  Holy Crap!  You read that right, I am banned from the computer for 160 days!

Okay, so that sounds extremely dramatic!  I think that is exactly what I need though - dramatic change - in order to be happier, more productive, and an overall better person.  However, let me say this, there are exceptions that will make this seem far less dramatic.  So, here are my "rules" to follow in order for this project to be successful:

1.  Computer and Internet use is acceptable for school.  Duh, I'm going to school online so I can't exactly ban myself from that if I want to get anywhere with my education.
2.  Messenger and Video Messenger are acceptable for use with AND ONLY WITH Mr. Fantastic.  With him away, it would hardly be a good idea for me to ban that.  I do need to see him/talk with him from time to time in order to keep myself sane and for the obvious reason of keeping our relationship in tact!
3.  Since email is also a very important tool for communication, I will allow myself to check my email from my phone.  By checking it from my phone, it will keep me from accidentally getting caught up and getting online.
4.  Each week I will allow myself to watch my 3 television shows on Hulu.  Since Hulu is on the internet, I will need to use my computer/internet for this.
5.  Each week I may also have 2 hours of "play time" on the internet to update my blog, and maybe use pinterest to inspire me for new recipes and projects. 
6.  I may use my phone a few times a week when it becomes important to update my facebook status in order to show my family that I have not jumped off a cliff somewhere and I am still alive!

Oh my goodness, I still can't quite believe that I have decided to do this.  I am obsessed with the internet. 

I would challenge you to try something similar.  I am not suggesting that you give up the internet for 160 days, but try doing it for a day maybe, or even a week.  I think that you would be surprised at all the things that you can accomplish in that time-frame.  When we aren't distracted by technology, it leaves us plenty of time to fill up with things that actually matter - family, friends, hobbies, talents, new food experiments, going to the gym, gardening, journaling, crafting, photography, and the list just goes on and on!  Try it!

This last week, although I have not banned myself, I have tried to cut down on my time.  Look at what I have accomplished:

Got the living room a little more organized

Hung up new artwork in the living room - this is still not complete though

Created a cute little nook in the entryway

Straitened up the formal living room and got a rug for in there

Made and drank a lovely sangria

Put together a staircase for Pugly Butt to climb into bed with

Started my seeds for the garden

Planted Sweet Basil in the pugly planter

Got my hairs did!  Had all the ugly unhealthy stuff cut off and added some layers

Drew up plans for the garden as well as had a friend help me get the lumber from Lowes

Have you done anything great and fun this week?
Loves!!!

Olive Juice

Have you ever heard of people saying olive juice instead of I Love You.  If you watch someone say it, it actually looks like they are saying I Love You.  It's kind of one of our things from time to time, so when I had to design three posters for one of my classes, it came to mind.  The posters are movie posters advertising a fictitious autobiographical romantic comedy.  Want to see what I came up with?

The idea of them is to use a phoot of ourselves and use Photoshop to manipulate it.  The first poster has to make use of changing our photo.  The second has to change another aspect of the images and focus on color painting.  The third poster must use glyphs.  all three must have underlying similarities and be considered part of a series.  My favorite is the third poster because I taught myself this very cool comic book technique.  I only wish it had not taken so long to do.  Do to time constraints I did not have time to add Mr. Fantastic to this one.  Perhaps this will be a free time type of thing!
Loves!!!

52 Lists. 52 Weeks. Goals for February

HAHAHAHAHA!!!!  That's what I get for being late all the time - a list that doesn't make sense for me to make!  I'm pretty sure this has happened to me before, right?!  Interesting!
Well, I know what I will do, I will share with you my list of things to try and accomplish in the next two months while Mr. Fantastic is away.  Here it is:
Paint the Mudroom
Build a bench and put up hooks in the Mudroom
Complete the tile back splash in the Kitchen
Paint the Kitchen
Put the handles on the cabinets in the Kitchen
Stain the table dark
Break all the tile out of the center of our dinning table and re-tile it
Finish the wainscoting in the 1/2 bath
Put up artwork in  the 1/2 bath
Find a little cupboard for the 1/2 bath in order to store toilet paper
Make and hang up curtains for our stairwell
Sew a seat cushion for the window seat in the stairwell
Paint the cord hider in our living room to match the wall
Paint some comic book inspired canvases for the gamer room
Hang shelves in the gamer room
Finish painting the wall in our Bedroom
Hang up the curtains and shelves in our bedroom
Paint the tops of the night-stands in our bedroom
Finish decorating our bedroom
Paint the master bathroom
Build a shelf and mirror frames in the master bath
Paint the guest bathroom
Install bead-board in the guest bathroom
Decorate the guest bathroom
Complete the "In this house we do..." painting in our entryway
Set up the digital photo frame that Mr. Fantastic got me for Valentine's Day 2 years ago
Make or buy a rug for our hallway
Finish making my jewelry holder/display
Paint the door edges of all the doors a bright and awesome random color!
Hang up lots of pretty pictures
Work on putting together my office/studio/craft-room/school room
And that's it!  Ha - I know, you are probably wondering, "that's it?"  It sure is a ton of stuff to accomplish in 2 months.  I will probably not accomplish even half of it, but wish me luck.  When I am not watching television, I will be working hard on this stuff.  That means I am going to also have to be more efficiant in doing my school work.  I really need to start a time planner again!

Well, I hope you all are enjoying the weekend!  Is the weather nice were you are at?
Loves!!!

Time for New Design

Hey all, I was getting tired of my blog design.  I'd love to completely revamp it and make it super awesome but Idon't have time to do it myself and I don't have the monies to have someone do it for me, so I once again used the templates.  However, I'm loving my new design and would love for you to stop over and tell me what you think!

Hope your Monday was a super funday!
Loves!!!

Good Design vs. Great Design - A visual example

Hello everyone, and Happy Weekend!!  Hooray!  Sorry I have been so crazy busy.  I worked a lot of overtime this week and still had to do school and whatnot.  Speaking of school, I have a design to share with you.  I wanted to share an example of how I bring my designs from good to great.

 

 

 I completed some edits that really make it look a lot better.  I messed with the images to add some inner and outer glow as well as a drop shadow and bevel.  I think this makes them pop a little more while not looking like they are floating off the page.  I muted the background color to provide more contrast between it and the foreground.  I changed up the font color for the quote because I really wanted it to be navy blue and was told it looked black.  The contrast is a lot stronger now and makes for better readability.  I also messed with the inner shadow to make it a little more dynamic and match up with the images better.  As for the part, "act like an animal"  I changed the font as well as the font color.  I think this helps with the hierarchy and puts a better emphasis on the entire message I am portraying here.  I want people to act like the animals that do not lie!  Next, I changed to position of that phrase to make it more a part of what was being said.  I wanted to unify it with the quote and did so by placing it next to it.  The differences in color help to keep each part separate.  Lastly, I brought the text closer to the center to give the format a better top to bottom balance.  By doing this I also created negative shapes that echo each other - the negative "L" shape on top of the design flips over and repeats at the bottom of the design.

If anyone has any further suggestions, they would be greatly appreciated!!

Loves!!!

Critique Me: Shape and Space

This project turned out way better than I expected it to.  I spent a lot of time perfecting it.  The goal was to create a collage image that emphasized shape and space.  Below the image you can find explanations for what we should be thinking about while creating this.  Basically, the way that I understood it was that the placement of each element was supposed to represent it's distance from the viewer.  Things that I are smaller are further away.  Things that are behind other things are further away.  We also were to make sure that our positive shape and negative shapes were balanced at 50% each.  Come Wednesday, I will have to explain myself and critique my own work.  I'd love to hear some constructive criticism from my readers before I critique it myself!  Let me know what you think of this:

• Spatial Plane: The spatial plane is the area that your design will be composed within. It is made from the dimensions of height and width. In this case, your spatial plane is 8.5" x 11".
• Shape: Shape is the illusion of three-dimensional form, created with value, and without the benefit of line work.
• Positive and Negative Space:
  • Positive space is defined as the subject matter in your collage. This will be defined by the images that you choose. For each positive space element, find an image that you can cut along the edge, thus defining the shape of the image.
    
    Be sure that your images are of large enough scale that they will work well in your composition. Images that are too small will not work, as you will need too many of them to properly balance your composition.
    
    Use great caution when cutting your positive space images. Cut cleanly to the edge of the subject using your X-Acto knife. Be sure to use a cutting surface under your image to protect your working area.
  • Negative space is defined as the space that you will place your positive space images on, and relates to the mid-ground and background. Build your negative space as you would a background to lay your positive space images on, and build your composition from the bottom up. Your positive and negative space should be balanced at about 50% positive space over 50% negative space background.
• Composition: Composition refers to the visual balance within your collage. Will you use elements of symmetry, asymmetry, repetition, rhythm? How will you find visual balance within your composition using your cut shapes? Your composition should be visually balanced with a good ratio of 50% positive image and 50% negative space as a general rule of thumb.
• Compositional planning: Before you glue anything down, play with your shapes and backgrounds to find the very best visual balance.
• Scale: Scale relates to the size of the positive images within the composition. To create a well-balanced composition, have elements that are in the foreground, mid-ground, and background of the composition. Remember, things that are in the foreground are larger than in the mid-ground, and smaller in the background.
• Proximity: Proximity refers to the spatial relationship of one shape or object to another.
• Overlap: Images that overlap create the illusion of space. The shape or object in front that overlaps an image in the mid-ground or background creates the illusion of space because of this overlap.
• Image resources: Magazines, brochures, periodicals, junk mail. Find photographic images that are bold and large that you can incorporate into your collage. A minimum of three images and maximum of eight images (including one or two background images) will be sufficient. You may also use found materials, such as foil, string, and textural surfaces to incorporate into your collage.

Let Me Explain

 

The very first thing that I did for this project was start researching quotes.  I chose the theme of design/art because I really wanted to emphasize the elements and principles of design and have a chance to practice them again in a very obvious way.  As I mentioned before, I believe that the most important element of design is line, so when I came across this quote that spoke of line, I knew that it would be perfect and offer a lot of options for a poster design. 
The first thing that I decided upon was a color scheme.  I chose to use a triadic color scheme to create a strong visual contrast. In a triadic color scheme, the colors create good contrast (I love contrast) but also remain harmonious and compliment each other.  Not one color calls for more attention than another.  Through experimenting, I discovered that it was best to choose one primary color in my palette and use less of the other two colors.  This helped keep the focus on the important part - the quote itself.  I also decided to add in a neutral color for more interest without being overpowering.
My original thoughts about ways to illustrate the quote involved a box, but it seemed too cliche.  I happened to look at some notes I had laying on the table and realized that I have a bad (or good?) habit of writing on lined paper but not writing in the lines of the paper.  This stood out to me as an excellent way to give more meaning to the quote.  I knew that I would have to incorporate this idea into the poster design.  I continued to brainstorm other ways that I could illustrate not staying within the lines.  I came back to the idea of the box and realized that the outside format of the poster could serve as a box and I could create an illusion that my design continues outside of the box.
This idea brought me to yet another idea of repetition.  I knew that my quote was not long enough or popular enough to only use one time if I wanted it to extend beyond the edges of the design.  I would need it to repeat several ties so that the audience would be able to read each word of the quote and piece it all together in the correct order to understand the concept.  I decided to write the quote repeatedly within a text-box larger than the format of my design so that each visible line of text would have a slightly different placement than the ones before it or after it, guaranteeing that each word of the quote would at some point be visible within the design format. 
In the end, I manipulated each line of text so that I could highlight a word on each line in a way that made the entire quote readable in one flowing line. The highlighted text runs from the top left corner and curves around the poster in a way that defys normal left-to-right reading habits but at the same time, it demands to be read in a proper sentence because of the emphasis that the bright pink places on the text. 
To imitate the curving pink text, I chose to curve each line of text as well.  This creates a peaceful rhythm that, starting from the top of the design, seems to ripple down the poster to the bottom, again bringing the eye from top to bottom and reenforcing the readability.  I chose a font that incorporates line in order to once again bring to surface this important element of design.  To show hierarchy within the text, I used a couple techniques: 1) I made some words a larger point size than others (You Don't Have To, and LINES).  I also made these words in all uppercase letters. And  2) I used color to color in the word lines to emphasis it.  Lastly, I chose to make that color go outside the lines of the word "LINES" to complete the emphasis on line and to prove the point of the quote.

No Matter What

Here is my latest project for school:

Have a lovely weekend!

Loves!!!

Design Principles

Hey all, did you all have a great week?  My week was super busy and out of the ordinary.  I worked a crazy shift that I am not used to.  The great thing about this week was that I was working for a different section of the company like I will be doing for a while more.  I learned so much this week about my job.  It was truly exciting and amazing.  I got to see so many things that I had never before seen.  I love this! 
This week was also my 4th week of classes.  It's hard to believe that we are already almost half-way through the term.  I thought I would share with you a really simple assignment that we had in my design fundamentals class.  Let me know what you think of it!

Upper Left – Rhythm/Movement

I’m interested in progressive rhythm. Starting at the top of the design and going toward the middle, soft background lines appear closer and closer until meeting and then begin pulling further apart again as the eye continues to the bottom of the design. This rhythm involves repletion of lines, however the lines ( or rectangular white negative space shapes) are changing in a regular manner that creates a progressive rhythm with a calming effect that is enhanced by the horizontal lines. Where the lines converge in the center, it creates a visual focal point enhanced by the addition of the darker jagged line that crosses through the design. While the horizontal lines create a peaceful effect, the jagged line creates a sense of motion. The line begins on the left and travels to the right. As it pulls our eye across the design, the line change abruptly at each point and begins traveling in a new direction. The diagonal slices suggest rushed and impulsive movement. The overall design is balanced in two ways. First, it is balanced between calming and jarring. Second, it is balanced by a dynamic combination of top to bottom symmetry in the background, and left to right asymmetry in the foreground.

Upper Right: Emphasis

In this design, the light value of the letter R is in complete contrast to the rest of the elements. It is centered in the design. Obviously, it is the focal point of the design. The use of a letter helps in creating this focal point. The subtle use of lines coming in from the edges of the design leads our eyes to the center as well. As one last use of emphasis, a bold dark shape that resembles a comic book style thought cloud or a star-like sparkle surrounds the letter R. The viewer’s eyes are first drawn to the center of the design, then they follow the directional points toward the edge of the design as they would follow an arrow , are finally brought back into the center through the subtle lines and once again focus on the emphasized focal point – the letter R.

Lower Left: Scale

To enunciate scale, this design uses both large scale and small scale to directly oppose each other. Initially the eye is drawn to the large white circles heavily contrasted by the black background. There is an obvious diagonal separation running from lower left to upper right where the black background gradually becomes a white background through the use of pointillism. This transition draws the eye upward to the smaller scale black dots that that gradually decrease in number the closer the eye comes to the top left corner of the design. Balance is obtained through the amount of texture and value on the opposing sides of the diagonal. The combination of asymmetry, pointillism, value transition, and repetition creates a unified design.

Lower Right: Proximity/Repetition

The proximity of the tightly grouped line combinations in the center of the design create the focal point or main component of the design. As the shapes ripple outward, they grow further apart and less defined. This creates less of a draw to the eye. Despite the change in shape as the eye moves outward, there is still a repetitive implication through the use of curves that imitate the initial shape running through the center of the design. Adding more visual interest, the soft stripes of the background repeat the vertical lines that format the edges of the design. This subtle mimicking of the formatted edges in close correlation to the calmness of a ripple, the repetitive elements of this design combine to create a soft design that also mimics a cloudlike shape of weightless dreamlike tranquility.

I'm super excited for this weekend.  Tomorrow night, my friend is coming over so that we can work on decorations for the party we are having on Saturday.  It is a gender reveal party for some friends who don't yet know the gender of the baby they are having.  My friend that is coming to help me decorate and I are the only ones that know!  Super exciting!
I hope your weekend is just as wonderful!
Loves!!!

Regarding Being a Designer

As designers we have an intended message.  Do we always get that message across?  No.  However, there are certain things we do that increase the likelihood of getting the intended message across.  The most important thing we can do is to know our audience.  Without knowing our audience, there is no way to understand our message in the same way that they will understand it.  Often times we don't necessarily have commonalities with the audience so research becomes an important part of the design process.  We must research not only our message, but our audience.  We must know their culture, what they find funny, what they find sad, what angers them, makes them smile, interests them, turns them away.  Each design project that we set out to complete must begin with visits to a library, surfing the internet, or immersing yourself within the audience.  Success as a designer depends upon this.
Unity is the most important of all the design principles.  Without unity, a piece feels lost and broken.  Each part of a work of art must have a purpose.  Each brush stroke, each line, each hue, each subject within the piece is there for a reason This purpose or reason is what causes unity within a piece.  Without purpose and reason, each element of the piece serves simply as an individual part rather than an entire whole.  My example of unity is the picture of all the hands interlocking.  Separately they are just hands, but together they are a web of support and unity.

Line is the most important design element.  It is the simplest form of design but without it, nothing else would exist.  Lines or the combination of multiple lines create shape, pattern, texture, space, motion, and value.  Now you don't need line to create color, but color is also just the cherry on top of the ice-cream sunday....it doesn't make or break the sunday, but it makes it just a little better.  In sticking with this analogy, line on the other hand is the ice cream.  You can't have a sunday without the ice-cream.  Without the ice cream, it's just toppings; it's just the extra stuff that makes the sunday a sunday instead of a basic bowl of ice cream.  The example image I chose for demonstrating this concept shows merely a bunch of lines.  However, each of the lines combines into a shape. The lines create a pattern and texture. The shapes create texture as well.  The positioning of the shapes creates motion and an illusion of space as the shapes move back and forth in front of you coming closer and then receding into the distance.  without the simple line, none of this would be possible.
Source
Well, I hope you have a wonderful start to your week.  Wish me luck in starting my new position tomorrow.  I'm a little nervous and have no real idea of what to expect.  Scary!!
Loves!!!

One Little Word

Sometimes one little word can mean so much.  I think that is the reason that I participate in the One Little Word challenge.  In years past I have chosen more than one word, but this year I only have one.  This is a big thing, guys!  So, you ask, what is my one little word for 2012? 

One of my past professors used this word as a mantra for designers.  This is the one thing she said that she could never teach us to be.  It's the one thing we ould have to be though if we wanted to be successful designers.  I'ts not enough to simple thing and design.  You must instead be curious enough to ask questions, to explore every option, to learn about things that are related to things that are related to things that are related to what we want to design about.  Curiosity is one of the most important traits that a designer can have because without it you never get better, you can't stay competitive, and your success will be limited to imitation.  

My intention for 2012 is to make it a year of curiosity.  I will be curious about my job, including a new positionn that I start on Monday with the testing group.  I will be curious about my school classes including those that I don't really want to take.  I will be curious about books and read a lot.  I will be curious about my art and experiment with new ideas.  I will be curious about crafts and try several new things.  I will be curious about my health and stay on top of getting back to being healthy.  I will be curious about my limits and try to stretch them.  Most of all, I will be curious about myself and explore who I am.

This should be a very curious year.  I'm super excited.  So, inn keeping with this mantra, what are you curious about?  Do you have anything you want to know about me?  About my goals?  More about my mantra?  Are there any other things that you are curious about?  fill me in, because I just might be curious about it too!

 

Our New Home - It's Coming Along!!

Hey all!  Just wanted to show you some of the updated photos of the house!

Loves!!!

52 Lists. 52 Weeks. Week 21

Well, since Halloween has come and gone, I really don't have a list of things to do in preparation for it, so I thought instead I would write a list of what I need to do to prepare for Christmas!  Enjoy!

Christmas presents that I still need to buy: My Uncle, my Brother-in-law, My Dad, my Grandmother, My Friend Erica, Erica's daughter, Our friend AJ, our friend Mike and his fiance, our friend Chris, Mr. Fantastic, my puppy, Two of my brothers, one of my sisters, Mr. Fantastic's mom, and his cousin!

Yummy treats I need to make:  German fried thingies, chocolate pretzels, caramel popcorn, vodka infused gummy bears!

 Design, write and send our Christmas cards

Wrap presents

Packing for our Christmas trip home

Call the airport about our puppy traveling with us

Decorate the tree and put up decorations

Keep Calm

Loves!!!

Finding Peace

I really am here!  All goes oh, so well!  Life is treating me kindly.  Happiness is all around!  Things have finally quieted down and now I am back to blog.  Now, please know that at first, it will be slow, but I'll get there.  In the meantime, here are some videos for you to watch!  Enjoy!


Hudson - Against The Grain from Dropbear on Vimeo.





Loves!!!

Our New Home - Building, Moving and Starting to Decorate

Alright, alright, alright!  I think I have held off long enough on a post about our new home.  Let me tell you a little bit about it, and then I will share some pictures...ok, a lot of pictures!  When my younger sister was down visiting, her and I must have looked at a million houses and each one just had little things we didn't like.  A huge issue we kept running into was houses that smelled like pets or had problems from their last owners.  One day we decided that we just really wanted to look at a home that was still being built.  The home we had chosen was in the drywall stages and already was being planned as a model home so it had many upgrades planned for it.  When little me and I looked at it, we loved it!  The floor plan was huge and spacious, it had an upstairs, and was in a cute new neighborhood.  We decided to bring Mr Fantastic to take a look.  He took a look and said ok without even looking at the other similar model homes that were finished!  so the next day we started the paperwork and went to pick out a few things that were not already set in stone.  We decided to upgrade to granite countertops in the kithen and Marble counters in the bathrooms.  In the end, we did have them move the kitchen island out 18 inches and put down a little more of the "wood" flooring.  We are so happy that we made these changes.
Move in day was pretty easy because the moving company did most of the hard work.  They did all the heavy lifting!  All we really have to do is unpack the boxes.  Easy enough, right?  Yeah, well, it's a month later and we are still unpacking, and painting, and decorating!
So now comes the fun part.  We really like color and pattern and all that jazz, so we have been working super hard on getting it the way we want it.  The pictures below are some from the finishing stages, the moving stage, and then the beginning of the decorating phase.  I hope you enjoy!

getting ready for siding

starting to look pretty

the

picking out flooring and granite

the great room

again

getting a window seat

getting the kitchen cabinets in

deciding on a backsplash

paint colors for the living room

bathroom vanity

the entry

starting to get the flooring down

the outside is complete

bathroom colors

things i found for the living room

move in day

dinning room colors

picking out cabinet handles

do the boxes ever end?

a full garage!

the crafting studio

getting the fridge

brown for the family room

Getting the stripes started in the family room

putting on the finishing color - turquoise!

yellow in the laundry room

gray in the master bath

my first attept at the master bedroom walls

the stencil just did not meet where it needed to so....

I switched it up and tried again!

Here is what I have so far!

Mr Fantastic picked this out for me and put it together!

The rest of the bedroom furniture

and our new bed!

 Alright, I promise to put more pictures up really soon!  since it is Friday for me, I hope your weekend rocks! 
Loves!!!