getting down to the last chance to order valentines in time for me to ship them for valentines day. if you want ’em, get ’em today!
here’s what i’m up to:
tuesday, february 8, 5:30-8pmLA east side mixed up mixer FREE! this month we’re meeting at the den of hollywood with special co-host, dave waite! join biznik and join in on the fun!
thursday, february 10, 7-10pmbehance / aiga meetup FREE! A casual evening where members of the Behance community and AIGA LA can gather and mingle over cocktails. Not a Behance member? No problem! JoiningBehance is free.
i was just marveling last week about how jam-packed january has been on all fronts: between work and social events, and just the sheer variety of it all. somewhere between realizing i hadn’t cataloged my ever-growing list of guest-blog posts and this lingering feeling after recapping my retreat about how you can never really remember all the great things you did, i got to this point where i realized i needed somewhere to keep track of the smaller steps that lead to the bigger ones. i got the idea of making a book like this as a gift, because it can’t just be me who would like a cheering section in the form of a diary of gold star moments, but i figured i’d try it out first.
enter these fantastic scout books people have been making. luke mysse gave me one of the promotional ones he made back when we spent the day coworking. i’ve gotten a few from friends in the meantime, so rather than archive these as keepsakes [as i do with way too many things] i counted the pages and figured there’s a front & back for each month with room for extra. great! i got out a pen and re-learned once again that, without practice, my handwriting will always be terrible.
i wrote out everything i felt noteworthy and proud of for january, and a couple that got started for february this week. these are usually cool, new things i wasn’t doing before, or opportunities i feel lucky about, milestones with clients, or milestones on my own goals. getting it all down on paper made me happy about this idea all over again, so i’m going to keep the book at my desk and update it whenever i’m feeling good about something i did, or circumstances that go my way, or any time i realize hey, progress has happened!
oh, and see that “updated web content” item on the february list? i did finally catalog the guest-blogging, and never would have imagined this would have happened in 6 months, most of it in the last 3!
how about you, anyone else do something like this? i think it’s going to really help, come year-end assessment time. and before that, it will help anytime i’m having an off day of business pms.
[image: matt lehman]
i don’t have a bunch to say about design today, but what i will say is that this illustrated state motto project 50 and 50 is super cool! i can’t wait till they get to california! thanks designworklife.com for the link.
[image: twig & thistle]
these have been all over the internet this week, and i think they’re brilliant: naturally sweet diy valentines! pick a fruit, pair it with a fruity pun sticker and share a naturally sweet treat with your valentine!
sustainability
it seems like a preponderance of news items involving sustainability came out this week. first of all, these services have been around for awhile, but if you didn’t jump on them before, reduce your junk mail with a selection of mail reduction services. second, if you wondered what it’s like to live as close to zero waste as possible, the zero waste home answers your questions about it. third, i’m astounded to find out that ben & jerry’s has figured out a way to run their ice cream factory on ice cream!
it’s february 1, which means it’s time to get awesome with a fun throwback to school-style valentines. get yourself a set, fill them out, and then sneak over to your co-worker’s desk, hand them to your friends, or stick them on your cereal the roommate’s always eating and tell them they rock! they’re awesome! hanging with them makes your day! if that doesn’t say i love you, the fact that they’re printed responsibly on 100% post-consumer paper in an odd size to maximize sheet use should [i’m just sayin’].
school-style valentines
bring back the fun of school-style valentines! cards come in 4 styles, full design on the front, space to fill in a personal message on the back. all cards are printed on neenah environment 100% post-consumer recycled paper, 100lb uncoated cover stock.
• variety pack: 5 of each style [set of 20], 3″ x 3.75
last week i was watching an interview my friend colleen wainwright did, talking about her year-long hiatus and what she’s been doing in the interim, when got to the part where she said she did a ton of writing. in no small part, 2-3 times the amount of writing than any year previous, but people just didn’t see it. then she had animated it thusly:
do people even realize, for every good thing you see on someone’s site, [this] (small hand gesture) is what you see, and then [TTHHHIIIISSSSSS] is what they’ve done—and my arms go out to infinity!
this SO hit home for me, because i do a ton of stuff, and i try to work it into something here or there, but there are already so many things i want to share that haven’t made it into even a mention in a blog post. you have to do so much in order to get good stuff up anywhere, sometimes it’s a wonder we have time to get the good stuff up at all.
so, thanks colleen! hearing and seeing the concept illustrated was a huge relief to my constant feeling of overwhelm from all the stuff-doing i’ve been up to.
i love these videos that animate the text being sung or spoken, but this one takes it to another level by including all the typos and having the narrator read every one of them.
sustainability
[image: thedieline.com]
the design museum made this awesome young designers kit—but they took it further than simply inspiring young people to get into design, arming them with tools—they did it sustainably with recycled and low-impact materials. bravo! see the whole profile on the dieline.
got a minute to take the first in a multi-part series of steps in learning to go sustainable beyond ink and paper? i’m writing a piece on revisiting all the milestones in a print production process and encouraging we make more sustainable choices over on neenah’s against the grain blog. Eco-Friendly 2011: Think Forward…Then Backwards.
i’m loving this LemonAid project on good.is: a german company mixed up the perfect batch of lemon aid [to their taste, anyway], then figured out how to produce it using all fair trade resources, and then they donate a portion of their profits to fund grass-roots organizations in the countries where they source the ingredients. now that’s cooking with lemons!
one of the unexpected turnouts of the katrina disaster is that some areas are being rebuilt using much more sustainable materials, read up on utne.com: thanks katrina for greener building materials.
design industry
the first of the reviews are in from AIGA LA: Speakeasy, our fellows celebration for the 2010 AIGA fellows. check out michael dooley’s 2-part follow up interviewing john coy: influence and inspiration, part 1: john coy.
with all the talk of annual planning, i think it’s important to remember not to plan so hard you miss unexpected opportunities. justin ahrens shares his perspective on the parse blog: rain or shine: embrace the unplanned.
food
i’m on a bender about using more of the food we buy, and this week i get on everyone’s case about wasting orange peels [among other things] over at LAist. because i’m a curmudgeon who thinks you should dry them and eat them. but look—this other girl at serious eats is also nutty for citrus seasoning with her deliciously italian lemon salt with fennel and chili!
and speaking of going grassroots on the food industry, what about an old-fashioned food swap!? i joined my friend emily’s LAX swappers group here in LA, you should too!
i actually did sing the happy mondays at karaoke this weekend, and it pretty much sounded just how i remember the 90s roadtrips with jenna to san francisco. i’m going to this awesome delab tour tonight, but otherwise working and meeing with various aiga committees tonight.
[image: howdesign.com]
couldn’t have said it better myself, from howdesign.com: Yesterday, Macy’s flagship store unveiled seven new window displays on Broadway in Manhattan featuring stunning paper works by fashion design, fine arts, industrial design, and interior design students from Pratt Institute’s School of Art and Design between 34th and 35th streets. The display showcases sophisticated and beautiful paper looks that compliment Ralph Pucci’s Spring 2011 “GIRL 2″ mannequins as well as inventive paper sculptures and will be on view through January 26, 2011. The work is part of an exhibition titled “Pratt + Paper & Ralph Pucci” that was on view at Pucci’s Gallery Nine Showroom in December 2010.
design industry
back in june, i went to the creative freelancer conference, where we met great people, learned a ton, and put a bunch of great ideas on our to-do lists and gave them to ilise benun to mail back to us in 6 months. i just got mine in the mail last week: my creative freelancer “progress report.”
i wish i weren’t superlatively under so many deadlines this week, or i’d round up more fun food ideas for you. but HEY—this article on kohlrabi i wrote for LAist should more than cover you, precluding of course, that you promise to buy some kohlrabi. seasonal eats: say yes to kohlrabi!
parlato design studio 