Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Greeting Card Sentiments

Being a designer of handmade greeting cards, I used to agonize over whether or not to include greeting card verses or sentiments on the inside of my cards, or if I should leave them blank. I was terrified that leaving cards with no inside message told my customers I was lazy, uncreative or just downright uninterested, but that just wasn't the case. I just didn't want to create barriers for my customers when there didn't need to be.


So, roughly two years ago I set up a poll on my website and blog and sent some of my most frequent customers a survey of their preference towards handmade greeting cards having or not having inside messages. I was shocked that an overwhelming 82% would rather their handmade cards be left blank inside. Since then, I designed all of my handmade greeting cards to be left blank inside for individuals to leave their own messages, verses and sentiments and felt pretty good about it.

Until the other 18% resurfaced... :)

To this day, many, if not all of my custom orders for greeting cards DO request that the inside of their cards have a sentiment, and more likely than not, they tell me to choose --- which can be even more agonizing in the middle of the creative process. To help me get through it, I compiled a list of greeting card sentiments and verses in various categories. These lists can be found in two of my hubs:

Greeting Card Verses

Humorous Birthday Card Messages

Hopefully these hubs will not only be helpful to those of you looking for the perfect message to write in your greeting cards but to my peer-designers who come across this sometimes-frustrating task in the midst of their creative process. Enjoy!

Thanks for stopping by!

Saturday, November 16, 2013

Hey There! Handmade All Occasion Card

This digi stamp is quickly becoming one of my favorites. I just love, love, love it! (And it's easy to color which is always a bonus.)

 

The stamp is from Mo's Digital Pencil and it was colored with Prismacolors and chalks.

Thanks for stopping by!



Wednesday, November 13, 2013

My Little Helper

Last night, in the middle of organizing my DMC and pattern supplies, I took a quick dog-nap with Cooper, our 7-month old Shih Tzu. When I woke up, this is how I found him:


In case you can't tell by the photo, he is fast asleep not only with his head in his dog bowl, but with one of my embroidery hoops around his neck. I still can't figure out how exactly that happened, but based on the tiny little teeth marks on the ring, I'm assuming he was using it as a chew toy before it ended up being a necklace. 

He didn't seem to mind that it was there at all. In fact, while I snapped photo after photo of him, he had a dopey little grin on his face like he was just so proud of himself.


I'm thinking this definitely falls into the category of "you can't make this stuff up." :)

Thanks for stopping by!