10 Tips for Taking Great Kid Photos

Still haven't tackled the kids and gotten them to cooperate in front of the Christmas tree? Check out this awesome article from Photojojo by Rachel Devine. My favorite advice in this article is to capture each family member's personality.
Still haven't ordered your Christmas cards? There's still time! So read on and then get those pictures uploaded to our site! Here is one of my favorite new designs this year. The photographer is the amazing 205 Photography

Recipe cards

Some of the most cherished things I own are the recipes my mom, grandmother, and my husband's grandmother have passed along to me. It is a true blessing to flip through their old recipe cards to see paper styles "back then" and to see the recipe written in their actual handwriting, especially since my grandmother has already stepped into eternity.  It is funny to see terms like "a pinch", "simmer for a while", etc.! These cards are a tiny glimpse into their lives before I was even born. It is a neat exercise to compare my homemaking abilities with theirs.

What a great gift our recipe cards would be for a mom, grandmother, aunt, or even a newlywed. Ask these ladies in your life to write their favorite recipe on one of these cards and give it back to you for your own collection...and for your own memory-making! P.S. We also have some great designs for men!

***CYBER MONDAY SPECIAL*** Through Wednesday, Nov. 30th, double your order for free on Recipe Cards, Enclosure Cards, and Gift Stickers! 20 recipe cards for $30 NOW 40 for $30

Ellen

New cards!

I am so excited that all of our Holiday designs are now up on our site. Here is one of my new favorites, but there are so many more new ones! Check them out here! 

CC958 (front)

 

CC958 (back)

Our biggest sale of the year!

Holy cow! We're excited to announce our biggest sale of the year!

Now through 9-30-11, order your Holiday Cards and receive not only 25% off, but also free return address labels or have your address printed on the envelope

AS IF that weren't enough...we 're also running a buy one, get one free on flat and folded notecards, stickers, enclosure cards, and bag tags!

You may remember my post from last year containing our Christmas card recap. Did you get a great picture of the family over the summer? Check out the recap to get some idea and then get this task marked off your Holiday list!

Follow me on Pinterest!

I've been hearing about Pinterest for several months but never took the time to sign up. Holy moly...now I see what all the fuss has been about. Basically, you see things online and you "pin" them to these "boards" to be able to keep tabs on everything you are interested in, or want to come back to later. I just signed up last night, so I don't have tons of "pins" yet, but click here  to follow me and see what all neat things inspire me!

4th of July Invitation

Maybe because I am still trapped in my hometown because of my Little Lamb's baseball schedule, but I am pining away for Independence Day and the chance to head out of town!!!  The food, friends, and FUN always make for a special day to celebrate our great nation. Are you planning a get together? Check out our new Fireworks invitation. 

Help your kids get along this summer with our FREE printable!

 

http://www.scribd.com/doc/56274473/Play-Together-Chart

My Little Lambs are 3 years apart, just far enough to really get on each other's nerves, but close enough to reasonably be expected to play together ;)  I had one of those "ah-ha" parenting moments last week and told them if I "catch" them playing together throughout the summer, they get a sticker on this nifty chart I made. When they get 5 stickers, they get a special treat. So far the treats we've thought up are going to get ice cream, hitting at Total Baseball, and getting balloons at the "party store." (For those who know my Little Lambs well, guess whose idea was what!?!)

Click on the link above and you can download and print this chart off and post on your fridge as I have done. So far, they've gotten 5 stickers last week...but only 1 this week...hopefully it's not going to be a LONG summer ;)

Ellen

Thank You Notes by Jimmy Fallon

Have you heard about the hilarious new book by Jimmy Fallon?

It is called Thank You Notes, and is really, really funny. The BEST thing about it, though, is that he takes out an actual piece of stationery and writes these "thank you notes" on them. LOVE it!!!

Raise them right!

Yesterday afternoon I took my Little Lamb to get a new bike since he's outgrown his last bike. Since we're preparing to leave for the National Stationery Show shortly, I had to go back to work last night, so Daddy took him to try it out. When I got in last night, he had left me this thank you note!
  


I gotta say, I am really proud ;)  After making him write thank you notes for birthday presents for the past 2 years, I feel like I've given him the gift of good manners!  Although he has an entire drawer full of thank you notes that I've designed for him, he chooses a piece of notepad paper, but I couldn't be happier...and prouder!

Ellen

It's Graduation time!

Hard to believe graduation will be a month or 2 from now. Check out our new photo graduation announcements / graduation invitations!  Graduation is all the buzz at our office this year because Stella has one graduation from high school and another from college!

 

 

Little Lamb Design Stickers put to use in Bangladesh

This past fall we had the pleasure of working with Tommy Obenchain as he took the next step towards realizing his dream of using his for-profit company, Taylor Pearl, to help fund his non-profiit, Pearls for Life.

In 2005 he traveled to China and saw an opportunity to import pearls and re-sell them in the U.S.
At the same time he knew he had a passion to provide for the basic needs of some of those most in need.
His concept was born to use a portion of the funds from the sale of fresh water pearls to fund fresh water for children and their families in Bangladesh.  In 2009 he traveled to Bangladesh  to research the problems and the best options to help.  Tommy also worked with several professors at Vanderbilt University, where he is currently a senior. The solution that he decided would have the greatest impact was a Sono filter, which uses rocks, sand, and an arsenic probe to eliminate bacteria, metal and arsenic from the water. 

This fall Tommy used his fall break to travel to Bangladesh and oversee the first installation of the filters.  Our stickers made the trip too, leaving the Pearls For Life logo on the filters provided by his team's efforts.

Over 77 million people drink contaminated water every day in Bangladesh. He has already provided water to about 300 hundred and hopes that number will reach the  thousands in the coming year . He will work full time on Taylor Pearl and Pearls for Life for 18 months after graduating this spring, before starting work for Huron Consulting. 

It has been a pleasure working with Tommy and learning more about the great work he is doing! If you would like to read more about Taylor Pearl and Pearls For Life check out .taylorpearl.com

aTeam Ministries' Heart to HeART Gala

I got an email several months ago from an old friend asking if I wanted to do invitations for a charity event. We get asked to do this a lot, and I am always happy to do whatever I can, but I had no idea how amazing this event was actually going to be. What a blessing to have received this request and to have been invited to the event!  Here is the invitation we created. It was an adaptation of our IV500 design.

Just in case you haven't noticed from my previous posts, I graduated from the best university in the country...and they happen to be 2010's national football champions. Coached by Gene Chizik, I couldn't have been prouder this past year to be an alumna! But this past Saturday, my pride pretty much doubled!  Coach Chizik and his wife, Jonna hosted this benefit for aTeam Ministries  It was actually Jonna's idea and vision and aTeam was blessed to have been chosen by Jonna. Long story short, 10 local childhood cancer patients were partnered with 10 renowned artists and each of the artists and children created artwork to be sold at an auction. Here is an example of the artwork:

 

The evening began with the children arriving by limo!!! Coach Chizik greeted each child, took a photo with the family, and then the children and family entered the event "paparazzi style" down a red carpet. It was SO exciting! Here are the founders of aTeam as their son just got out of the limo.

Coach Chizik spent the next hour or so signing autographs and meeting everyone. Wow, was that exciting! I don't usually get star-struck, but I so was this time...lol! Luckily my husband thanked Coach for the email he sent our brother-in-law when his wife passed away last Fall...because I could think of NOTHING to say ;) Except maybe to say, "I'm taller than you in my heals," but maybe that wouldn't have been the best choice?

Afterwards was dinner, and because Jonna sadly had to miss the event, Coach's 13 year old daughter stepped up and filled in for her mom. I will tell you, they are doing something right with that girl. She spoke so eloquently about her faith and about how much her mother and father loved the Lord. I doubt there was dry eye in the room.

Next was the AUCTION! It was SO exciting. So fast-paced and cut-throat ;)  So fun to see how much money the paintings went for and how much aTeam benefitted.

 

Being the art lover and Auburn girl I am, this was pretty much the highlight of my year...at least until my son caught an amazing hit in left field the next day at his baseball tournament ;)

Help needed to support a great cause!!!

What a privilege I had last Fall to be asked to design a State of Alabama license plate that will benefit Cystic Fibrosis research, and treatment and care for those affected by it.  Not only is it super cute ;)  but of the $50 it costs, $41.25 will go straight towards the fight against CF. It was an honor to work in conjunction with Laps for CF, the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, and Children's Hospital.  Will you consider helping this worthy cause? The organization must have 1000 of these commitments to purchase to make the funding a reality. They still need to sell a few hundred and through this Sunday they are half off, so visit http://www.lapsforcf.org/licenseplate and fill out your commitment to purchase!

GOOP's A Day in the Life. . .

Ever heard of the blog GOOP? It is written by Gwyneth Paltrow. I am a huge fan. Today's post was SO FAB, it features a day in Gwyneth's life as well as 2 other working moms. It was great to read because of the tips given, but also just to know that my life isn't quite as crazy as I always feel like it is :)

Christmas cards recap!

I know I may be a little behind the eight ball with this recap, but I just had to share a few of the cards we did during this AMAZING holiday season! Once again this year, we were blessed beyond belief by being able to work with so many fabulous people. Thank you to everyone who chose one of our cards to send to brighten your friends' holidays!
It is beyond fascinating to watch people's lives unfold, especially those who have blessed us by being repeat clients year after year after year. We get to watch all phases of life: new babies being added, kids heading off to college, divorce :(  remarriage, and even the sweet family who said "thank you for your support for our family during this difficult year." I don't know very many of the people whose cards we proof, but catching a small glimpse into their lives give me personally the chance to pray for them and reflect on the blessings in my own life. My close friends know the past few months have been a bit of challenge for my family, and ironically, I had already designed my own card shown here and had used the verse John 1:18 "From the fullness of His grace, we have all received one blessing after another."  Despite everything, I claim this verse for my family this year because I know The One who has it all figured out and am in constant amazement of how He has been giving us one blessing after another!  So here is the card my family sent out (by the way, this is Ellen writing this post). It is our trifold card design.

Next up is my co-owner, Stella's family's card. She chose our 5x5 folded design.  She has the MOST amazing kids (of course besides my own ;) and it is always fun to see her include a photo of her dog, Ryder. Maybe the reason we work so well together is because of our shared Golden Retriever ownership?

Lastly, I wanted to show off some really fun trends we saw this year. Hopefully you know that our flat photo cards can be printed with photos on the front and the back, and that our folded cards are customizable on all panels of the card. It was so fun to see people include their pets or a picture of their family's vacation or a crazy shot on the backs of our cards.  We are constantly amazed at our client's creativity. We had fun changing colors, fonts, and wording to help people create truly one-of-a-kind Christmas cards. So sit back and enjoy a VERY SMALL sampling of some of our 2010 Christmas cards!

So fun seeing where everybody traveled to this year...

An efficient use of your Christmas card is to make it a Birth Announcement Christmas Card Combination...

It is always special when you have a wedding in the family to send out a wedding Christmas card showing off the big day... 

Cute pet Christmas Cards are such fun!!!

I love Grandparent holiday cards!

And because my alma mater, Auburn University, is playing for the BCS National Championship in 3 days, I just had to throw in my favorite Auburn cards we did. There were actually many more, too many to show here. If you will remember, a certain other university in our state played for the National Championship and won this time last year. It was really funny to see the trend this year...we did a couple of Auburn cards last year and more Alabama cards than we could count, and this year it is vice versa. So funny!!! WAR EAGLE!!!

Thank you again for your business and we wish you the very best 2011!!!