{i’ll have a side of…}

good gravy – you must be wondering when i have time to do things like bathe and eat. i promise. i’m clean and i definitely don’t miss a meal!

anyways – i’ve also been dabbling a bit in some graphic and web design. over the course of redesigning my web site i realized that i really REALLY love doing this! i love to take a concept, a point of inspiration, and build on it and expand it into a whole suite of branding items!

just recently, as a surprise for my sweet friend alina, i gave her blog a little overhaul. she and her husband are big hobby-bowlers and her blog is aptly an extension of that: bowling my butt off! she records her scores, talks about life as a deaconess married to a pastor and has just recently started talking about their biggest news yet – she’s baking a baby! so here are some screen shots of her redesign…

this is a picture from after her reception. and yes – it is true. she did go bowling in her wedding dress! i told you – they love to bowl! 🙂

guess who else went bowling after the wedding?? yep – me! we had so much fun that day! everyone wanted to know if she really just got married or if it was some bet she lost.

i made some cute little buttons for her about me page, her archives…

…and a place she can click to always see her scores. i had to teach her how to tag her posts for it to work. i loved doing this and had so much fun surprising her with it! and i’m pretty sure she likes it too!

hugs alina! 🙂

in other news, my uber talented brother has decided to start a little side business as well. when my brother was in middle school my mother was at her wit’s end with him because he was ADHD. he needed something to do. always. constantly. so his middle school band director (who, coincidentally was also my middle school band director – shout out to mr. parker!) stuck a trombone in his hand. and as they say, the rest is history.

{oh and if you are from white oak and reading this – we both know it’s really pronounced mista pahkah. trust me. i remember.)

my brother is a very talented performance musician, vocalist and composer. but i’m not going to tell you everything about him. i’m going to make you go read about him yourself! he asked me to design a website and some business cards. of course i jumped all over that. i’m all about adding to my portfolio theses days!

thus was born written by rance hawthorne. the man is beyond brilliant. he can listen to anything, and i do mean anything on the radio, and get out pretty much any instrument and play it.

one of the coolest things rance ever did was compose the music for my bridal procession. it was beautiful and i was so proud when i designed my bulletins and got to include “composed by rance hawthorne” under the processional. still gives me goose bumps!

the other really awesome composition my brother wrote was the music to a poem that was on my grandpa’s funeral bulletin. he was a sophomore in college and wrote music that brought an entire auditorium of people to tears. it was amazing.

so anyways – you can go to his website and read all about him, his credentials, and even listen to some of his recent compositions. we worked together on this and i really enjoyed doing it!

i still have a couple other projects up my sleeve. right now i am just doing it for close friends for free to build my portfolio up and learn as much as i can about it. i’m hoping to one day go back to school and get a degree in graphic design or web design. if i put up a donate button would you help a sister out? just kidding.

well sort of.