For Father’s Day I made him a black bicycle hat. I have a few childhood memories seeing my dad wear hats like that, so I thought he might like one. It was a complete shot in the dark.

You’ve got to understand that my dad is impossible to buy/make gifts for. He only ever says he wants happy children. Of course he means it, but we’re a pretty happy bunch so it doesn’t seem like we’re giving him much of anything. Personally, I think he doesn’t believe we’d ever pool our money/assets together to buy him what he really wants: a 40 acre ranch in Kolob canyon. He’s right. We’d never do that.

As luck would have it, my dad was very excited to receive the black hat for Father’s day & it fit him perfectly. He asked me if I could a decal on there. Of course! With my Silhouette, I’m unstoppable! He gave the hat back & requested that I put a decal of a cyclist & “Ride like the wind, Tonto!” wrapping around the side.

It’s taken me nearly 2 1/2 months to get around to doing it! The cyclist took some effort & patience to apply, but the quote was impossible. Maybe I should’ve taken apart the hat to apply the decal. Round shapes are not fun to iron. Admittedly, I was more than bummed to see that it wasn’t going to work out. Blerg. On the positive side, the hat looks pretty rad with just the biker on it.

Hope my dad likes it!

I saw this little yellow & white striped shirt at the thrift store the other day & couldn’t pass it up. It’s so cute & in awesome condition for being somewhere around 15-20 years old (based on the tags). My neighbor’s son just had his first birthday so I wanted to do something thoughtful & possibly handmade. There’s something so foreign to me about making gifts for boys, maybe it’s because I have a girl & I am a girl. Maybe.

I had a bunch of black heat transfer material that I got with my Silhouette, so when I saw this shirt in the thrift store I knew exactly what I needed to do. I wasn’t sure if I was going to do a robot or rocket ship, but when I started thinking about the stripes on the shirt I knew it had to be nautical.

It took me less than 5 minutes to cut out the design and iron it on! I love how slick this is! I think I need to get more colors of this heat transfer stuff. It’s rad. It almost looks & feels like dried silkscreen paint. I’m a huge fan.

While I was gone, my cousin’s wife, Christa – interior designer extroardinaire – FINALLY posted pictures of her home on her interior design blog. Christa & Josh invited us over to their home a couple of months ago & I was just floored at how gorgeous, simple & classy their home was. Not that it was a surprise; they’re very classy folks with great taste, I just never thought people actually lived in homes that look like they came from a magazine. I don’t normally write posts like this, but I really want to share with you details from their gorgeous, real-life space.

Christa brought new life to this couch by using such a gorgeous, bold & graphic textile. I love how it modernizes such an antique!

I love the juxtaposition of the über modern plexi-glass coffee table & the antique wingback. The upholstery is awesome, no?

Christa had an old (GIANT) chair upholstered in white to sit at the head of the table (so genius) and found someone to hand make her table. Again, she mixes antique with modern & I love it. To read more about her living space & what it looked like before, head over to Christa Pirl, the blog. All photos in this post are courtesy of Michael Tallman.

Now I’m going to take a nap. I need to catch up on my sleep.

So, I’m retiring from the Design House Digital scene. Farewell! If you like any of my artwork over at Design House Digital, you better go over there & buy it. RIGHT. NOW. It’s all 40% off through the weekend. After the weekend it’ll all be gone.

Cheers!!

Now that I’ve finally committed to a new design scheme, it’s high time I have business cards that reflect that. Uprinting kindly offered to print my business cards in exchange for a review. Actual bricks & mortar print businesses can be a huge shot in the dark when it comes to quality printing & knowledgeable employees, so of course I was interested in how this online printing company measured up.

I submitted my artwork & a few minutes later I was sent a confirmation email to look at the “proof”. Uprinting’s proofing service is really cool, they send you a file showing how the business card will be printed. You can check to see if their colors match yours, if the bleeds are correct, etc. Very slick. Once I approved the artwork, it took about a  business day before they sent me a shipping confirmation. Shipping took about 3 business days. Overall turnaround for business cards with Uprinting? About 4 business days. Nice!

If you’re the kind of person that needs business cards fast (like for BlogHer, *ahem*), their turnaround is great. You can also opt to pay a premium to have the artwork expedited & shipped overnight. Not bad for those of us that work in the 11th hour.

I love my new business cards. They’ve been printed on a 14pt matte stock (nice & thick and NOT shiny! YAY!) and they’ve applied a matte coating that makes them deliciously smooth. I like that. I was a tad concerned that I didn’t make my type thick enough or big enough, but their high-quality printers did the job well! I’m sure my dad would be annoyed by having to grab his reading glasses to see my info, but my young eyes are really happy with the result.

Would you like 500 business cards? Uprinting has generously offered to print 500 full-color, double-sided business cards for one lucky reader! Here’s how you can win:

• Leave a comment on this post telling me why you need business cards
• One (1) comment per person only
• Comment by 11:59pm (MST) Thursday, July 22, 2010
• No purchase necessary
• Must be 18 or older to enter
• US residents only
• One (1) winner will be chosen via random.org & announced Friday, July 23, 2010

Good luck!!

Today I’m over at Good Look Cook Book sharing my opinion on over-used and hideous fonts and how to avoid them. Check it out!

Head on over to Skip to My Lou for an exclusive printable made by yours truly, to help you figure out what to do on those boring summer days. Have a happy weekend!!

Please excuse any weirdness over the next few days. I’m working on updating the look & feel of IS•LY.

Cross your fingers that my wordpress won’t explode, ok?