I've been bugging Chris for the last 6 months to get me an iPhone. Why the wait? Chris didn't want to buy an iPhone when Apple might just come out with something cooler. Understandable. Now that the iPad is out, and it doesn't quite make sense for us to get one (yet), I got to get my iPhone! Hooray! Now I can stop borrowing Chris's for conferences & Whrrl posts! Life with my very own iPhone is so great. Everything is easier and more fun! The poopy diapers are more bearable! The dishes are more sparkly(er)! Now that I finally have a nice phone, I've got to protect it from Penelope. I was planning on going to TJ Maxx or Ross to get a cover (because that's where you go for cheap iphone covers), but Penelope napped for nearly four hours yesterday! Four hours was plenty of time to design and create my own case – and make a tutorial to share with you! I'm just tickled about how it turned out. I just love the pink/orange color combo.

This was a very easy project. If you have all of the materials ready, it would surely take less an hour to make (embellishing not included). Did I tell you that I love my finished product? It's fabulous, and I'd surely make it again. I wouldn't change anything about the pattern, but I would like to try using elastic instead of a small leather strip across the front. That might make tucking the flap away, a tad easier. OH, and did I mention that I LOVE how it turned out? EEE! I'm so happy about it.

Well, I hope you give this tutorial a try. If you do, please share pictures! I've just started a flickr group and I would love to see you join! Enjoy!! This tutorial (click above to dowload) is free for personal use only.

I think it's safe to assume that everyone who attended Alt Summit had a blast and everyone that didn't go missed out. I am so glad I got to attend. I was in heaven, rubbing shoulders with the finest and creative-est in blogging & design. I think I said, "Oh my goodness, I love your blog!!" about million times last weekend. Every time I said it, I meant every word. I was just giddy and maybe a little star-struck to meet some of my blogging heroes, like Grace & Maxwell. They were all SO KIND and surprisingly approachable.

There's no doubt, Gabby & the other fabulous Kirtsy ladies put on a spectacular conference filled with 100% relevant topics for design/creative bloggers. IT WAS AMAZING. It was rolling-on-the-ground hilarious. It was thought-provoking. It was an absolute blast. It was perfect. Here are a few of the highlights:

Early Bird Session: How to Find the Best Design Sites

• I got to meet with each of these ladies, and they were all so fabulous. (Allison of Petit Elefant, Nicole of Making it Lovely, Jaime of Design Milk, and Karey of Mackin Ink)
• Here's the complete list of sites to check out (Allison put me on the list as the next big thing. Uh. . .  serious?!?)
• My google reader is bursting at the seams & so is everyone else's.

Morning Keynote Breakfast: Why design?

• Putting all of my attention into blogging full-time made all the difference. - Maxwell, Apartment Therapy
• Martha is OVER. It's all about being real, not flawlessly perfect. - Maxwell, Apartment Therapy
• People will always have an opinion about everything. - Heather, Dooce
• Heather Armstrong is a fabulous speaker and hands down hilarious.
• Grace from design sponge is so genuine and so awesome. I love her blog so much more now that I've met her in person.

Form & Function: Designing online

• What makes a good site awesome? Pixel perfection, good CSS, faster loading speed and sites that function on most browsers.
• Good clients trust designers. They know what they're doing. - Struck Design
• Good designers don't say no. They come up with something even better & knock the socks off their clients. - Struck Design
• IE sucks. - Bryan, Typekit
• Good typography is possible, even on the web. - Bryan, Typekit

Form & Function: Building your brand & business

• I came into this session a tad late, but it was still super inspiring. Victoria from SFgirlbybay is ridiculously cool. I cornered her a few times to chat and she was very, very nice to me.
• You don't need to pigeonhole yourself in blogging. As long as it's something you love & true to you, people will read it. - Gayla, You Grow Girl
• I try to make my life blogworthy. - Sarah, Sarah Jane Studios
• Blogging is a labor of love.

Keynote Lunch: New media artists

• Let the creative process take you on a journey. - Erik Natske
• Erik Natske does some incredible things with flash. Jaw-dropping awesome.
• DJ earworm does an incredible job of mashing up 20 different songs to make a cohesive song. Super awesome.
• DJ earworm did a mash-up for Annie Lennox. It's stunning. Check it out here.

Design Theory: Designing Your Community

• Erin of Design for Mankind is another new favorite person (Goodness, I met so many!). She's so genuine, sweet & super stylish.
• It's good to keep the conversation going in the comments.
• Meaningful comments that add to the conversation, are key. It's especially important to show appreciation for folks that take time to comment on your site & to those that may write about you.
• A canned response is better than no response. - Erin, design for mankind
• It's not super important to follow metrics obsessively, but be aware of them. - Erin, design for mankind
• Blogrolls can be frustrating. Who to add? How many to add? Should they just disappear? {probably}.

Form & Function: Beyond Ad Networks

• This session was super helpful. I really enjoyed how each panelist had a different perspective & brought different ideas to the session. Maggie is another new favorite person of mine. She's stylish, clever, a savvy shopper and super fun to talk to.
• If you're a good writer, try selling your stories to a newspaper. (that does NOT apply to me)
• Sell individual ads rather than sponsorships.
• Sell more ads at a lower price.
• Stay consistent in your ads aesthetics. It's not bad to send advertisors a style guide. Ads are like accessories to a great outfit. They've got to match.
• Make sponsored posts separate, and mark as being sponsored content. Charge 10x more for in content sponsorship posts.
• Hand-pick your sponsors, don't be afraid to ask for advertising. You've got to grow a pair to be a successful blogger. Ask for what you want.

Is there a rewind button I can press so I can relive the conference? Goodness, I had so much fun! I didn't meet a single person there that I didn't like. I can't wait for Alt 2011!

*I didn't take these photographs, mine turned out terribly. You can see the event photos here.

I've noticed something about myself. . . If I find a recipe somewhere other than in my three recipe books and I don't blog about it, I lose it. I'm terrible at organizing my recipes. Lazy me. This recipe was, at one point, in the cookbook my mom compiled for us kids, but I lost it. I've called my sister twice now for the recipe. In my attempt to avoid calling my sister at awkward times (like 2am, perhaps?) I'm posting the recipe here. I love spritz cookies. I have very fond memories of my mom making a million of these little cookies in assorted Christmas colors and in the cutest, petite shapes. They're incredibly addicting and easy to make. I can't tell you the excitement I felt when my mom gave me a cookie press for Christmas. There may have been an audible squeal. These cookies are divine when dipped in chocolate, topped with a melt-in-your-mouth lemon icing or just by themselves. Without any further Ado, here's the recipe:

Spritz Cookies

no idea where this recipe came from– my mom? makes about 70 cookies

• 1 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 tablespoons milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/2 teaspoon almond extract
• 4 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder

Cream butter, sugar and egg until smooth. Add milk, vanilla and almond. In a separate bowl, mix flour and baking powder. Gradually add flour mixture to wet ingredients. Mix until flour is incorporated. Use cookie press to form cookie shapes. Bake at 400º farenheit for 8 minutes. Cool and serve. Download and print the recipe card by right clicking the image below.

Some of you may have noticed the ALT button on my sidebar the last few months. It's a cool-looking button, eh? Well, I'm proudly going to be attending the Altitude Design Summit this weekend, and I couldn't be more excited. The speakers are going to be out-of-this-world awesome and the activities are going to be glam-fabulous. I'm super excited. In preparation for the conference, I needed to print more business cards. Of course it wasn't going to be a simple re-print of the cards I gave out at BlogHer. Oh no. I need to redesign my site, cards & everything. It kind of snowballed into this huge thing. As you can see the site hasn't changed, yet. Lame. I've been a little busy getting the business cards perfected. Didn't they turn out beautifully? I bought some small envelopes a while back, and decided I'd use that to package the business card. I also designed a die-cut vinyl sticker that says "i still love you" in my own handwriting to stuff in the envelope. They're gold. You really need to see them in person to really appreciate it, but they're beautiful. It's so funny how a printer can make or break your day. The printer who did the stickers for me gave me a good deal, so long as I weeded and cut them myself. Weeding is when you peel out the negative space of the die-cut sticker, which is time-consuming and unusually fun. The weeding was a piece of cake, and so was the cutting. . . well, until about 11pm last night when my rotary cutter slipped and took a turn for the worse. You want to know how sharp brand-new rotary cutter blades are? Effing sharp. It went clean through my nail and through part of the pad of my finger. It even took out part of my middle finger. It was a good thing Chris was around to help. Penelope wouldn't be much help in a situation like this. Gross, hu? I was thinking about giving myself a manicure for ALT, but this was clearly not the one I had in mind. Chris so kindly scoured the entire Salt Lake valley for steri strips and got me some old fashioned liquorice to bite down on for the pain. Man that hurt. He's thoughtful, isn't he? Besides the minor set-back of having my index finger out of commission, things are moving right along in preparation for ALT. I can't wait for tomorrow!! Tomorrow night is a 1920s social and I have the perfect dress for the occasion. It's orange (awesome, right?) it's real hand-dyed silk, it's from the '50s and it was my grandmother's. I love it. Are you going to ALT? Are you excited, too?!?

Your feedback was awesome last week. I really, really appreciate it! Please, keep it coming! I listened, and this week I've released my newest collection: Crown Moulding. I'm really proud of it. I've been looking forward to today for a while, I've been that excited about it. Crown Moulding's color pallette was inspired by 100 Layer Cake's holiday glam colorboard. Isn't that a gorgeous colorboard? Yummy.

{click on the images below to enlarge}

Have I mentioned how much I enjoy making repeat patterns? It's been a little obsession of mine for a while now. I surely couldn't go without making a couple of pattern sets with this collection available in warm & cool colors. Here's a border set. Doesn't it look regal? Again, making repeat patterns and borders is so much fun. It's like I get endorphins out of it or something. Your feedback was really positive about the blog graphics, so here you go! A blog kit just for you. Go buy it (only $6.99 today!), use the graphics on your blog and make all of your friends jealous. Are you going to have any parties soon? Check out this invitation printable! I just wish that I had a baby or bridal shower to plan. Getting married? Get glam invitations on a budget! Kit includes 2 5x7 designs (fits in A7 envelopes) in 2 editable formats, .eps & .psd. Whether or not you're into Digital Scrapbooking, I hope there's something there for you to try! Head over to DHD today and get 30% off all my new releases! Enjoy.

View details of the full room here.

Since returning to stay/work at home, I've got the nesting bug all over again. Sheesh! It's like I'm 8 months along, but with out the swollen feet & belly. Since I didn't have a nursery to decorate when Penlope was born (I only had a closet) so my brain is just swimming with ideas on how to make miss P's room adorable. While it feels like I'm swimming with ideas, it still seems that my ideas have to percolate for about a month before they happen. Naturally. This one incubated for a good few weeks, and I think my hesitation was mostly because the project seemed a little daunting. Hardly. I had this idea to make a scalloped border around the top of Penelope's room with contact paper. Contact paper has served me well in the past, so I thought I'd give it a try. I only have a "during" photo, but I'm sure if you put on your imaginary hats you'd see that it was just incredibly plain before. Here's how to do it:

• Apply the contact paper to the wall. It's a two person job.
• Make your template to the desired size using a bowl, ruler, large paper and pencil.
• Cut out the template
• Using double-stick tape, temporarily apply the template to the contact paper.
• Lightly cut along template lines.
• Move template along until your scallops are complete.

Applying the contact paper was definitely a two person job and took us about an hour or two to apply. Honestly, that was the hardest part of the whole thing. It got pretty tricky pulling off the lining paper and smoothing to the walls without creating a few air bubbles. My new yudu squeegee came in handy for smoothing everything out.  Once I made the template, cutting out the scallops was a cinch. I think it took me under an hour to cut them out. Contact paper is so easy to cut out! Seriously, all I had to do was score lightly along the template and I got perfect cuts every time. I'm really happy with how it turned out. Penelope's room is starting to look better, but I've got a long way to go. Something needs to be done about her bare walls! I've got a few ideas up my sleeve. You'll be seeing more of her room as I get them done.   Isn't Penelope a crack up? She seriously thinks she's hiding. I love that girl.

Two or three months ago my friend was going on and on about this woman, Susan Petersen. I'm thinking What? A blogger in my area? A CRAFTY blogger in my area? No way. We need to make friends! All it really took was a second or two on her blog before I realized how utterly cool she is. She made freaking gold Lamé leggings for her 3 year old. How cool is that?!?

Her blog is chock full of inspirational ideas, fabulous sewing and sweet thrifty finds. She has some great tutorials on her blog for skinny jeans, pillowcase dresses, nursing covers, and coin purses. You should check out her blog and her store, too! I suggest you snatch up the his & hers pillows and the sweetest, most darling ruffle skirts you've ever seen.

Seriously, aren't these skirts to die for? While Susan's blog is awesome and a time-sucking pit of inspiration, she's even cooler in person. We had her and her sweet family over for dinner a while back and had the greatest time getting to know them. I'm really excited to have a new friend so close by!

Are you sick of my talk of digital scrapbooking, yet? Seriously I want to know. If you haven't heard of DHD or what's going on with all that, you should probably check it out. TODAY. All new releases are 30% off every Thursday. There are over 70 new releases today. That's a lot if you ask me! I didn't release a ton of stuff this week, I'm still just settling down from Christmas and the New Year, but my goal is to release a new collection or parts of a collection every week. I'm not sure how realistic my goals are as I'm SUPER new to the digital scrapbooking thing and there's quite a learning curve.

click image to enlarge

So among the few releases this week, I managed to make a blog kit. This is no cutest blog on the block kit. My first blog kit is like a blog on acid. Not that I would know. I'm hoping that one or two of you out there might like it. Maybe. Snatch it up for the discounted price of $5.59*. Holy crap, that's cheap. Dirt cheap! This surely won't be my last blog kit. I redesign my own blog often enough, you'll be seeing a lot of these in the future.

click image to enlarge

I really wanted to do a winter theme collection, so I did. It's a mini collection. I really like scrolling. So I made snowflakes out of my handmade scrolling. Snatch these graphics for $4.19*. Hope you like them. So I really want to open up this blog post to some serious conversation. I'd really, really like to hear what you think about digital scrapbooking, what you think of what I've done so far (do I dare? EEK!) and what you'd like to see more of in the scrapbooking industry. Will you help a girl out and let me pick your brain? Heck, I might even send a freebie your way if you leave a thoughtful comment!

*These discounted prices are valid today (January 7, 2009) only.

I was hoping to make this year my third annual handmade Christmas, but there was just no physical way that was going to happen. Up until just recently I've been working full-time as an in-house designer for DownEast; so between that, other design work, sleep and a ferociously hyper toddler, there was just no way I could squeeze in a million hours of crafting. It just got to the point where I had to ask myself, "Do I want to be institutionalized?" to which I breathed a sigh of disappointment and let go of all of the crazy ambition for handmade gifts and crazy cool decorations. Next year, perhaps? I totally could've bought handmade gifts, but I wanted to surprise Chris more than anything. Just after my brother-in-law bought his gun, he brought it over to show off to Chris. Chris was clearly jealous by the drool on his chin. I knew right then, that was what I needed to get him. Something that he'd NEVER suspect I'd buy. Well, not unless he got a little nosy. I pretty much dragged every male from my family and Chris's into the whole thing asking for advice, models, etc. Even the guys at my work were excited about it, too. There were a few times leading up to Christmas day where I thought he had figured the whole thing out. Turns out he was thinking I was getting him a wedding ring. (note: he's been through two wedding rings so far.) It was better than Christmas to see the surprise on his face when he opened his gift! AH! It was a fabulous surprise. He's taken it to the range a few times since Christmas and it's just fun to see his excitement about all of it. Chris sort-of surprised me this year, too. He had led me on thinking that I was getting a pair of boots. Then a couple of weeks before Christmas he asked me about my camera bag and if I wanted a bigger one. That was a dead give away. While I had my suspicions I would've never guessed he'd get me the bag that he did. Have you heard of Chrome bags? You might if you're from San Francisco or you're super hip. The bag that Chris got me is the smallest of the messenger bags and it's ENORMOUS. There's so much room inside. Did you peek at the cool buckle above? Rad. Now when the sun decides to come out and warm up the frozen valley, I'll be the hippest fixie rider in town with my Chrome bag, rolled up pant leg and  bright blue & yellow fixie. Thanks Chris for upping my coolness.