This week's good stuff

I love the internet and the internet loves me. I read all sorts of things and these are my favorite finds from this week.

It's been about a month since I did my last "good stuff" post so I thought I'd better put some attention back on this poor blog. The people that invented Facebook and Twitter should really be sent to a concentration camp so they can concentrate on how much time I waste because of them. However, I am ghost-tweeting for a client of mine now so that means I'm getting paid to waste time, er, I mean, market a product on Twitter. And it's actually doing really well, and this article by Chris Coyier was really helpful.

But back to my blog and back to the wonderful things the internets have provided to me this week.

I absolutely love this post about Maya Lin's original Vietnam Veterans Memorial competition submission. It is not only beautiful in it's composition but it keeps reminding me that design is not only about the finished product, it's about the process of getting to the finished product. As a designer I sometimes leap past a few steps of the creative process and this drawings makes me want to slow down, get out some pastels and let my mind wander.

I've been wanting to put my creative process to work on a pet project of my own -- I want to incorporate my portfolio into my regular website. This of course takes more energy than is humanly imaginable simply because I am my worst client, well besides my dad... and my uncle but that's another story for another time, because I want it perfect and perfect can mean a wide range of different things depending on the day or the hour or the minute, etc. So my process starts by spending hours looking at how other designers display their portfolios, and I've been doing that with the help of this great post by noupe.com. It breaks down a new portfolio design into a 12 step process and shows good examples of each tip.

But outside of my office it's getting chillier. Our nights have hit 49˚F! What? I know. That is too cold for humans. But what if we warm up with some of this awesome white chili from my friend Pretty Ditty. Autumn is here. Which means we're one day closer to Halloween and I think this is the perfect trick-and-treat.

I grew up in a college town, and one Halloween our doorbell rang and we opened the door expecting to see trickortreater—but what was in front of our open door—was another door! Like, a full-on wooden door, that had a sign that said “Please knock.” So we did, and the door swung open to reveal a bunch of college dudes dressed as really old grandmothers, curlers in their hair, etc, who proceeded to coo over our “costumes” and tell us we were “such cute trick or treaters!” One even pinched my cheek. Then THEY gave US candy, closed their door, picked it up and walked to the next house.

A recent harvest

Foggy mornings and a sneak peek

It's been a long, hot, crazy week around here. I barely even remember taking Daphne the Adorable home on Sunday. On Monday we repaired our DLP tv. It broke ten days prior and when we finally received the new color wheel there was no way Thomas was going to wait to the weekend to do THAT project. It went pretty well, we had most of the tv apart in under 20 minutes. Except for one tiny connector, the last possible thing that needed disassembling before we could put the tv back together, would not come out of the circuit board. Everything we had read about fixing the tv warned about this one connector. DO NOT PULL UP, DO NOT WIGGLE IT, DO NOT GRAB IT BY THE WIRES, DO NOT LOOK AT IT FUNNY OR ELSE IT WILL COME OFF ITS CIRCUIT BOARD AND YOUR TV WILL BE DEAD AND IT WILL BE ALL YOUR FAULT, WE WARNED YOU. So we heeded their advice and talked nicely to the connector, we massaged it and fanned it while we fed it grapes on the veranda. It didn't matter. That connector wasn't going anywhere. It was so stuck and so brittle that it didn't want to budge. Then I got angry. I mangled the hell out of that connector until it finally gave me my way. And then I could move on. And you know what? Replacing a critical part of your tv is not as bad as I thought it would be. It was actually kinda fun! (Minus, of course, that connector and the one hour of my life it stole from me.)

Then came Tuesday and here's a sneak peek of what megalithic DIY project we did THAT day. A new kitchen floor!

Daphne's morning photo sitting

Waiting patiently

Daphne has definitely become a member of the pack today. Whenever one dog barks the other two are right there checking on the problem. And you can't walk anywhere, you cannot take a full stride across the house because you are constantly surrounded by three heavy beasts. But if you mention the word T-R-E-A-T (I have to spell it because if I say it all three sets of eyes lock onto me like I'm going to be a radar-guided missile target if they don't get their T-R-E-A-T RIGHT THIS SECOND, lady) you get three adorable dogs waiting patiently and drooling on the carpet.