Night at home

So, tonight I was supposed to be doing laundry... and well... I did a little bit (*biting lip... there's kinda a HUGE pile still to do). BUT, I also made my mom & bff a completely fattening and incredibly yummy dinner! I found a recipe for home-made corn dogs on Real Mom Kitchen yesterday while catching up on my favorite blogs and couldn't resist. I bought all the ingredients tonight on the fly and made up my first batch ever of home-made corn dogs (don't judge my pictures... there's better ones on the recipe blog page :)

Like I said... don't judge my pics :) I paired them up with Annie's mac & cheese and corn on the cob... yum!

And then I got right on the laundry! Okay... not... really...

I then started playing around with a pattern that I found on Delia Creates to make a t-shirt into a produce bag and oh my word! Sooooo easy! And turned out super cute. The only not-so-great-don't-think-I-want-it t-shirt I had on hand was a navy one. Definitely going to try this out on a lighter shirt... maybe even patterned :)

And that's it for this posting! Have a fantabulous night everyone!

The baby shower was a hit! Shawna got loaded down with gifts and little Alex shouldn't need anything for the next year! For Alex's gift, I made the onesie cupcakes from the tutorial on Little Birdie Secrets (http://littlebirdiesecrets.blogspot.com/2011/02/baby-onesie-cupcake-tutorial-and-sweet.html). Alex's mommy & daddy have chosen a jungle theme for their lil pride and joy so I went nuts in the baby section of Target to make my cutie cupcakes ;) And for the shower's edible goodies, I volunteered to make the cookie dough bites (yes! cookie dough! and we decided to switch up two tablespoons milk for each egg so each "bite" was Alex-safe and everyone else-safe for that matter) and mac&cheese bites which were delectable! Here's some photos from the shower. Enjoy!

First off... here's some of the prep on my end :)

mac&cheese bites! before&after :)

cookie dough bites... before&after!

and here's some shots from the shower... the decorations we've all been working on came together beautifully! Awesome, awesome job, Sarah!

here's the dot backdrop that Stace & I made :)

Congratulations Shawna & Adrian! Aunt Cate can't wait to meet your son!

Other than weddings... BABIES!

One of my girlfriends is going to be having a baby (hopefully) in the next several weeks and her sisters asked me to join in on the baby shower fun... I got to design a custom invitation and labels... which as we talked about last time, I LOVE!

Shawna is having a bouncing (literally... he's an active one!) baby boy. So, the colors for the shower are classic baby blue, green and gray all chosen from coordinating fabrics our host, Sarah picked out. The plaid on the invitation, the birds on the labels, and the cutie "b" on the return address labels were all inspired by the fabric choices. The theme of the party has a more clean, sophisticated style to it, but still fun and very baby-like. The fun part about all of this is that not only am I able to pull out my graphic designer skillz I've been able to be "crafty" with it too... Last week we all got together and made a doily paper chain from green, blue and white paper (Martha Stewart, you are a genius!). Then this week, me and my bff (also sister of mommy-to-be) designed, printed and constructed a cutie dot backdrop for the gift table. There's a whole lot more that we've been working on but those are my favorites so far ;)

I'll post some of the pics from the shower after the big day on Saturday, but for now here's some digital previews of what the invitations looked like.

Getting Serious

Ok, so I've been told by a good friend of mine that I need to get serious about my blogging purely for the exposure that it will give my products. I've listed a ton of my invitations on etsy.com and am patiently awaiting some bites... I've sold two things so far and am praying and hoping more will come in. So, now that I've poured my heart out about my design work and desperate need for more business, please direct your focus to the pictures :) This post is all about my wedding work. I've blogged a couple of the weddings that I've had the wonderful privilege to be apart of so far. And here's a little more...

I started designing for only one wedding at first (I work as a Graphic Designer at my church) with not much of an intention on continuing... the wedding I designed for back in 2009, was for one of my best friends. She and her fiance wanted something one of a kind, but didn't have the budget to pay one-of-a-kind prices, so she asked me if I would be willing to design for their wedding... I was more than thrilled and delighted that she'd ask, but also very intimidated since I didn't know anything about weddings or designing for them. [Sidebar here: seems like everyone goes through this part of their lives where everyone they know is getting married, and then all of a sudden it's over and then everyone is having babies... anyone ever paid attention to this??? K, back to the subject] I quickly got online and started looking... I was shocked at the market there is for wedding designers, printers, letterpressmen, calligraphers, and all things wedding stationary and I had never heard of it... go figure! In the end I did a completely custom wedding package that included save the dates, invitations (base, RSVP card, extra note card), programs, candy bar banner, and thank you cards and I LOVED it. Not too long after that I got a request from another friend and then another... so, now five weddings, two bridal showers, one baby shower, and at least eight birthdays later, I am so in love with the invitation industry and am coming up with stock designs and can't get enough of this field. I still love working at my church full-time and the fulfillment it gives, but have now added moonlighting as an invitation designer to my belt. So, anyone need an invitation designed??? Bring it on! (oh, and check out my etsy shop too! http://www.etsy.com/shop/catelovinlife?ref=si_shop )