Hello!

I recently completed a web design project for Interfaith Action of Evanston. They are a non-profit organization dedicated to serving hungry or homeless people in Evanston, IL. I haven’t worked on too many web design projects besides my own portfolio site, so I was really excited to work on this project. I completely redesigned the site and helped them restructure it so it was easier to use. Once the design was figured out, I wrote the HTML and CSS.

Click here to visit the new website!

New site design!

Hello!

My friend Mike is a High School Chemistry teacher and has an alien periodic table game that he plays with his students to introduce them to the topic. The activity was passed from teacher to teacher by photocopying and the image got worse and worse. My friend asked me to redraw the aliens so they’d be easier to see. I also had fun making them more cartoony. The aliens have certain attributes that students use to arrange them in a pattern such as facial expression, body size, etc. Then at the end of the activity there are two blank aliens for the students to continue the pattern. Check ‘em out!

old aliens

New and improved!

Hello! I recently did some logo redesigns for Christensen Consulting & Tax. I liked the original logo design and was just going to do a few options to update it. But once I started the project I got a bit carried away and designed a whole bunch of new logos.

Original CCT logo

These are preliminary designs I sent out. The only color that I added so far was from the original design. The next steps are to narrow down the choices, make changes and add in color. Stay tuned for the final design!

Preliminary logo options

Up next: Interfaith Action of Evanston website redesign

Hello! Recently I got the opportunity to take a day at work and go downtown Chicago to shop for inspirational samples. We were looking for new ideas, fabric and paper techniques and inspiration. I got to visit some very cool stores that I had never been to before and get some fresh air. Some of the stores I went to that I really enjoyed were: Merz Apothecary, Hazel, Twosided, Art Effect, and Paper Source. The shots I have below are mostly cool packaging design I saw – enjoy!

I love the newsprint element of this design

The textured paper and plastic wax seal are amazing

Up Next: Non-profit website I’ve been working on or an accounting logo redesign!

I am finally able to show off the Etsy shop identity that I have been working on for my friend Erin! Erin is one of my best friends who I have known for a very long time. She is a pilot and has taken up crocheting in her free time. She came up with the shop name Fly By Yarn (which I love!) to combine those interests. The name really inspired me when I was working on the design. Erin makes handmade crochet items such as hats, scarves, blankets, etc. Check out her shop: Fly By Yarn

My first ideas doodled on a napkin

Logo

Shop banner

Business card

My favorite part!

My favorite part of this design is the little paper airplane included in every package! I came up with this idea during my lunch break one day and had so much fun creating it… and throwing it ;)

This was such a fun project to work on. It gave me a chance to be creative and help my friend get her business started! Be sure to check out Fly By Yarn!

Up next: Sample shopping in Chicago!

Today I celebrated my brother Ben’s birthday with my family and I wanted to share the presents I got/made for him. The first part is some posters I picked up at Hatch Show Print in November when I was visiting my friend Sandra in Nashville! It was so great to visit Hatch Show Print. The shop is awesome, and they have so many cool posters. I picked up the first one in their variety pile. I thought Ben would appreciate the humor. He’s going to put it on the door of his bathroom.

Ben is pretty much addicted to coffee so I thought this was appropriate.

I picked up one of the many Hatch Show Cats posters for Ben and his three cats.

This past summer after Ben and I attended Wizard World and had our picture taken with Patrick Stewart and LeVar Burton, I was determined to come up with a cool way to frame our picture. I had the brilliant (if I don’t say so myself) idea to make the frame look like part of the computer from Star Trek: The Next Generation. I found some perfect plain wood frames from Hobby Lobby and my dad rounded the corners for me.

Plain frame with rounded corners

Then I painted the frame silver and painted the computer details. I also made a matching frame for myself! Engage!

I also met with my friend today and reviewed the designs for her Etsy shop identity! I’ve got a couple more pieces to edit/finish and then I’ll share the project!

Up next: FlyByYarn Etsy shop

It’s crazy to think that this time last year we were experiencing Snowmageddon, and today there’s a high temperature of 50 degrees! This past weekend I unfortunately felt some negative effects of the warm weather. I went to the Snow Days snow sculpture competition at Navy Pier in Chicago. The temperature was hovering right around freezing making it very difficult for the snow sculptures to stay alive. The poor sculptors were trying to protect their creations from the sun and had to spend a lot of time fixing up their sculptures. While I felt bad for the sculptors, it was cool to see how they work. Who would have thought it would be too warm for snow in February… in Chicago…? Even though the weather wasn’t the best, the sculptures were still awesome! I love going to this event every year!

One new thing this year was some carnival type games… made of ice! They were sculptures in themselves and offered fun activites for kids (or adults!).

Football throw (left) and hockey shoot (right)

“The Air Life” was my favorite sculpture. I love how graceful and majestic it is. It is interesting from so many different angles. I’m always impressed by 3D works of art, coming from a 2D background.

"The Air Life" Snow Team Captain: Pavel Spelda Location: Czech Republic

This was my favorite sculpture this year!

Beautiful model that sculptors made to help them with the snow version.

“The Standoff” was such a fun, quirky sculpture. The squirrel’s face was my favorite. You tell that bear!

"The Standoff" Snow Team Captain: Fred Gardner Location: Caledonia, IL

The orientation and angle of “The Rodeo” was impressive. The sculpture captured the action of the bull very well. I also love the details in this piece.

"Rodeo" Snow Team Captain: Rudolf Pylaev Location: Russia

Suprise! The Shedd Aquarium brought Magellanic penguins to the Family Pavilion inside Navy Pier. And yes I definitely knew what a Magellanic penguin was before this weekend (just kidding). They are “temperate-weather” penguins that live in South America where the Atlantic Ocean, Pacific Ocean and Straights of Magellan meet. We got to watch them waddle around and see a very cute typical penguin stretch.

The penguins were so cute!

Up next: Etsy shop identity (finally!) or a website redesign project I’m working on.

Happy New Year everyone!! I hope you all had an enjoyable holiday. I am posting this quite a bit late, but I finally got a roll of film from the Canada/New England cruise I went on in September developed that I took with my Holga camera. There were some cool shots in the roll, so I wanted to share some of the highlights.

The whole family: my brother, me, my dad, my mom and our fashionable hats

I love how the sky turned out in this photo

I love the sepia like coloration

Up next (for real): Identity design for my friend’s new Etsy shop! I just sent her round 1 designs, so I can post about it soon!

Hello! Sorry it has been such a long time since the last post. It has been a crazy couple of months. Let me tell you all about the new apartment that I moved into recently! Here is a before shot of the furniture that I refinished before moving in.

Sad, unfinished furniture

First I was finally able to provide a proper home for the dining chair I redid so long ago (see my Garbage chair). My master plan is to buy multiple dining chairs of different designs, paint them black and recover the cushions in different black and white fabrics to create a match/mismatch look. I redid a second chair so my roommate and I could sit down at the same time haha. I thought the design of this chair was very classic, so I chose a French toile fabric for the cushion. I love the details of the legs and back of the chair. I’m excited to add a couple more chairs so maybe we could have some people over someday ;)

Finished chair!

Oh yeah... it's all coming together

I was lucky enough to walk into Urban Outfitters when they were selling some display furniture and I got my headboard and coffee table for a really good price. I repainted them to match the new decor and voila!

Last but not least are the decorations that my roommate and I just put up. We were struggling with how to decorate our living room since the main wall is so long. We each purchased many random decorations from craft stores and thrift stores and arranged them on the wall in a very eclectic collection. Some highlights of the collection are: our John Wayne portrait, large key, lion embroidery and gold ampersand. What’s your favorite?

John Wayne shrine... jk

Whew! I didn’t expect decorating an apartment to be so tiring! We’re still not completely done, but I think it’s going well so far!

Up next: Identity design for my friend’s new Etsy shop!

Hello! I have a few random things to share today. Up first is the final logo for the Northwest Suburban Alliance on Domestic Violence. I met with them and talked about the initial options I sent them for their logo. We picked their favorite and I made a couple tweaks. Here is the final version!

Next I was going through boxes of old stuff and found a drawing I did a looong time ago for a friend. It was for an annual Thanksgiving “Turkey Bowl” football game t-shirt. The shirt was never made but I’m still really partial to the drawing so I worked it up on the computer really quick and here it is:

He's wearing my high school colors!

Lastly here is one more thing I found in old boxes, just for fun. It’s a science fair participation certificate (not even a prize haha) that looks so old it made me laugh. I think I made the right decision not pursing a career in science ;)

Up next: A few more random projects