New Look!

I mentioned a while back that it usually takes me a long time to design a logo for myself. I think I went six years once with the same logo simply because I didn’t know what I wanted to do next. I made a new logo in 2018, and I felt ready for something new again in 2020.

Here’s my new logo; nice and simple. I’m kind of loving it.

The past few years have brought a little bit of a shift in the focus of my work; focusing more on contract work with companies and branding. I have reorganized the artwork on my website to focus much less on event invitations and party stuff. I am still happy to create that stuff, but it’s no longer my main focus. It turns out that creating a logo for myself kind of goes hand in hand with figuring out what the focus of my work is. I have been tremendously lucky to get to contract with a couple of amazing companies in the last few years and I really love the work.

I printed my business cards with Overnight Prints and I love how they turned out.

In addition to this refocus, I have always had watercolor as a part of my life, so it was fitting for it to still be prominent in my logo. With the Covid-19 pandemic forcing us to cancel travel plans, I took to my painting to virtually escape to the places I had hoped to visit and I built a little branch of my business with it.

I started with creating a YouTube channel (with some serious encouragement from my oldest son) and I started posted timelapse videos of some of my paintings. From there I started having these paintings printed as stickers and, as of last week, they are now for sale. Click HERE to see what I have for sale. I am going to try and get two more paintings done before the end of the year and then I’ll end my Utah’s Public Lands Series and look at starting a different series; or I may just paint some of my favorite outdoor spaces. I already have a finished painting of Delicate Arch from Arches National Park, but I’m not sure if I want to do a series on National Parks. We’ll see.

One thing I do know, I want to eventually have high-quality prints available of these paintings. In January, it’s on my to-do list to research printing options and find out what it’ll take to have a limited number of prints made, maybe I’ll sign them, and what will be involved with shipping them to customers and make sure they make it there in good shape.

If anyone has recommendations on a printer, please share in the comments! Even better if they can print on paper that feels like watercolor paper.

Our Holiday Card 2018

With another year, came another fun holiday card for my family. Every year for the last 6 years we’ve had Santa photos taken with FotoFly, and it’s become a fun, family tradition. I make a point to schedule the photos right before Thanksgiving so I have time to design a card!

My boys love to dress in the same outfit and they now give input on how they want to pose with Santa too. This year, my 9yo had the idea for his brother and him to wear their “wedding clothes” and sunglasses and pretend to be Santa’s bodyguards. I thought it was a cute idea and we went with it. Of course, the night of the shoot I completely forgot the suit jacket for my youngest (In my defense, I was suffering from a nasty head cold). Even without the jackets, the photos turned out cute.

I have to give a shoutout to my friend Amanda for coming up with the fantastic words for the front of our card. That part is always the hardest for me!

Here’s the back of our card:

I had these printed with Overnight Prints. They turned out great and were very affordable. When it was time to mail them, I really like to get colored envelopes, so I picked some up from my local Paper Source in their Clover color. I would have preferred a shade of red, but they didn’t have enough on the day I went. I should have thought of that ahead of time and ordered from their website.

Relax, that’s not really the Wiselka Family’s address.

I printed names and addresses onto the envelopes using the same fonts I used on the card. My trusty HP laser printer, that I’m sure is more than 10 years old, but it still does a great job.

I don’t get to do much design work for my own family, so our annual holiday card is one thing I really look forward to designing every year. I think my kids love getting to add their input too.

Merry Christmas!

Our Holiday Card - 2017

I look forward to creating our holiday card every year. I do a lot of design work for clients throughout the year, but I don't do much for my little family. We don't have elaborate birthday parties for our boys, so our annual holiday card is the one thing I get to work on that's entirely personal. 

A few years ago, a friend introduced me to a local photography company called FotoFly. They do unique Santa photos every year where one of the parents wears the Santa suit, hopefully ensuring that the kids are calm and happy for photos. The results produce some really beautiful and unique holiday photos. 

My boys and Santa have been the feature image on all of our holiday cards since the very first card I created in 2013. You can see other years here: 2014, 2015, and 2016.

Here is the card I created for 2017:

I used the fun knitted sweater texture that I created last year. My oldest requested a dark green background. And since our cards hardly ever include my husband and me, I added a little snippet at the bottom, "Bill & Alex send their love too."

I had my cards printed with OvernightPrints for the first time this year. I've always used VistaPrint, but this year, both companies' pricing was comparable and a close friend of mine raved about the quality of her business cards that were printed with OvernightPrints. So I gave them a go. They didn't charge me extra to print my cards two-sided, which I love, so above is what I put on the back. Plus, only $1 to add rounded corners. Score!

When I shared my photos on my Instagram account, I was notified shortly after Christmas that I won their Art & Design contest! Woot!

Part of my prize was being featured on their blog. Click on the image below to read the blog post:

Thank you so much OvernightPrints for not only beautifully printed holiday cards, but for the feature! Pretty sure you've created a very loyal customer.