RamsdenDesigns

Keep Spending and Stay in Debt

Who’s with me girls? Come on, lets all be irresponsible together.

My New Logo is a Delight (snort!)

I’ve never actually had a proper logo. Not a real one, so, in an effort to get my business act together I spent an inordinate amount of time making one.

Now I’m not going to tell you that whilst looking for a bird with the word “Delight” in it’s name I came across a “Twitchers Delight” which I thought was a simply wonderful looking bird. But it turned out that that isn’t the name of a bird but rather a term used to describe the sighting of a rare bird (or something to that effect).

I won’t tell you, because that would just make me look like an idiot…and we can’t let that cat out of the bag.

So it’s a twitchers delight wearing a crown. See where I’m going here? My little bird friend is the emperor of delightful birds.

I know I know, my genius is positively radiating from me.

He’s (no name yet, we’re still at getting-to-know-you stage) going to be absolutely every where soon. In fact the little fellow is already on this blog and on the website. Check out the website if you don’t believe me, and while you’re there, buy something. The soaps are fantastic value.

Most Days I Can Be Found Lying Next To This Fellow

 

He really does so elegantly describe how I feel most nights after 7.30pm. I’ve been dealing with a tad too much fatigue these last few months. I know…right…total wimp but I keep waiting for my body to go “Aha! I get it now. Do carry on Jacquie, I promise to never ask for a comfy chair, doona or pillow during waking hours ever again. Feel free to continue your relentless march towards stardom without my interference again”

But alas, my body has clearly not gotten that memo yet. And so I continue to spend many a day wishing for a quick lie down in a quiet dark room.

And it’s not just plain old exhaustion sending me in the direction of the bedroom. I’ve got a new bed mate and am having the time of my life.

Do put your dirty minds away. My new friend is Robyn Okrant who wrote the book Living Oprah describing how she spent an entire year following Oprah’s advice and suggestions. I love her dedication, if Oprah said we should all go out and buy a particular book, Robyn did just that. She once spent over $400 on new chairs because Oprah declared we should all have a nice chair in every room.

I personally know I could never do anything remotely like that. I have enough trouble just remembering to feed the kids, let alone the unending list of tasks Oprah declares must-do’s.

I’m already up to May but can already tell there won’t be a happy ending. Robyn is not finding inner peace, nor living her “best life” which she thought she’d find. Probably because she was just fine to start off with.

It’s an interesting experiment because I’m sure we all feel that how we live is the best way for everyone and if only people would do things our way, the whole world would be a better place.

It turns out that’s probably not the case, and people do what is right for them.

I do wonder however that if someone else had tried the experiment, things may have turned out differently. What if Robyn was just a square peg to Oprah’s round hole? Could there be potential mini Oprah’s out there who would feel perfectly content and happy living Oprah?

I hope there is a million mini Oprah’s out there. What would it mean to her legacy if everyone watched but no one was listening?

Obligatory New Year Resolutions Post

Resolution #1: Uggg - will obviously lose 20 lbs.

#2: Always put last night's panties in the laundry basket. Equally important: will find nice sensible boyfriend and stop forming romantic attachments to any of the following: alcoholics, workaholics, sexaholics, commitment-phobics, peeping toms, megalomaniacs, emotional fuckwits, or perverts. Will especially stop fantasizing about a particular person who embodies all these things.

Ok, sorry, obviously not my New Year resolutions. But good for you Bridget for choosing sensible, positive changes into our life.

These are my New Year resolutions:

1. Spend less time on computer
2. Spend time on organising myself...and then doing what I organised
3. Use my diary and calendar properly

Shall probably blow all three, but hey, it’s good to aim high.

And So Is The Theme Of My Day

All A-Glow

On pure impulse the girls and I stopped at a bookshop on Thursday night. One Dr Who sonic screwdriver and three books later we retired for home to look over our booty.

One of the books I bought was “First & Only Women. History’s female trailblazers” about remarkable women in history.

The first woman I read about was Marie Curie, who discovered radioactivity. She was the first woman to win a Nobel prize, the only woman to win two Nobel prizes (in Physics and Chemistry) and the only person to win in two different fields. Albert Einstein considered her an inspiration and she was treated like a celebrity in France.

Marie was not only brilliant but passionate as well. She and Pierre Curie had a loving and committed marriage. Pierre, determined to never marry changed his mind as soon as he met Marie, proposing after only six months. She was unsure and fled France to Poland but Pierre was relentless, bombarding her with love letters, declaring “It would be a beautiful thing which I dare not hope for if we could pass our lives close to each other”.

They quietly married and had two children, working together everyday under the beautiful but deadly blue glow of radium until Pierre’s untimely death nine years later in a road accident.

She was a remarkable woman, refusing a government pension, declaring she could earn her own way in life. And despite the dangers of her work she saw the potential of x-ray as a tool to help doctors, setting up hundreds of x-ray machines in hospitals and ambulances, training nurses and doctors in x-ray technology and sometimes driving the ambulances herself to the frontline during World War I. Her compassion and brilliance saved the lives of untold soldiers.

There’s Marie Curie sitting two seats away from Albert Einstein in 1927.

Utterly compelling isn’t it? I’m besotted by science and Big B and I own countless books on the subject. Did you also notice something else about the photos? Slipped into the second photo is a glimpse of my engagement ring. Big B surprised me with a ring and proposal earlier this month and on Thursday I finally got the ring resized to wear.

I can’t promise not to bore you to tears with wedding related posts. In fact I promise I WILL bore you with wedding related posts.

Starting tomorrow.

Party Inspiration Board: Pink Girls Night In

Since having kids I’ve fallen in love with parties. Organising them isn’t a whole lot of fun but when they look pretty the whole world seems to fall into place.

I’ve started doing a few inspiration boards to fuel my imagination, and of course have added my own products in there. We all need a bit of Delight in our lives :)

Now I just need some excuses to have them.

Careers I Could Have Chosen

Sometimes in life there are way too many choices. There are just so many cool careers out there that I feel like I want to pursue them all, as if I could have a second career on the sideline and it wouldn’t be too much work.

So what would I do if I magically had the time to have a second, third, even fourth career?

Children's Clothing Designer

Baker of Yummy Things

Like Bakerella, who seems to spend her day making cookies and taking cool photos of them.

Hair Adornment Designer

Like Twigs & Honey.

Artist

Especially art like Rebecca Rebouche, who creates the most divine paintings.

Fabric Designer

Like Australian designer Mel Bomba.

Photographer

Just like Kiss the Grooms Elizabeth Messina.

House Renovator

It ‘sounds’ like a great idea, gutting old ugly houses and redecorating them into something beautiful.

Illustrator

Like the very talented Elise Hurst who wrote and illustrated one of our favourite books, The Night Garden.

Book Shop Owner

I could just read all day long. Bliss.

Shoe Designer

Like The Shoe Girl who spends her day dressing up and designing fab shoes for top fashion labels.

Invitation Designer

You design pretty things like Rifle Paper Co, people love them and use them a wedding invitations. Perfect.

Party Planner

I couldn’t think of a better way to spend the day.

It Girl

With my own reality show of course.

Stay at Home Mum

Where the only thing I do is what I want, when I want…and then I blog about it of course.

Chocolate Shop Owner

No explanation necessary.

Let Them Eat Cake…All Day Long

We do a lot of cake and chocolate eating in this house.

Well, why not? It’s perhaps one of the great loves in our household.

And in honour of that delicious substance, just yesterday I saw these online:

Oh how divine, how delicious, how scrumptious. Details here.

And while we’re still on the subject of chocolate I also came across this beautifully designed chocolate milk collection:

How amazing. Designed by Mark Johnson a recent graduate from the Savannah College of Art and Design in Savannah. I would buy chocolate milk everyday if it looked like this.

To add to my blissful morning I’m listening (and forcing the kids…one’s home sick) to the 2005 Pride and Prejudice soundtrack. It’s really lovely and I’m definitely getting old :)

Advertising Revamp Experiments

I’m not very good at marketing and advertising. It probably has more to do with my lack of training in that area as opposed to me just being a dummy. But it’s something I’d like to get better at.

When I was doing some work experience as a photographers assistant…many moons ago…one of the photographers told me it’s ok to copy another photographers style. Not only would I put my own spin on it but it would give me the opportunity to learn lots of different techniques and ideas. Obviously, eventually you develop your own style, but how would you know what your style was until you tried out lots of different ones for size?

So using that idea I’ve started my own little fun experiment. I’m going to find ads I like and adapt them to fit Empire of Delight products. They won’t be ads I can use for the business but will be a great way to get my creative juices flowing and I’m hoping they’ll help me develop my own ideas.

So I’ll hopefully be featuring one every month, depending on time and what I find. First off, is an ad for a car I found.

Cute huh? And here’s my ad for Empire of Delight.

I like this. It doesn’t really fit the brands image but who knew an ad for soap could look so fashionable and sophisticated? How’s the swish reflection effect? I’m pretty pleased with that.