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Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Ornamental Cherry Blossom Trees

Looking out my patio window I’m staring at the beautiful cherry blossom trees that are lining the sides of the road. Living on a corner lot we have three cherry blossom trees on the fringe of our yard. Two of them have several blossoms and the third is just beginning to bloom. I love this time of year as the trees looks so pretty with the soft, pink ornamental cherry blossoms. I was reading that originally cherry trees were given as a gift to the people of the U.S.A. from Japan. The cherry tree originated from Japan in 1912 also called the ‘Sakura’, an exalted flowering plant. Many cities celebrate with ‘National Cherry Blossom Festivals’, showing beautiful displays of these trees. The Cherry Festival marks the beginning of spring in Washington, the nation’s capital. All kinds of activities and special celebrations take place during cherry blossom season. I imagine it would be quite a site to behold.  As a lover of nature and all things floral I love to capture great pictures of the cherry blossoms when I have the chance too! Here are some of the pictures on products that I have in my store, Designs by Shell and some from other photographers that have taken some beautiful pictures too!

 

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Use Youtube to Market Your Business

In exploring different ways to market my business I was reminded about making a Youtube video clip. This is a great marketing tool and can help you gain exposure for your company or brand. I had no experience at this but thought I’d check out what others were doing. Once I realized how easy this was I decided to use a simple video editing platform called One True Media, they lay everything out with simple directions, they even provide the music. With this you can create free video clips, of course if you want to get into making bigger and better ones you’ll have to pay a little for this. When you publish a video to your account, You Tube creates a profile channel and viewers can subscribe to it. Pretty cool! This way of marketing has proved beneficial for many people so like me why not get on the bandwagon and embrace this technology. It is free and fun to create these after all, you do want to promote your business every way you can, don’t you?

Here’s one that I’ve done,

Funny Animal Cards

As always here are some of my recent designs I’ve been working on for Designs by Shell

Thursday, April 12, 2012

8 Ways to Repurpose Old T-shirts

Everyone has a few old t-shirts that they probably no longer wear. Perhaps your style has changed, you no longer like them or they just don’t fit anymore, well I have some creative and fun ideas to repurpose those t-shirts. Just be sure they are clean and fresh before creating these items or before you decide to send them to the goodwill or toss them out.

1) Make a pretty t-shirt flower. Use a white t-shirt or a bright color, add a pin back and use it as an embellishment for another shirt. See tutorial! Easy enough for kids to manage.

2) Create a t-shirt scarf, there are many styles that can be made. Braided ones are hot right now!

3) Sew a drawstring or tote bag using the base of a t-shirt. Great for books or toys.

4) Stitch a casual memory quilt, use t-shirts with logos or pick a theme or color scheme. Get creative…

5) Crochet a t-shirt rag rug. Here is a page showing a neat one.

6) Crochet a round pot holder, similar to rug but much smaller.

7) Make the kids some comfy throw pillows using a t-shirt that they loved but perhaps have out grown.

8) Lastly, cut them up for dusting and polishing cloths for the home and vehicles.

Well I hope you liked my ideas, share one of your own in a comment with me!

I’ll share some fun t-shirt’s from my store since the theme this week is all about them. Thanks for visiting… Designs by Shell

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Hunger Games – What Did You Make Of It

This past Monday night my husband and I went to see the movie that’s all the rage right now called ‘The Hunger Games’. I haven’t read the book and really didn’t know what to expect from this movie. I have to say I did leave the theatre feeling a little disturbed by it.

The gist of this movie is about a young girl named Katniss Everdeen from a future place called Panem. In this particular society every year the government chooses a boy and a girl from each of the country’s 12 districts to face off in a battle to the death which is called ‘The Hunger Games. Katniss volunteers from her district to protect her little sister who is actually the one who was chosen to participate. I won’t go into anymore detail as many of you may not have seen it yet!  It definitely makes you think about our society and how so many people have become so focused on video games, reality tv and self obsession. The movie made me think about the strength of the human spirit and one’s determination to fight for life no matter what you’re up against. Anyways just  a few thoughts, I think it’s worth seeing, so put it on your list if you haven’t yet!

I’ve been working on a variety of designs for my store Designs by Shell. Sports themes, ice cream and a few cartoon animals. Here is a sampling below…