Don't Panic Design

Congratulations to my blog giveaway winners: M. Nootz - Calendar Mindy Teini - Recycled Notebook Cyndia at Black Siren Studio - Ever Occasion Notecards Please contact me via email (designsdontpanic@gmail.com) with your address, and I will ship out your prizes within 3 days. Thanks so much for helping me celebrate!!

Happy Anniversary to me, and Don't Panic Design !   One year ago today, late on Halloween night, I opened my Etsy shop of printable invitations and personalized note cards, at the urging of my sister.  A year ago November 1st, (tomorrow) I made my first sale.  Even though I didn't make another sale until sometime in January, that first sale was like a fire, urging me on.  It has been an amazing year, full of failures and successes, lessons, and celebrations.  And that's what I like most about this job: helping others with their special celebrations!   In honor of celebration, let's celebrate with a giveaway! To celebrate the last year, and start off on a good foot this year, I am giving away three items that haven't hit my shop yet.  A set of 20 Just a Note note cards with envelopes, a small daily calendar, and a recycled envelope notebook with the winner's monogram on it.  In order to enter, all you have to do is leave a co...

A long skinny invitation, either portrait or landscape,  is a great way to take advantage of your  standard sheet size and look creative and pretty.  Tuesday's Tip Another way to stay within your budget and get a custom design is to create yourself, or have a designer create for you, an invite that will fit two or more onto a standard sheet of paper.  This way you can print two (or more) for the price of one.  Think outside the box in terms of size.  5 x 7 is pretty standard and will fit two up on a letter page.  But 3.5 x 8.5 will fit three per page and with the unique size and shape will really stand out in the sea of invitations. This invite has a white border around the edges and will fit in a number 9 envelope.

As I travel ever deeper into the world of blogging, I am attempting to post more often with meaningful  content.  So, while my business is centered on you - what you need and what you want in an invitation design - my life, while focused on my business and on growing it, has many and varied interests.  One of the most important to me is to make small changes in action and habits every day to become more environmentally friendly and reduce my own waste.  So, going forward Thursdays are dedicated to being green, if not other reason that today is Thursday, and I am inspired to start now! The first thing that I would like to share with you is this website about keeping produce better longer.  Understanding about food and how it 'works' is essential to everyday healthy living and reducing waste by knowing how to keep it fresher longer.  So please, take a look at this link and read a bout some of these fruits and vegetables and learn how to keep them longer, so...

I got an email tonight from a recent customer.  I set up the files to fit onto her pre-printed stock.  She was so excited about how they came out, she sent me pictures of the completed invitations to share, and I wanted to share them with you. It really made my night and got me to thinking about some of the other invites I have designed since I opened my shop on etsy.  I have gotten so many nice comments back, and I wanted to share some of the designs with you tonight.  I love being able to provide someone with the design they wanted and to hear them say, these turned out even better than I imagined!  It's why I do what I do!

My sister is getting married in June, and we  started assembling the invitations last week.  Just before, we went out shopping for paper to use as a backing, she says to me, "Oh my gosh, I don't know what I'm doing.  Why am I doing this?"  I just kept looking at the paper and said, "You have to practice to be good at something.  Everyone is an amateur when planning a wedding, because you only do it once." So, when you decide to DIY your wedding, or any party, (and I applaud you if you do) make a list of what needs to be done, and then decide what you need help with.  When it comes to invitations, the hardest part is the design.  Do your research and find a template you love; if you can't, solicit the help of a designer who can help bring your ideas to life.  If possible, find someone who has experience with print as well as design.  You should be able to have a dialogue about what you want and some back and forth with tweaking details....

Printable invitations are becoming more popular, and with near constant access to the internet, your resources are extensive.  There are so many options that I think it must be impossible to not get what you want.  It may take a little research, a little work refining your searches to return to you the results you want, but somehow, there is something for everyone out there, and you can find it. If you can't find it, you can always have your design custom made.  Search for created designs that have a similar sensibility and then contact the designer about custom work.  I would be willing to bet you will get a resounding, "Of course I can do that for you!" almost every time, because designing is what designers like to do, so taking on your project will be fun for them. Here are a few of the designs available on my etsy site,  http://www.etsy.com/shop/DontPanicDesign .  They're not just for weddings; I've adapted a few of these for birthdays and even bu...