New Home!

With the advent of my first Etsy shop, I've decided to start fresh with my blog and make the switch to WordPress. You can find me now at www.christinalikes.com. Hope to see you there!

Cause to Celebrate!

Our college minister (who also married us last June) and his wife have been in the adoption process for a little over a year and just found out that they get to bring home a little boy who is being born on May 15! They're going to be amazing parents, I'm so excited for them and can't wait to design their birth announcement. His name is going to be Lincoln, but I'm sure he'll be cuter than this one:

Babycakes Vegan Bakery

I caught a few minutes of the Martha Stewart show when we were at home for lunch today (Justin promptly put on his headphones to avoid craft overload) and my mouth started watering when I saw Erin McKenna of Babycakes NYC making the most delicious looking chocolate chip cookie sandwich in the world.

Giant piles of cookies and icing are healthy if they're vegan, right? She just released a cookbook which I think I might actually get. I love love love my sweets!

Feelin' Rustic

This box and many other beautifully crafted wooden boxes, sculptures and frames {made by SixthandElm} are in her etsy shop.

I love the woodburned type on this photo box. I would be much more likely to feature this on my coffee table than a typical photo album.

Mother's Day Gift

I just found the perfect personalized Mother's Day gift for my mother-in-law (who is the best mother-in-law ever). She collects spoons, so the second I saw this necklace by SpoonerZ I knew I'd have to get it. It's really affordable, too, which is great now that I have two moms to buy for! I'm thinking of maybe getting the numbers to her favorite verse engraved on it.

Texan Etsian: Leah Duncan

Some wonderful delicate line work and soft color palettes from this Austin-based designer/illustrator Leah Duncan.

Lisa Hannigan

Adorable personality, lovely voice, great lyrics and crafty videos. Sounds like a recipe for stuff I like, how bout you?


This image from the set designer, Maeve Clancy, is much more compelling to me than the shots actually in the video. I wish the lighting had been a little more interesting, but I love that they used cut paper, so I won't complain too much.

Spirit Photographs

William Hope was a photographer/medium (who was eventually exposed as a fraud) in the early 20th century.
Check out the flickr set for more haunting images.

Maximo

The final site for Maximo Cocina Mexicana & Margarita Lounge launched this morning. Go take a look! And then go eat dinner there, because its really really good!

The Student Show

Well, friends, it looks like I'm going to be co-chair for the 2010 DSVC National Student Show & Conference. How did this happen? I don't really know, but you can count on a fantastic show for the 6th year in a row!

I spotted some of my contributions to the show on flickr, today. I designed the banners for the conference (based off of the poster designed by Barfoot) and came up with, dare I say, a pretty clever little tote bag that all of the conference attendees got to take home. I'm thinking of making my own run of them (minus the student show logo) to sell on etsy.




I don't know who these people are, but they stood in front of my banners to take pictures! Don't they look like they just love their bags?

Happy Vegetables

This reusable vegetable bag really caught my eye today. Wonderthunder's entire shop is full of screenprinted goodies.

White is for Witching

A few weeks ago I signed up to get a free early proof of the book White is for Witching, by Helen Oyeyemi. Read about what I'll be doing with it here. I had honestly kind of forgotten about it until I got the book in the mail today! Its quite lovely.

Letterpess for Mom

Lots of great choices for beautiful Mother's Day cards on Etsy. Mother's Day is May 10, so send your sweet mama a sweet note!

1. smockpaper
2. smockpaper
3. afavorite
4. sycamore street press
5. dutch door press
6. two hand design

Headin out west!

We just booked our flight+hostel+hotel for our first anniversary trip to Portland in June! We're spending two nights in a cute little hostel in Nob Hill and our last night at the uber-cool Ace Hotel. I first heard about the Ace when our friend Mark designed the website a few years ago and have been wanting to stay there ever since. (Another friend, Jeff Rogers, recently painted a couple of fantastic murals in the new location in NYC)

If you've ever spent time in Portland and have any recommendations I'd love to hear them! We're for sure planning on enjoying an afternoon in Powell's Books and are looking forward to hiking and checking out some museums. Would love to know if you've been to any good restaurants/coffee shops/etc.



So excited! I can't believe we're just a few months away from our first anniversary. The year has floooown by!

Go Barefoot.

Flower DIY

Thanks to a great link from Melissa I found this fun and incredibly easy DIY project from Martha Stewart.

I Want This.

So pretty. Made by florabond.

SXSW in Brief

Just wanted to make a quick post of a couple of my favorite photos from the weekend in Austin. You can view the rest here. I'll do a more thorough recap of flatstock and the sweet posters we brought home with links to the amazing artists and designers who were there.

For now, here are some fireworks from the explosions in the sky show at auditorium shores, as well as a few other favorites from the weekend.

As Justin Put It...

...profoundly appropriate.


Made by buttonempire.

A Childress Special!

Here's a sneak peek at the first website finished at Switch that I designed and Justin developed!

We've also updated the Switch website with a few images from the menus I designed for Maximo.

Pinch!

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Here are a few green goodies from Etsy to spread the Irish cheer.

my Irishman loves this bicycle clock

a sweet Irish babushka with Russian roots

for the stylish Irish

if you forgot this year, make sure you have a little touch of green for next!

Handwriting Matters

Read this article and ask yourself, what kind of impression does your handwriting leave?

Summer Rings

If you know my husband and me, you know that we have beautiful custom wooden wedding rings, made by a really wonderful couple, David and Nicola, who live on a farm off the grid in British Columbia. They are some of the most inspiring people I've ever "met" and completely embody the idea of living simply so others may simply live.


But, now that we're getting into the spring humidity of Texas and know of the impending doom of summer, we've noticed a bit of wear & tear on our rings and are a little nervous about how they'll hold up summer after summer until we're old old old. SO, we've ordered ourselves some custom silver "summer rings" to keep our wooden rings beautiful as long as we can.

I'm so excited about our silver rings! They're both so unique and beautifully handmade. Justin's was made by ballandchain

and mine was made by Hannah Salomon of Kutuu Jewelry, based in the UK.

I can't say enough how sweet and accomodating Hannah has been in working with me in the process of making my ring. The kindness of the handmade community is amazing. If you've never bought handmade or worked with someone on a custom project, I really hope you will soon for a gift or a wedding or anything. Being able to connect with other artists, designers, and craftspeople online is the best part of the internet.

Be sure to check out the Kutuu flickr photostream and Etsy shop, too!

Sunday/Friday Favorites

I completely forgot about Friday favorites this week. Good thing I'm not a professional blogger! Last week's favorites are a combination of flickr & etsy. Enjoy!

This is the funniest lunchbox I've ever seen. An example of truly maximizing potential of the relationship between a product & its use. Made by OnesandZerosFashions.


Completely out of my price range, but I absolutely love this vintage lace dress.


There's an amazing story behind the folks who made this wallet.
Transit Antenna is a mobile living experiment: seven people living and working while traveling the roads of North America. Bob, Dawn, and Taylor Snead, Jamie Self, Seth Gadsden, Josef Kristofoletti, and Amy McBrine live on a retired city transit bus, called Walter, that we converted into an RV that guzzles straight vegetable
oil. By dumpster diving for grease, we're reducing our carbon footprint and avoiding the diesel pumps.
Over the next two years, we will create writings, photographs and videos about our road experiences and our collaborative projects, and post them to our website for your enjoyment.


Another favorite from yodraws' photostream.


This polaroid by sarina cass has been on my favorites list for awhile. The little bit of pink in the corner set against the gorgeous green-blue water is so great.

Half Price Books Loot

Its been awhile since we've searched through the endless aisles of the giant Half Price Books in Dallas. Found some great old stuff.

Nate Williams

Some great illustrative work and a regularly updated blog from Nate Williams. If you've ever been curious about an illustrator's process from sketch to completed piece you'd enjoy perusing his blog. Apparently he also works under the name Alexander Blue.

Hoffice Wedding Buttons

I made these buttons for a wedding-themed party that Switch+NarrowSearch is throwing in celebration of our partnership with each other and as a follow-up to our engagement party that was in November. We had a very official meeting of the Committee for Planning Committees (to plan committees, for party planning purposes) so I made a button for everyone and the committee they're in.
Check it out on my flickr to see which committee each button represents.

Orla Kiely for Target!

I was SO excited last weekend when I saw the tell-tale Orla Kiely brand pattern on some fabric storage boxes at Target, I can't believe its taken me so long to blog about it. I was even MORE excited to find Orla Kiely housewares when I searched on Target's website! For some reason the fabric boxes aren't online, but I definitely saw them in the store, so you might want to go check it out for yourself. Maybe there are even MORE Orla Kiely products! (No, I have no affiliation with Orla Kiely, I just reaaaallly really love these products and I've never been able to afford them before!) All of these images are products available at Target.