I had been working on a marketing project for a while, but it was all back end stuff. When the time came to actually contact people, I had to figure out what email address to use. My personal one is personal. My blog one would be pretty inappropriate (I use the “eff werd” too much). And anyway, who wants to work with some girl who is emailing out of blue? So I started a company.

If you click on the picture you can see the site.

The copy isn’t exactly the way I want it, because I wrote it rather quickly. Najla, copywriter extraordinaire, is working on that for me.

I call it Pink Moose because I really, really like the word “Moose” (MOOOOOOOSE!) and I figured the logo would be great. Pink can be saccharine, but when it’s a pink moose, it’s less Pretty Pretty Princess and more whimsical and funny and not too serious.

I’m not sure if this is the permanent logo, but it’s what Rob came up with in a pinch, and it’ll do. I’m NOT paying someone to design a logo, and my attempts at drawing a moose have left me regretting skipping most of the second semester of my illustration class in college. (I got a B anyway, a fact that my then-boyfriend found deplorable, because I was literally never there.)

I’ve done marketing like this for another company. I enjoyed it (even though the pay was poo) because I learned a lot about what works and what doesn’t, and I also got an abundance of tiny secrets on “going the extra mile”. For instance, she insisted that any paperclip that was not red (to match her logo) was to be banished from the office! Sounds weird, but made all of our outgoing, paper-clipped packages look SO special. All of my paperclips are going to be pink! I also learned a lot of what I would do if the firm was MINE: things like handwritten labels (we HAD to have typed in her office, and I always wanted to hand write them) and recycled material packaging and paper.

I’m pretty excited, although I’m overwhelmed because my home office is not up to par. That is tonight’s task, along with making cupcakes for Jen’s birthday tomorrow. These are the ones I made for her last year:

This year I have something pretty special planned, too!

My new bloggy friend, Ciao!Chessa, was featured as a runner-up in the Popular Photography Annual Reader’s Contest in the “People” category! I am very proud of her! This is the winning photo.

Congratulations Chessa!

This cute program takes a digital image and converts it into a faux Polaroid. It’s kind of cheating, but the results are really pretty.  It makes a genuine Polaroid camera noise and then takes a few minutes for the picture to appear.  While it’s “developing”, you can shake it!

I used the program to convert a cell phone photo my friend Carissa snapped and sent to me.  The bracket is from Anthropologie, and the a lamp shade and cord are both from Ikea.  She strung the cord through the bracket and made herself a charming, inexpensive, zero-footprint light, perfect for a her tiny apartment bedroom.  So cute!

Tino jumped into bed last night several times, and every time he did, his little jabby paws would prod me awake as he made a nest for himself that inevitably included some bit of my person. He would circle a few times (jab jab jab!… jab.) and then flop down with a contended sigh, like he was thinking, “Ok, this time they’re going to let it slide.” Each time he landed, we put him back on the floor with a firm “No! Stay!”, but he must have heard “Try again in a few minutes.” because it went on all night long.

The lack of sleep and rushing around made today one of my least favorite kind of days days, although it ended nicely, with a cozy ladies dinner in Connecticut, and I got to put my hand on G’s ever-growing belly and feel her tiny daughter kick me hello.

Tomorrow, however, is totally empty. For the first time in a long time, and probably for the last time in a long time, the weekend is laid out totally blank! It’s New York City, I’m sure we’ll find something to do, although now that I’m thinking about it, we do have two important housekeeping tasks to tackle: find the source of the horrendous smell in the kitchen, and trap the mouse that lives in the laundry room and makes the dogs crazy.

Wish us luck.

Have a happy autumn weekend!

taken by me, from flickr