Horse Camping Sept. 2010

Horse Camping Photos

Part of the reason I haven't had time to keep my blog updated is because my husband and I are starting a trail riding business with the owner of the ranch we live on. Check out our website: www.RiverOaksTrailRides.com! We plan to be opening to the public sometime this month, probably within the next two weeks, once we get the final business/insurance arrangements wrapped up.

We've got four horses and a pony available for guests, and they've all been just wonderful. We figured a little horse camping trip would be a good test to see what they were made of... plus a fun adventure for us and our friends Ingo the farrier and his wife Jenny. We went up to Rancho Oso, a little over half an hour from home, where they have horse camping facilities. The horses were without exception absolute champs -- handling trailering, tying, standing, river crossings, narrow trails, dogs, deer and campers in stride with no fuss at all.

We all had a great time, and I have to say, it was a dream come true for me, something I've always wanted to do. I'm so very grateful for the opportunity to be able to live these dreams... and to be able to work doing the things I love.

Waxing Poetic...

I feel so fortunate as a designer to be able to work with a company like Waxing Poetic -- an amazing team of brilliant talents who bring together elegance and whimsy and meaning and spirit to create truly unique and beautiful treasures of jewelry.

We recently finished their gorgeous 2010 catalog, almost a third larger than last year's catalog, and brimming with exciting new pieces and fabulous photos. Lucky talismans, whimsical bottle pendants containing "Essence of Dreams," "Stress Remedy," and "Wish Tonic," storybook page charms, camp bracelets, and bangles engraved with things like "shadow, sparrow, lilacs, twilight" and "be braver than you thought" are some of my favorites. They're nearly finished with a spectacular new and improved website, but visit http://www.waxingpoetic.com/ now to see what I'm talking about!

In addition to the catalog, Art Department handles ad layouts and other promotional print items such as sales sheets, easel signage, website updates, and more. I even create designs for charms here and there...

Now Waxing Poetic is opening a retail shop in lovely Los Olivos, right here in the Santa Ynez valley. Here's a great idea: spend an afternoon wine tasting, then swing by Waxing Poetic and discover a precious treasure to give for mother's day, or a birthday, or just because...

A Little Holiday Music

I'm just wrapping up a cool website for a friend of mine, guitarist Jon Jeffers, and his new duo "Jeffers and Rose, " featuring saxophonist Les Rose.

I used the Wix.com flash site, which worked really well for building a fun online listening interface, as well as creating an interactive and hip-feeling website. Take a look at http://www.jeffersandrose.com/! I really do enjoy creating sites with Wix -- it's so easy and fun (especially compared to Dreameaver, which I'm trying to learn right now and is giving me nothing but headaches)!

We also put together some other promotional materials, including a rack card, business card, and demo CD label.

Jeffers and Rose are available to play holiday parties, fundraising events, weddings, vineyards, restaurants and more. They're fabulous musicians, and know how to create just the right musical ambience for any occasion.

Time for a new website look?

I was scanning through one of my LinkedIn graphic design discussion groups the other day and noticed someone asking about easy to build websites for designers who aren't necessarily web experts. There were quite a few glowing responses referring to Wix.com, so I decided to check it out myself.

Right from the start, I was very impressed with how simple, and well, just how plain fun it is to use! I've been wanting to update and refresh my website for a while, so I started tinkering with laying out a new Art Department website... and just couldn't stop.

Wix is a Flash-based sitebuilder, and it features lots of really slick looking transitions and movement, sounds and effects. I've never worked with Flash, but I had no problem with the Wix interface. It seems like a good way to build a site that's dynamic, professional looking and easy to use. I don't think there's any software to download, either -- it's all done online, so should be updatable from any computer, anywhere. I really like their templates, too; lots of fresh, contemporary layouts that were well designed.

Now, I've always heard that Flash websites aren't a good option if you want to be searchable by Google and the rest, but Wix claims they've fixed that and are search engine friendly... I'll be looking a little more into that before I transfer my domain name. Right now I'm signed up on their free service -- yes! I was able to put this all together without spending a dime! And that's something I really appreciate -- I didn't need to provide any credit card info or anything to get started. If I do transfer my domain to their hosting service, I can pay a fee (from $5 - $20/month, depending on the package), which will take their ads off, provide site statistics, etc, etc.

I'd appreciate any feedback regarding how the site loads, and what you think about the site overall. If you've got a minute, please check it out at http://www.wix.com/suekrauer/Art-Department.

Color My World...!

Here's a super cool website to check out: http://colorschemedesigner.com/

It easily generates all sorts of color schemes, from simple to complex, ID's the colors, and exports them in a variety of formats to use in different programs (like Photoshop) or to file away or send to clients, etc. You can adjust hue and contrast to fine tune for subtlety or boldness. But wait, there's more! There's a randomization option, and even a vision simulation option to see how the scheme would appear to viewers with different variations of colorblindness. Wow, who comes up with this stuff?

It's a brilliant tool for easily visualizing color scheme concepts. Well, and for some of us, it uh, can provide hours of entertainment! There's also an "Instant Designer Shop" with pages and pages of ideas for logos, websites, etc... an all around handy place to go for inspiration when the creative juices aren't flowing so well, like on these hot summer days!

Current Graphic Design Project: Nerds Are Fun!

NERDS: WE CAN FIX THAT! Now there's a company name I can relate to -- nerdy with a positive attitude! ;-)

This local Santa Ynez-based company created a computer support service franchise. They already had a logo, but needed a bright, playful, eye-grabbing look that would solidify their branding throughout all their printed promotional materials.

I found some great "nerd" stock photos, and integrated the images (including their very cute signature cars) with their bright color scheme in clean, bold layouts for stationery, business cards, a brochure, banners, owner's manual and ads...

I think the point I want to make is that with good graphic design, even nerds don't have to look nerdy!

Current Project: Dressage Trainer Websites

It's no secret that I'm a horse nut... so any project that involves horses in any way is a treat for me!

I've had a great time lately working on websites for two local dressage trainers. Both trainers wanted sites that would be easy to update themselves, especially to promote their busy clinic schedules and other news.

Robert & Verena Gharibzadeh's "Top Riding International" features a bold, contemporary design, and some animated text & slide show elements to add energy and interest. Robert is a Pferdewirtschaftsmeister (I'm trying to learn German, but please don't ask me to pronounce that one!), which is the highest level master rider/trainer certified by the German government. One of the elements he wanted to incorporate was a calendar that he can easily update from anywhere to publish his very active schedule. We found a great solution by integrating a Google calendar into the website, which has worked really well for him. Robert also has a lot of videos posted of horses for sale, which were easy to incorporate through Homestead's YouTube tool.

Katja Elk is the resident trainer at Felicity Farm in Santa Ynez, and her dressage training program is called "Gentle Solutions for Horses and People." Katja is also a talented designer herself, and collaborating with her to create an elegant look for the site was really fun. I love all the great photos she had to work with! One of the things Katja wants to do with her website is to share the wealth of information and ideas that shapes her training philosophy, so clean organization and navigation was very important. Communication is a key element in what Katja does with horses, as well as people, so we built in a mailing list and blog, which I think she's going to have a lot of fun with!

Now I've been testing Katja's patience and skills as an instructor as she's giving me an introduction to dressage riding! ;-) I'm thoroughly enjoying learning about a world of subtle communication with horses that I've never experienced before. Katja is a wonderfully talented and insightful horsewoman, so if you're interested in horses on any level, I encourage you to check out one of her clinics, or take some lessons with her! Special thanks also to Ann Cain, for allowing me to ride her lovely thoroughbred gelding, "Si."