A lot is happening and changing around here... with much more to come

This past week has been jam-packed with exciting things going on around here... so much so that I'll just have to do one of those smorgasbord posts I always like reading on other blogs.

Website and blog domain changes
I finally took the plunge and retired the clickable "business card" style website at www.RosehavenCottage.com and made this blog be the permanent home of www.RosehavenCottage.com. I realized that for most people the name "Rosehaven Cottage" is associated with my home and gardens anyway and not my art and design.

I added a "Where to get my art" page to this blog (those of you reading this on email will need to click through to see it) with a pretty graphic directory that helps you find my art more easily.

Then I took the domain www.CindyGarberIverson.com out of mothballs (I've owned it for a while), using a simple yet elegantly responsive template I found at www.CreativeMarket.com for $10, I created a new placeholder site for that domain. [By the way, when a site is "responsive" it means that it resizes and reshapes for optimal viewing on a myriad of mobile devices as well as standard laptop and desktop computers.]

I've decided that I will be exploring some exciting new hands-on art forms once I get my studio done. I will be producing original artwork and it seemed like the right time to embrace my full name for my art website. It will probably morph over time but this is a good start.

Finally, www.RosehavenCottageStudio.com will serve as my official artist blog. So if you want to read updates on what I'm doing creatively you'll need to follow me there as well as here.

I'll let this www.RosehavenCottage.com blog be the home of all my garden, wildlife and home posts and photos as it has always been.

Designing for a soon-to-debut author
I was thrilled when my wonderfully talented cousin informed everyone that her first book has been accepted by a publisher and is due for release around September 2014. I was even more thrilled when she reached out to me and asked if I could help her with designing her website and online presence graphics. My answer was, "Of course!"

I got her all set up with a new domain at www.SarahEBoucher.com with custom-designed website and pretty graphics for all her social media sites that she'll be using as a published author.

I feel that I was getting inspiration poured into my head as I created for Sarah. It was such an amazing experience. First, I designed a monogram for her as the foundation for her branding (below).

The monogram became her little favicon on the tab of any web browser when someone is looking at her site.

I spring-boarded off the monogram to create a header for her website that also became her Facebook cover photo (below).

Once I had those nailed down, I had the basis for the colors of her website as well as the other graphic accents she needed like her bio pic (below)

Finally, I created her social media buttons to be uniquely hers (below).


Make sure and go check out her site and follow her on your social media of choice. You'll definitely want to be one of the first to know when her book is coming out and where you can buy it.

And if all that isn't enough...
Hubby and I have been given an incredible opportunity! We were invited to serve as technology specialists on the public affairs committee for a conglomeration of our Church's congregations (a.k.a "wards") known as "a stake". These positions are unpaid as are all positions in our Church (even clergy), so this will be a "labor of love". Our committee's job (and our job) is to assist our congregations in connecting with the towns, cities and communities in which they live, so they can be engaged in service opportunities both large and small.

One of the first jobs I was tasked with was setting up an online presence and social media accounts for the public affairs committee. I got a chance to use one of my own older photos of our local shoreline in the design.

I also got to design the posters and flyers for an upcoming community service event that ended up being the first thing we published on the new public affairs site. Here's the poster:

And here's the flyer in black and white so it could be easily and inexpensively photocopied:

I told you there was a lot happening around here. I wasn't kidding!