How to of the Day!

I wanted to pass along the following websites. You can register for FREE to be taken off the list that all of those credit card companies use. They do state that they will ask for your social security number, full name, address and telephone - so don't be alarmed. Don't forget that both husband and wife should fill this out. If you would like to reduce the number of pre-screened credit and insurance offers you are receiving, visit www.optoutprescreen.com or call 1-888-5OptOut (1-888-567-8688) to opt-out of these offers. This is a free service to consumers offered by the major credit bureaus.

There is also another service through The Direct Marketing Association that will add your name and address to a "delete file." DMA members agree not to use your name in marketing products and services, or trade or sell your name to other marketers. You can renew every 5 years. Cost $1.00 If interested check it out at www.reduce.org

Unique Color Tool

There are countless color-generating tools out there, but this tool from ColorJack recently caught my eye. Though it's not the most customizable, it is the only tool that I've seen that puts you in the shoes of about 10% of the male population - those that are color blind.

It was very interesting to see how the palette changed when it was simulated for the most common red-green deficiencies (deuteranopia and deuteranomaly). My misconception was that this deficiency only affected reds and greens, making them a sickly brown, but it actually affects all the colors (which I should have known...red and green are in all sorts of colors...silly me).

The usability would be even greater if you could input your color scheme and see how it's affected, but alas, this is not so. But play around with it...it will give you an interesting perspective!

Photo Realism...in 3D

This artist is, in my opinion, incredible. Called "The Invisible Man," he paints himself to match the background and almost disappears in each photograph.


"I experienced the dark side of society, without social relations, and had a feeling that no one cared about me, I felt myself unnecessary in this world," said Liu Bolin. I think his art expresses that quite well. See more images here.

Finishing what you start

I picked this page because it looked easy! How hard can it be to draw one continuous line all over the page? I learned quickly that wasn't the hard part! Initially, I was creating a smaller pattern and twenty-minutes later I hadn't covered too much ground. I put the book down. Then things began to pile up on top of it and I forgot about it. It was in one of "those" piles that sits out but isn't in the way so you can walk past it while ignoring it eventually never seeing it - selective blindness! The day of reckoning came while cleaning one weekend. Opps! I've prodded others to keep it moving and here it sits. I sat down, decided I needed to finish what I started, and off I went continuing the line until the page was full.

Lessons learned: Finish what you start. Keep your word even in the small things.

The journal will now be traveling out east to visit Jamie and then returns to Wheaton!

We Ain't Afraid of No Germs!

We'll rock the Spock greeting... we'll spread anti-bacterial over every square inch... whatever it takes to keep those nasty germs by whatever name... away!

Thank you team!

What can I say?! You guys ROCK! What a memorable Bosses Day! Thank you for the emails, flowers, and Harley Davidson blanket. If my husband Geoff shows up at the office, don't let him steal that throw!!

How to Motivate People to Take the Stairs

Knife + Spoon = Knoop - Whatever, it works!

Heidi returned this past summer from BlogHer with several promotional items. One that she shared with several of us was the Kiwifruit knife/spoon utensil. Today was the first time I tried using it and find that it works amazingly well! Highly recommend if you are a Kiwi eater, as opposed to a cake-eater and well, you know what to do!

P.S. Kiwi serves well with Cocoa Roast Almonds! Tummy-lious!!

This is Incredible!

Amazing painter. Watch till the end or you won't "get it". It is worth the wait.

Ask A Friend

As I flipped through the journal looking for a page to obey, this one caught my eye: "Ask a friend to do something destructive to this page. Don't look."


Since my fiance (wedding in 3.5 weeks!) and I are at a place where we pretty much do everything together, I thought it would be fitting to have him give the page a whirl. Turns out he was even having a bad day, so the timing worked really well! I didn't look as he destroyed, but it appears permanent markers and ripping were his primary weapons.

Cover Page with White (and Pink) Things

The assignment was to cover the page with white things, but as I started searching my home for white things I found more pink than white so I decided to cover the page with both! Some of things used were wrapping paper, string, rubber band, pipe cleaners and candy wrappers. It turned out to be a very pretty page and fun to do!

100 Years of Visual Effects Inspiration

1900 -- The Enchanted Drawing
1903 -- The Great Train Robbery
1923 -- The Ten Commandments (Silent)
1927 -- Sunrise
1933 -- King Kong
1939 -- The Wizard of Oz
1940 -- The Thief of Bagdad
1954 -- 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
1956 -- Forbidden Planet
1963 -- Jason and the Argonauts
1964 -- Mary Poppins
1977 -- Star Wars
1982 -- Tron
1985 -- Back to the Future
1988 -- Who Framed Roger Rabbit
1989 -- The Abyss
1991 -- Terminator 2: Judgement Day
1992 -- The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles
1993 -- Jurassic Park
2004 -- Spider-Man 2
2005 -- King Kong
2006 -- Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest
2007 -- Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End
2007 -- The Golden Compass
2008 -- The Spiderwick Chronicles
2008 -- The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Source: The Inspiration Room

Coffee Fun

What a simple medium for serendipity! I loved the way the layers built up upon each other. One small cup of coffee = hours of fun at work! I'd love to do this one again, with better paper that absorbs the coffee better!









It was interesting to see how dark we could get the coffee to be. I also enjoyed the way you could "see" things in the coffee- like looking at clouds!

Attention to Detail!

Just read this story and think it is a good reminder to pay attention even if it feels familiar!

I used to work at an office where birthday greeting cards were passed around at least once a week. When the card reached me, I'd quickly scribble down a message and pass it on ASAP. One day, a co-worker (and friend) told me that I might want to pay more attention to when signing cards, since the one that had most recently made the rounds was not a birthday card but rather a sympathy card for a co-worker whose parent had recently died. In it, I had written, "Hope it's a great one!"

Totally mindless activity

Crawling boxes follow your curser around the screen! Click here to begin the mindless adventure.

Hearts of Light

I love this photo!

Before and After

Take some time to look at the two ads and see if you can tell which is the before and which is the after ad. Then read this article by Thomas L. Collins to find out the why behind what he did.

Activity for our next team meeting?

FOUR Letter Words

I chose to come up with a list of Four-Letter Words. I however was nice with this list. Most of the words for similar to: Baby, LOVE, Time, Date and DONE!

The Art of Hermann Zapf

This video came from Bob. Great history and art lesson!

The Art of Hermann Zapf from Johnny Dib on Vimeo.

Cool Color Website

I found this website that helps me when I am looking for color inspiration. It has swatches of popular color combinations with the rgb breakdown.

http://www.colourlovers.com

Lori's 10th Anniversary

I wanted to share with everyone what a great day I had on Wednesday! Robin decorated my cube with twilight inspired streamers. Robin also got me a matching feather boa which I wore all day with some highly fashionable sunglasses. (I'm giving Elton John a run for his money). Bob did a great job on my poster adding in "bling" just my style. And both Ben and Robin made sure the cake was just how I liked it. Chocolate with buttercream icing. The icing colors were black and red, John Jackson said very twilight. Several coworkers had nice things to say but no one would let me forget how I adored Joshua Jackson during the Dawson Creek days. And now how my cube is decorated in everything Twilight-Edward Cullen. Pam, yesterday you had asked if I was married or dating anyone, sadly no. I am looking for Mr. Right (if anyone has single guy friends keep me in mind :0) but I have attached a picture of my fictional boyfriend Edward. tee hee Overall, it was a fun day. It was nice to hear that so many people appreciate me and are glad that I have stuck it out through the good and bad times. I wanted to thank everyone in this department, you have made me feel so welcomed over the past 6 months.
Enjoy the pictures! Lori

Visual Inspiration

Page after page of inspiration! Click here. Or here. Works here too. I can link. Can you?

Team work is beautiful!

Wrecking Havoc... BOB!

Bob, Bob, Bob... what can we say? You continue to exceed expectations. While most of us are content with creating a page in an hour or so... you have to go the extra mile and spend several days if not weeks wrecking havoc upon our beloved journal. While the timeline leaves something else to be desired, the outcome is rather remarkable. Its not something to be expected of you!


Pressing several flowers within the pages of our journal was no small task, I hope no eyebrows were harmed in the lifting of all those books! I was surprised by the quality and variety of flowers you selected. Nice job Bob!

(You might want to get started on the next one to be finished "on time".)

Wrecking... Lori

Lori turned to the art of collage when wrecking our journal. She chose to collect stamps off all her mail. It appears that Lori has many many friends sending her elegant correspondence. She has quite the collection of stamps for us to enjoy and be inspired by! Thanks Lori!

Journal Wrecking... Ben

Ben took his turn wrecking our beloved journal and he selected "DOODLE over top this page."

The tool of choice looks to be a red permanent marker. Displaying his wonderful doodling skills, he depicted Odie, which most of us know from the cartoon "Garfield" his subtle hues and delicate lines bring to mind a carefully rendered depiction of a overly-salivating canine with a river of drool falling off the page.

To complete this masterpiece, Ben included the line "Ha! They said 'DOOD'" I couldn't have put it better myself.

This is why we don't have Macs in the office!

I wish I was a mac

My new desktop background.... my computer is now crying!
I was inspired by this link
http://www.tutzone.org/2009/04/28-creative-mac-wallpapers.html
(thanks Amanda!)
Lindsay

Vinyl.. chalk board.. fun..

I thought these were neat!
http://www.hu2.com/stickers/chalkboard-edition/view-all-products.htm

Why didn't we think of this?!

Too funny! I had to post this one.. Happy Friday

Great video about Information Technology

Temptation

Taken from The Pioneer Woman blog - hilarious.

I wait until Charlie is in a deep, deep sleep. In the hot summer, his naps are are always deep.

Then I place a small morsel of food in the proximity of his nose. This happens to be a small piece of scrambled egg left over from breakfast.

Seconds pass with no response. So I nudge it a little closer.

Still no response, so I nudge it even closer. Not a wink of a reaction.

Charlie drives a hard bargain.

So I break out the big guns.

“The big guns”, in this case, is bacon.

Just a tiny sliver of bacon. But that’s usually all it takes.

C’mon, Charlie. Don’t let me down. Folks are watching.

Oh, yes. I believe it’s going to happen.

Oh, yeah. It’s definitely going to happen.

Wait…

Oh, no! I can’t believe it.

He’s going back to sleep?

It’s not possible!

Oh, ho ho ho.

I knew he’d come through.

And…

Three seconds later…

He’s back to sleep.

Charlie leads a very hard life.

But I wanna try the egg one last time.

Heh heh. See, now I’ve awakened his senses.

Here we go.

And, three seconds later…

He’s gone.