Archive for the ‘PPP’ Category

Vista Print – Best Printing, Best Price!

Friday, May 16th, 2008

Vista PrintFor the past six months I’ve been a member of Vista Print. I haven’t spoken about them very much but I can honestly say that if it weren’t for their services, I probably wouldn’t be able to effectively run my design business. I have everything from personalized stationary to business cards and I’m even in the process of creating car decals as well for those interested in advertising for me (which there are a few of, thankfully). Working with Vista Print has been amazing for me and now is the time to give back and let the rest of the world know about them!

You can get absolutely anything you could need from Vista Print. I started with their Free Products which include everything from business cards, rubber stamps and even pens with your name and logo on them. They specialize in full color printing, business cards, car door magnets, logo design, post cards, brochures, window signs, hats, t-shirts, pens, magnets, note pads, sticky notes, holiday cards, thank you cards, self inking stamps, and so much more.

I originally printed my 250 free business cards with them, with $5 shipping I received my cards quickly and then went and dropped them off in stores around the area to gain some business. With a huge thank you to them, I was able to bring in enough clients to afford their premium cards – which are high gloss front & back designs. I typically buy in bulk so I have about 500 left out of the 1,000 I purchased. It only cost me $55 to get the glossy finish that I was looking for in order for my cards to stand out amongst the rest. Yes, the original cards were great but having that extra color really did allow my logo to pop.

I’ve also printed return address labels with them as well. For $24 I picked up 420 customized labels that house my logo and all of my contact information. I go through a lot of paperwork. From sending out bills to payments – you really need to stay on top of things and with a thank you to Vista Print, I’m able to run my business more effectively and couldn’t ask for a better company to work with.

Business Add-ons

Thursday, May 15th, 2008

EZUnsecuredI’m currently in the process of paying off a personal loan that I took out back in October. The initial reason behind the loan was so that Sean and I could successfully moved out to Ohio but with changed plans we’re still in Delaware. Now, while we don’t mind being in Delaware it would have been nice to fulfill the dreams we had with that money, instead of just staying where we currently are. Unfortunately the income I had back in October is no where near what I’m making so I’m in the process of looking into Small Business Loans so I’ll be able to refinance the previous loan and hopefully be able to pay off the second one at a much lower interest rate. There are also a few things that I need in order to maintain my business and the extra money coming in will be a really big help.

I need a new laptop, while I have the Mac to work on I do like the portability and I’ve noticed that my laptop is running very – very hot and since I’m no longer under warranty and it keeps crashing on me – I’ve decided that it’s time for a new one. I’ve been looking into numerous different brands and while I would absolutely love to invest in a MacBook Pro I can easily run Mac OS X Leopard on an Intel based system that costs much less. I was able to customize a laptop with no operating system that housed an Intel 2.5GHz processor, 4GB of ram and a 256 Graphics card for only about $850. That’s about 1800 cheaper than the MacBook that I customized.

I also need to invest in a new car, and while that doesn’t seem “business based” when you need dependable transportation to get you to and from both job interviews and client meetings – having a stable car would really help me out. The one I’m driving now? I’m lucky to make it out of the complex, let alone making it down to Ocean City or any other major town in the area to hold my meetings. The car would also be used as advertising space, I’d use the back window for a custom message that I already have designed in Photoshop for when I’m ready to print things out.

The possibilities are some-what endless, I just need to be eligible for a loan totaling about $25,000. It would take me a long time to pay off but if my payments could be less than $350 a month it would really help me out.

Cash Advance for Tires

Thursday, April 17th, 2008

Hopefully in the next couple of months I’ll be able to look into Car Loans. It’s my goal to make enough money to pay off my existing personal loan and then continuing to send out $300 a month to get myself a new car. For the past few months I’ve been driving Sean’s and while it gets me to where I have to go, it would be nice to have something to call my own. As I’ve noted in the past, I’ve been looking into the Chevy Cobalt Sedan. A few people have asked why I don’t just get the coupe but from my experience with cars, the Sedan usually offers a bit more room and for those long trips up to New York it would work out better for Sean and I considering Bella likes to roam around the car and it would be pretty easy to stick her into a larger back seat. Another plus would be the ability to switch off and doze in the back seat for when my eyes start to burn from concentrating on the road too long. Sean and I have already said that our next trip up there will go much smoother because the 5 hour drive can be broken down in 2 1/2 shifts for each of us. I can handle the DE and NJ end of things, he can take over for the second half of getting us out of NJ and into NY.

We just can’t do that with his car right now, he desperately needs tires. I was pulled over the other day because my tires spun out in a rocky area and the cop happened to be sitting right behind me at the light. He stuck a quarter into all four tires and saw that there was literally no tread left on them and I had to talk my way out of a ticket informing him that it wasn’t my car and I had no idea that there was even a problem with the tires. Something tells me that I’m going to have to take out a Cash Advance on my credit card so we can get new tires for the car. I’m close to being maxed out on one card so I’d have to take the money off two cards in order to be able to afford the $300+ for four tires.

Not a good time to be broke, let me tell you.

Summer’s Coming!

Thursday, April 17th, 2008

Summer is fast approaching and the last 70+°F days have proven this. It’s absolutely gorgeous outside so sitting all cooped up in the house just isn’t an option for me. Yesterday I spent a lot of time in the yard cleaning out the weeds and doing some general maintenance to make the front lawn look a little more appealing. There is a lot that I’d like to accomplish, and it all requires money so hopefully business starts to pick up soon.

It’s difficult to figure out which is the ‘garden’ and which is the grass when it comes to our yard, it kind of all grows into eachother and looks absolutely horrible. I wanted to pick up some bricks or even wood to setup a border, making a mini fence. I’d then like to fill the garden with fresh soil so I can plant nice clusters of flowers, the soil down here is so sandy that it’s hard to really grow anything. Then I’m going to pick up a few packs of solar lights, I figure 8 would be enough for the front lawn and that will make it a bit brighter around here at night as well. That should cover the visual aspect of things.

Then comes the comfort. While we don’t have a wide porch, we have a very long one that covers the whole length of the front of the house. Right now I have two plastic chairs from Walmart with a couple of side tables and a plastic bench in the middle. I absolutely hate it but it was affordable. I’d like to make it look really nice with a few Adirondack Chairs. I figure two of those with a nice little table in the middle would be more than enough to give me the comfort and the look I’m going for. When it comes to the nightly time spent outsde, the lights along the front garden and a couple of candels to keep the bugs away are all I’d really need.

Then comes the back yard. We’re not allowed to fence it in so I’d like to do a simple little seating area behind a privacy screen. You still get all of the sunlight but you can relax without someone staring at you. I’d definitely need a nice Market Umbrella and I’d love to put a few Adirondack Rockers back there as well. Throw in a little fire pit and maybe a few flower pots and I can’t tell you how happy I’d be to spend my summer tanning outside while I’m getting my work done. That’s a great thing about working from home, you can spend the day outside enjoying the fresh air and still get a nice glow from the sun.

Getting an IT Certification

Wednesday, April 16th, 2008

IT Certification Sean and I are both pretty interested in getting ourselves back into school. We both want to focus on the Computer Science aspect of things, but obviously we’d like to specialize in certain areas. He’s more into Programming so he’d look into a degree in that field specifically. I’d like to get one in the Web Design field. I know I’ve been involved in this field for 10 years but without a piece of paper showing my skills it’s hard to find a job down here. I’ve been considering certificate courses, while they aren’t a full-fledged degree – they do at least give me a piece of paper noting that I’ve dedicated the time and money in the attempt of getting a piece of paper proving what I’m capable of. That, I would hope, could get me in the door so I could work enough to eventually afford to enroll in a full-time college and earn my Bachelors in Computer Science. For now, I may pick up my IT Certification from quickcert.com. I can choose from a Microsoft Certification, COMPTIA Certification, Cisco Certification and a few other different programs. I’m not really sure which one I’d choose in the end but I think just having the Microsoft Certification would be all I need to at least get my foot in the door…right?

Promoting Your Business

Wednesday, April 16th, 2008

Trade Shows One of my favorite things to do during the Spring and Summer months is head up to Laurel, DE and visit the local camp-grounds to look at trade show items. They vary from new ideas to ones that were improved on. I really enjoy finding new items, and I’m happy that I found a few resources online that will give me the opportunity to push my own.  There’s this site called Gimmees.com where they provide promotional products and trade show items for business owners and really just about anyone interested in promoting their product or brand. I floated around the Apparel and the Office section, I figure with business cards on hand and things like bumper stickers, shirts, caps and even pens – I can really push my design business to the local companies in the area. Word of mouth advertising is just about the best thing in the world and if I can partner up with upcoming companies, even existing ones, there would be a solid flow of work coming in so I can pay my bills without any major concern in upcoming months. They aren’t expensive either, you can buy items in bulk for as low as $.50 cents a unit. Talk about affordable!

New Opportunities

Tuesday, April 15th, 2008

Thank YouIn the past week I was approved to work at a new Web Design company. Well, they aren’t new but it’s a new company for me. Things look pretty promising, I haven’t done much work yet but I had to work on a Sweat Equity project where I donate a template for them to give to potential clients looking for free templates, even premium ones. The first one I designed was a little over-the-top for them but I was told to archive it so I could use it later on. I don’t mind that though, at least I know it’ll be an easy project for me considering the bulk of the work is completed. I’ve already been asked to design a template for one of their business networking projects and while I don’t have that many ideas running through my head as of right now, I’m sure within the next day or so of spending some much-needed time in the garden, something will come to me.

Cards Direct What I really like is that when you become a Designer with this company, you’re provided with just about everything you’d need in regards to Business Cards, Letter Heads, Custom Envelopes and you can even access their supply of Logo’s to design your own Thank you Cards. When searching for initial template ideas I did poke around on cardsdirect.com, they have a lot of different templates to choose from, my favorite being the one I posted to the left. I know it looks a little bit on the plain side but I’m someone who really likes clean-lines and simplicity. It’s a simple white design with gold embellishments. There’s a lot of other ones to choose from, but I have to say that I like the fact that they give you the ability to customize your cards so you can use your own images and logos when sending out your notices. Anyone who knows me, knows that I tend to over-customize things so that it’s easy to tell when something came from me. Sure, I could go and pick up a package of generic “Thank You” notices, but with my stamping abilities and special stickers for the envelopes – I can stand out in your boring stack of bills, let me tell you!

Non-Surgical Procedures

Friday, April 11th, 2008

I’m going to honestly admit that the thought of any Medical or Surgical procedure that requires anything sharp coming in my direction scares the bejesus out of me. So naturally when someone saves up tens of thousands of dollars for cosmetic surgery to make themselves “feel better”, I kind of wonder what the point really is. What’s so wrong with working with what God gave you? You’re paying to place your life and well-being in someone else’s hands and that’s when I believe the need for perfection has just gone way too far in life.

I feel pretty strongly about this because of known experiences with these routes. With botched Botox injections and breast augmentations gone terribly, terribly wrong – you wonder why people even bother. Today, however, I came across alternative routes to achieving the look you desire, without the surgical intervention. If you take a look across med spa Georgia, you’ll notice that it’s a facility in dedication to doing things without requiring a scalpel. They can do everything from skin revitalization, removing unwanted body hair, eliminating cellulite and just to shape their bodies, including reducing the signs of aging without surgical intervention.

I think it’s the route to take if you’re not looking to spend tens of thousands of dollars on irriversable procedures that you’re rarely happy with in the end.

ColdFusion: Validation

Friday, April 11th, 2008

I was poking around the Internet in search of more programming techniques using validation and I was side-tracked by a very well written article about programming in cold fusion. This wasn’t exactly what I was looking for because I was thinking more of th XHTML/CSS aspect of things but when it comes to a field where I’ll eventually stick my nose in – it’s worth the effort to at least do some reading about it. The point of the article was the importance of programming with required fields that have a validation option in the background. The only thing I didn’t like about the article was the lack of proper HTML validation but they’re programmers, not designers so of course the way of going about things is going to be a little different. Unless programmers are learning to care about how the front-end of their scripts look – it’s rare that you’ll find one that will be a completely valid form. From my experience, a lot of programmers outsource their completed script to have someone go through the outputs with a fine-tooth comb to make it valid and cross browser compatible.

It’s a pretty good start-guide if you’re getting into ColdFusion, I’d recommend that you bookmark the article to use as a future reference. While it’s not the authors fault, I will admit that it was a little hard to read. The text was a little too small and it was mashed right next to the Google Ad on the page. Once you can get past that it’s a pretty basic break down of something very important when it comes to all aspects of Programming. IE: Making sure you’re only going to get VALID information from the person filling out the form.

Stylish Design

Thursday, April 10th, 2008

When I get a little bored, I like to float around the Internet to other Design websites so I can check out my competition. It keeps me on my toes and gives me an insight as to what clients currently want so I can focus my attention on learning the new tricks of the trade. Doing things this way has helped me to build a pretty unique portfolio over the years. Today I came across a website called Stylish Design, it’s The blog where web design and style have met. At first I thought I was going to come across a site, much like my own, where the main focus is the technology related blog and then web design solutions are offered in a different part. Eventually the design aspect of the site will over-power the domain but for now I’m content with how things currently are.

Stylish Design isn’t like that though. I was expecting to find templates and what-not but the site houses well written articles about many aspects of the Interweb, It’s primarily a seo blog offering up tips and tricks on how to properly get your site out there. A popular site isn’t just based on the beautiful design, it’s based on proper content with well written articles and that’s something that many bloggers are now starting to realize. The authors at Stylish Design have had this in their mindset since the beginning of their blog and have since written wonderful articles about everything you could need to know about the Internet. From SEO to Page Ranks and CSS and what-not in between – I’m sure you’ll find something of interest. Their design concept (in my opinion) is a little plain but minimalist is the IN thing so that works well for them. Their focus is on the content, and they do a pretty damn good job of it.