pretty things {from etsy} friday: HALLOWEEN EDITION

Horray! Today I have a special post for Halloween!!! A Pretty Things {from Etsy} Friday... but featuring Halloween related items! Enjoy!

I hope everyone has a fantastic Halloween weekend! Be safe, and eat lots of candy :)

pretty skeleton (via angelastudio1)

pretty sweet vampire cake (via houseofclouds)

pretty cute pumpkins (via pickledpumpkins)

pretty black cat hat (via mk4designs)

pretty creepy eyeball ring (via mintyfreshstudio)

i wanna do pretty bad things with you (via corsostudio)

pretty weird brain-cupcake soap (via sunbasilgarden)

the prettiest knitted candies (via butterflylove1)

pretty cute skull pin (via fingerstuckfelts)

pretty skull and crossbone earrings (via featherandbranch)

pretty pumpkin knitted hat (via kensingtonave)

-g.

raphael vicenzi

Here's a little something sweet & a little bit spooky to get you in the mood for Halloween!

Raphael Vicenzi is a self taught illustrator hailing all the way from Belgium! Simply beautiful! I love the elements of typography.

-g.

jenny hart

Good afternoon! How's everyone doing today? Hope you all had a nice weekend. I sure did! I will talk more about that later though :)

Today I am very inspired by Jenny Hart, an embroidery artist based in Austin Texas. I specifically love her embroidered portraits; the detail is simply amazing! Check out her Flickr to see more of her embroidery, or follow her blog!

Dolly Parton

-g.

{inspired by} dia de los muertos

Hello there! I apologize for the sporadic posts that don't follow much of a schedule, but right now things are busy and I am just trying to keep up with life in general.

I also can't believe how fast time is passing. Some days still feel like the end of summer, but then I remember that Halloween is just around the corner! And speaking of which...

I was truly inspired by John Rees'  "Dia de los Muertos," a beautiful collection of photos portraying women dressed as Catrinas, elegant skeletons that are often associated with the Mexican holiday Day of the Dead, or Dia de los Muertos. I was in such awe after seeing these photos; I hope you can appreciate them too!

I'm at a bit of a loss right now in terms of Halloween plans, but if I happen to find something to do, I definitely want to be a Catrina!!!

What are you going to be for Halloween? I want to know!

-g.

sweater weather

I was in denial for a while, but now I know that it's definitely fall!

I recently started knitting myself a cozy scarf, and I'm absolutely craving this gorgeous sweater from Zara! I need it. {Hint hint Mom if you're reading this!}

Can Zara please please please hurry up with their online store? K, thanks!

-g.

weekend work

You may or may not have caught on to my "complaining" about working a lot. Besides working a full-time job during the week, I also do a lot of freelance work on the side. I love both my jobs but sometimes going from one to the other can get pretty exhausting....

This weekend was spent mostly working on these projects. I have a bunch that are still in-progress, but I'd like to share some things that I worked on!

The first was a poster design for my brother's first gig at college...  he needed a poster to be displayed around campus, so naturally he asked me if I could put something together, and this is what I came up with!

I used Graphics Fairy for the awesome fossil image, and I had a lot of fun playing around with fonts from Dafont too. Ya like???

The second project that consumed all of my Sunday is the cover to this journal that I'm creating for my temple. It will be my Rabbi and his wife's 25 years at our temple, and I helped put together a book of ads from temple members as a fundraiser for the celebration.

For the cover, I originally wanted to hand draw it, so I started drawing a portrait of the Rabbi and his wife. I was completely stuck after finishing the drawing and I really wanted to add elements of color and texture, but I knew I couldn't do that with just the drawing. I drew a simple desk surface with some objects and filled them in with watercolor. Then I scanned all my separate pieces and put them together in Photoshop.

I'm extremely satisfied with the result... I think it's subtle in it's message while being extremely personal... and it came out exactly the way I pictured it! Yey!

If any of my wonderful readers {YOU!} is looking for posters, flyers, drawings or any kind of creative design, you know where to find me! I'm always looking for more work!!! :)

-g.

logo lundi

Happy Monday! How was your weekend? Mine was spent working on this never-ending project, which I will share with you all soon!

I haven't done a "Logo Lundi" in a veryyyy long time... so I thought that I would share this awesome infographic with you all displaying the most popular logo colors. Apparently no one likes purple!

Stay tuned!

-g.

pop-up shop

My blog reading list is growing and growing by the day... it's getting to be quite lengthy, but I like to think that blog reading is time well spent.

Today I got around to reading Lune Vintage today, and oh... my... goodness... I am so inspired by Jill's little eggie!!!

I thought her mobile shop was definitely inspiring, especially for dreamers like myself who would just love to own some sort of shop one day! She invested in a 1976 Boler trailer in hopes of turning it into a mobile shop with a little redecoration and renovation. I think she did a fabulous job of keeping the original feel of a '70s trailer while making it look inviting and most of all, adorable!!! Take a look at the photos, and don't forget to check out her shop!

-g.

what i wore

I'm sorry to be boring you all with my "What I Wore" drawings, but I really want to get the rest posted so that I can post the newer ones! So bear with me... I hope you still enjoy them :)

-g.

ps. Please don't make fun of my strange and always-changing body types... or my scanner :(

music monday & what i wore

Hello friends! How was your weekend? Mine was very nice... I saw the movie Catfish {amazing!!! go see it!}, went shopping, took my puppy to the park, and went to my neighbor's party. I also over-indulged in pizza, Chinese food, and beer, so my tummy ain't feeling so great today, haha.

Here's a music video from El Guincho called Bombay... I can't understand the words since the song is in Spanish, but I still like the beat, and the music video is so strange that it's cool. So check it out, hopefully you don't think I'm a weirdo for posting this {but it's alright if you do...}

On another note... I've been doing more recent "What I Wore" drawings in my new sketchbook, but I want to wait until I finish posting these summer ones, so here's another from June 23!

-g.

hannah j conti

Hey, all... it's Katrina! I hope that you all have been doing famously.


I was on Facebook the other day and saw that I was sent a "like" page... I'm not too big into these kinds of pages, but when I realized that it was HJConti Designs (multiple links below) I was really excited! Behind these beautiful works are Hannah J Conti, a friend of mine from college (who collages... that was awesome). Her "paper and pixel" pieces are prettiful and I especially love her wishing bottles:



"These bottles are full of shells, sea glass, bead, or paper as the fancy strikes me. Each bottles features a little fairy. These bottles can hold your secret hopes, memories, and wishes. I have filled each one with some of my secrets... what are yours?" -HJC



I can't wait to see her line of collaged household products coming soon. Follow her work on Blogspot, Facebook, and Flickr.

pretty things friday

I know I've been slacking big time on Pretty Things Friday, but hopefully this one will make up for lost time!

Happy Friday!!!

Pretty cute stuffed animals

Pretty much a dream swimming pool, made of wine

Pretty awesome! {and geeky}

Pretty owls

It's getting pretty toasty in here

Love pretty letterpressed things

Pretty happy picture

Pretty UGG-ly... nah just kidding, pretty darn cute!

The prettiest notebooks

Pretty adorable kitties

Pretty hilarious

Have a fantastic weekend!

-g.

ps. Most images via fffffound