Tag Archives: Website

Mental Detour

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The weather has been pants for a few days now: I’ve had thunderstorms and vertical rain. I don’t really mind because I don’t have to go anywhere and have been extremely busy sorting out chores that have been on the to-do-list for ages already. I finally started to mend some dresses and skirts and I finally finished my chocolate satin dress. I don’t know what happened but last week one thing led to another and all of a sudden I was sick and tired of the mess that has been lying around for some time now waiting for me to fix it or finish it. Oh… I remember what caused it: be prepared to dive into my warped mind…

Last Friday I received a wonderful surprise in the post all the way from New York, the package from Ismoyo that I’d won a while ago. Thank you, it’s totally sweet! So I wanted to take some pictures, I always take pictures of everything and that’s what it all started: me wanting to take pictures. I have a small desk near the window where my sewing machine sits and it’s the best spot to take pictures since the light conditions are always perfect. But the desk was piled up with dresses that needed fixing. So basically I ended up cleaning up the mess. Halfway I decided to sort out my CD collection too, all the archive CDs that is.

And before I knew it I was throwing out stacks of old CDs that my Mac refused to read and burning Gigs to DVD, reorganising years of archiving. Then I got all hyper and realised that I only have two LaCie Porsches that I really needed to sort out because I don’t have the extra backup space anymore. Well I do basically but it needs a lot of reorganising. So while working on websites for clients I suddenly realised that if one of those Porsches would crash I would have a serious problem: I don’t have the extra backup available, the second Porsche became home to my music collection instead.

What happened next is that I started my online research for internal and external HDs to see if I could afford one. I asked Christiaan for advice since I had a slight idea what I wanted but wasn’t sure if that was the best option but he confirmed my feeling *thank you!*. So I decided to buy an extra 500Gig internal HD since that is the cheapest way for now and I do need to invest in this if I don’t want to get myself into trouble. Over the weekend I ended up wasting time waiting for others to help me so I lost a few hours there but have been catching up these last few days.

Why the detour you wonder? Because I need to get rid of clutter: all the clutter around me on desks, the clutter on my Mac which used to be organised but most of all the clutter in my head. I’m probably over-criticising myself again because some from the past told me I was the most organised person they’d ever met and I guess I can see why. But you see, I can’t design new projects if I don’t have a neat place to work: neat place clean of clutter means no clutter but room in my head… So I decided to throw out and declutter starting with the pile of clothes waiting to be mended.

And since I finally have a clean window desk I finally took some pictures. Now if you’ll excuse me I need to get back to decluttering so I can start some web design soon!

I’ve finished my chocolate satin dress, more mending to be done…

Lovely surprise in the post all the way from NY

Cute Japanese generosity I received from Ismoyo, thank you so much! :)

Garden Design

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I had a really relaxed weekend after a bit of an annoying week. You see; I have been trying to get some sample urls from a client for three weeks now, to see what kind of design they would prefer and to get an appointment with them to go there and discuss things. I never received a response from the person who was supposed to contact me until Tuesday night, last week when JG. –her boss and friend of AS. who’s really eager to get things done- forwarded her email to me because she’d sent it to him instead of me.

So I read the email just after midnight when I was on my way to bed and noticed that she expected me to be in the office the next morning [I don’t think so!]. Ever since, I have sent emails, have been on the phone every day and left messages to call me back. No reaction… Here I am thinking: I’m doing you a big favour -I am actually- and you can’t find two minutes of your precious time to respond to my email or give me a call back? What on earth is your problem, do you want this deal or not?

In the meantime I’m getting more work in and I’ve about four websites to design so time is running out since this particular client needs to have it all done by the end of August. I’ve installed the software, played with it and I realised while checking it out that this is not going to be a simple job. Normally with this amount of work at least one developer and designer would be assigned and be given three or four months. I’ve been given less than two months, while other work needs to be done as well. See my point?…

To stay focused on the serious clients I arranged to meet up with K. over the weekend to get some input from him about what he would like. He’s a landscape gardener/designer and he is extremely creative so after our brainstorming session I left having all these ideas and images in my head and I couldn’t wait to get started. He showed me some amazing gardens that he did for these millionaire clients: owners of huge old Victorian houses with huge gardens in the West End and South End of London. Truly inspiring!

K. was extremely enthusiastic about having his website done and came up with really nice ideas. I took his portfolio with me so I can scan some of his drawings and I’ll have to do some research later today to see if I can find some leaves and stone structures. I’ll also have to redesign his business card once the website is done. K. was so enthusiastic that he had told a friend about it and this friend -who’s in education- is really interested in having his website done as well. So… things are picking up!

After the meeting with K. I went over to CS. to work in their garden. We’ve been cutting and trimming down a large bush to clear the path while enjoying the beautiful weather. Their garden is amazing but it’s all growing wild now since they haven’t done much maintenance. I helped cutting last year but they neglected it ever since while I offered my help so many times. I really love working in the garden, so I had a bit of a gardening theme going on all Saturday and a nice BBQ to end the day *hehe*

I was totally knackered when I came home, knackered but relaxed and Sunday… well… Sunday was just a typical Sunday…

P.S. CS. made a really interesting remark, she said: ‘those who are sincerely busy will always make time for you, those who are not busy at all need to pretend to appear to be busy thus won’t make time for you…’ I think she has an excellent point there!