New Year, New Look

I started my business over 4 years ago with a dream and a goal.  My dream was to stay at home, even though my oldest son had already started school at that time, and my youngest son would be starting the following year.  I knew that I wanted to be available for my children...before school, after school, when they are sick, during the summer, snowdays, etc.   And my goal was to make a little bit of money while staying at home! 

Some other time, I'll tell you the story about how it is that I realized making and selling handcrafted jewelry was the answer to meeting that goal.   Back to my point for the post today...  Along the way, as my business started growing, I realized that I needed more professional looking business cards than the ones I had thrown together.  So I contacted my dear friend, Mary Jo.  She is a graphic designer with gobs of talent. 




Mary Jo ("MJ")

MJ and her husband have 2 adorable, little girls.  And get this, she used to live in South Dakota, but now she only lives several miles away from me!   We see each other often, although not as often as we both would wish.  Life seems to get so busy. 

So MJ (oddly, I never really call her MJ, but that's the way I always write her name) created my first professional business card and Etsy banner.  They were both fine for what I wanted at the time, but I recently decided that I want a new look once again.  So this fall, I contacted MJ again and asked her to redesign new cards and banners.  I had a fairly certain idea of what I wanted too.  Have I mentioned that patience is most certainly one of her virtues?

Didn't she do a fabulous job?!

Here are more examples of her work:

Pictured below is the cover of a book (written by Elwood Yoder) that MJ and I collaborated on together.  She was the graphic designer, I was the proofreader.  She and I are thinking that we should go into business together!  Currently we're collaborating on yet another book by Elwood. 



left:  cover of book written by Elwood Yoder to commemorate the history of Zion Mennonite Church
right:  map created by MJ for the book 

 If you need a graphic designer, no matter where you live, I highly recommend that you contact this dear friend of mine!  You can find her contact information here.