PaperSalad week 27

Well it was my last week at my placement with PaperSalad and I can definitely say it's been an experience, and I have learnt quite a bit.
I finished making up the five sample sets of every card of every range, as well as working through some orders.
Karen & Claire went for a visit to Hallmark on Wednesday to see how the delivery boxes will arrive and be organised- very high tech apparently.
I tried some new things out with some of my imagery; creating backing designs etc.
I'm going to still continue with the briefs I was set as there are some I still want to do. I'm also planning to do some design boards for the briefs I've completed; and with my printed cards I'll be able to them from start to finish with a final piece to show- should look good in my portfolio :)


Thanks to Karen & Claire and everyone at PaperSalad for the opportunity; it's been great

Jubilee street fair- WA stall

I was suppose to be doing a stall at a jubilee street fair today in Warrington town centre with Created in WA but unfortunately I had to cancel due to the wet weather as with most of my stuff being paper craft it would have been ruined. It's so disappointing as I've been planning for this event for ages and been working on designs etc for the past two months to make sure everything was ready in time.
This is definitely the frustrating side of freelancing & selling your stuff at events; it's never 100% guaranteed :(

PaperSalad- week 26

Well after a rather wet and dull jubilee weekend, I was back to work "JJ-afing" cards for PaperChase and packing up cards for Waitrose orders. I've begun to make up five sample sets of every card of every range- definitely not a five minute job.

I finished my father's day designs ready for my stall on Saturday and started to play around with some butterfly designs, I still would like to do more designs with my bird imagery like wedding & engagement designs for my Love Birds range as well as creating new ranges with some of my imagery that I haven't yet used.
Speaking of my designs... my printed cards arrived on Thursday morning and look great; they turned out better than I thought they would- it was a very proud moment; my first professionally printed cards! I'm planing to use them on design boards of each of the briefs I've worked on whilst here- it'll be something good to add to my portfolio :)

My first professionally printed cards!

PaperSalad- week 25

The nice weather started to decrease throughout the week unfortunately.
I've been making up brochures, filling up the empty card boxes with new batches- working my way through a large pile of boxes and spending a good hour dismantling them all; making the studio look more spacious. I also "JJ- afied" and barcoded cards for Waitrose and Paperchase orders as well as counting out cards for the orders. I picked and packed all the June orders to date and went around all the cards, making a list of the ones that needed packing up, I then made up a sample set for a new client of quite a lot of the older card ranges.


It was Emma's last day today; she's been spending the week training the new girl- who's also called Emma; lets hope she's managed to grasp most of it as I've seen how hard and time consuming Emma's job can be at times.


Samples of the new gift bag ranges arrived on Thursday and looked really good even though a few changes needed to be made.


I've been working on a few different things this week mainly adding a back to my Quirkie little birdie designs & changing them into kits for an upcoming Loie&Co stall I'm doing. I also worked on another Father's Day design since my stall is the week before Father's Day.

Papersalad- week 24

Been a gorgeous week weather wise, so much so that I've been able to have lunch outside in the sun- lovely.
Karen & Claire were away in New York til Thurs, so we've been getting orders out; "Not on the High Street", Paperchase, Waitrose as well as the regular orders too. Emma had to go to the bank on Monday to pay in some cheques so I was left in charge whilst she was gone- I answered the phone; being polite of course & the rude person on the other end put the phone down on me before I could finish answering there question.
 I made up samples of the new ranges to go on the stall and in the card book for PG Live next week, so I was cutting the backs off all 42 of the Christmas cards to go in the book. 
I also did a stock check of the cards that were running low and needed filling up, so me & Emma went down to the stock room bringing about seven boxes back- not an easy task as the stock room is on the opposite side of the site from PaperSalad, with bumps and ramps on the road; then the was trouble with trying to get the door open and once in the boxes we needed were at the top- of course.


I was able to interview Karen & Claire for my dissertation and my card designs have been sent off to the printers!- can't wait to see what they look like. :)
Everything was being packed up for PG Live on Thur & Fri, and I was packing up Waitrose orders and restocking the cards from the boxes we'd brought up.


I've been working on more bird designs and have come up with three ranges- Love Birds; which I was working on last week, Quirkie little Birdie; which actually includes some of my bird cage imagery and another one which I haven't decided on a name for yet.

PaperSalad- week 23

The week started off a kind of quiet with a few Waitrose & Paperchase orders coming in, so I've been picking them and labelling some of the Paperchase with JJs and doing the odd "Not on The High Street". I went home ill on Tuesday but was back in for Wednesday, Karen was only in for the morning making up jubilee party boxes for agents ready to be finished and sent while they're away; as she & Claire have gone to New York for a week to visit a design show; Surtex and possibly find an American distributor. 
Today has been busy though as twelve Waitrose orders came in that needed cards making up for and there were also four orders that had to be dispatched for 4pm today because they contained Father's Day cards; thing was that the cards only came yesterday and would have been packed but there was a print error and the new cards weren't delivered until 3pm and we had to make up 12 packs of 7 designs so it was full on making sure they were all packed in time and Emma could book them through the system.
We also needed to go down to the store room for boxes of the cards needed for Waitrose orders.
So it's been a hectic close to the week :/


I've worked on some repeat patterns for my brief with the birds and some of my scanned pieces. I also worked on a "Steam Punk" style card for Father's Day... I know; heading away from the bird & cage theme yet again but don't worry I'll get back to it as I've got some cage designs and a cute little quirky bird & cage that I'm wanting to do more with :)

PaperSalad- week 22

This week I've been working through some Waitrose & Paperchase orders with Emma; picking and packing them as well as labelling some too. Popped out some shapes that we've run low on and helped Emma bring some boxes up from the store room; which has now been rearranged so that all the boxes are stacked up to the ceiling on high shelves- not great if we need a box at the top...

Samples of the new Christmas gift bags arrived on Wednesday & they look really good- almost as good as the mock ups I made up in December- lol :)


I've been working on design ideas for my bird & cage theme but have once again kinda detoured a bit as I started an Anniversary design just with some of my birds and have decided to do a small range with them for Engagement, Wedding & Anniversary; calling them "Love Birds". I then plan to continue with the cage theme.

I've also changed my card design from JPEGs to PDF files for when they're sent to the printers as that's the format they use.