With some encouragement from a friend at work, I finally decided to submit a design to http://www.threadless.com.  I submitted the design from the Ahlivv Earth Day contest after touching it up a little bit.

Here’s the link to it below.  After they approve it to go up for voting, you can vote for it here:

http://threadless.com/submission/215672/For_the_Love_of_Trees

Please give it a 5 rating to help it win!

My entry is “i”.. I’d love your help by voting for my design! 🙂

Pick the Blackbird (TwitterBrew) label design (follow @OdellBrewing for details)

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So, one of my newest attempts at making money while sitting on my couch is to try out these freelance farms.  Crowdspring and 99Designs are both websites that allow companies to post projects and then designers do the work, submit their designs and compete to win.  The company picks the winning design and then that designer gets paid.  

Technically speaking, it is most definitely a way for companies to take advantage of designers by not paying them for their time unless they deem them worthy of the pay.  However, in a down economy setup, it is also a way for designers who might be a little down on their luck (i.e. me) to get some work and money that may have otherwise been just out of their reach.  Not only is this a way to keep yourself active and working, but to build your portfolio as well.  

But, what do you think?  evil corporate idea? or fun new way to create design?

A couple of my entries so far…

Skateboard design for a Deckpeck promotional skateboard

Loop visible logo... wanted to play with the idea of sight

So, I’ve moved to Fort Collins and am hellbent on finding a job in the creative industry as I refuse to ‘settle’ for another job that I will end up hating within a short time.  I would love to get a job as a junior designer or a marketing coordinator, but am not too picky as long as it will allow me to flex my creative muscle.  I have a lead on a marketing job and a photographer’s assistant job right now.

However, they are still just leads… so, I have been delving into the world of freelance.  It’s not too bad, although it feels like a lot of work for not that much pay off.  (i.e. applying for a new job everyday)  I totally understand why some designers charge so much per hour now, because it’s not about the actual work done sometimes, but the follow up and all the technicalities leading up to the actual work.  Some people are super easy to work with… they know exactly what they want and it makes it so easy for me to deliver exactly that.  Others, not so much as convenient.

For some people, their world is somewhat constant, minus the rarity of a vacation.  They come and go to work every day, maybe stop at the gym on the way and go home to cook dinner.  They see the same people all the time and don’t forecast any change for the future.  Change is scary in their world.  They want job security, a mortgage, and good credit.

For most people I live around, their whole existence is a constant metamorphosis.  Noone wants to put down roots and I don’t blame them.  Tomorrow is much more exciting when its contents are unexpected.  People come in and out of our lives as the seasons change and life moves on.  Some of the people I meet and talk to here have experienced more places in the world than most of my elders and they are only in their early 20’s to early 30’s.  I envy them in a way, because although I have experienced a good amount of places, I feel like somewhere along the way I lost some of the youthful abandon that allows you to travel guilt-free without any thoughts of your future.  Maybe it was the couple years I spent making good money that pushed my mind on in life; the thoughts of 401k’s and saving to pay taxes.

I feel that each day for me, I struggle to get back to where I once was, claiming I wanted nothing to do with corporate america and all that it offered up.  I never needed money to be happy before, especially considering I never had it, so why should I need it now?  Through most of my life’s adventures, I’ve traveled alone.  Maybe there have been others along the way here and there; I’m not a hermit.  However, there’s never been a constant.  That is the difference between then and now and the reason I feel I can’t quite get back to that point.  I want that constant.  I found someone who I thought might be there for me… the constant throughout all the other changes, and hopefully he still will… but that is also something that might change and it is possibly the first time that I fear change.  In one person, I have been faced with the weakness of the many, the fear of the unknown.

I covet change; I crave it.  My one request out of a job is that I will be constantly learning… that is why I chose the path of an artist, but I am yet to fulfill it.  Instead I sit inside an office and I write on the ever-changing internet walls about adventures I am yet to experience.  I feel my rate of change is slowing and it may be time to give it a boost… off to a new location, a new way of life, and a new experience.  I just hope that the one constant that I desire will come along.

I want to feel your body close to mine.

Hug me. Hold me. Pretend like nothing is wrong.

Tell me that I don’t have to let you go if I don’t want to.

Why does there have to be an end.

Why do you need time. Time for what? To forget me? To let me go?

Don’t let me go.

Why can’t we just be what we’ve always been… something great.

Just hold me again. 

Don’t let me go.

Don’t let me go.

Don’t let me go…

So, I stumbled upon a website named Stumble Upon recently and it is definitely my favorite new internet toy.  Think of it as the Pandora music player for the internet.  You click on which categories you are interested in and then click stumble in the spiffy new stumble upon search bar.  It sends you through a random journey through all of the internet’s hidden jewels.  Once you get there you can either choose the thumbs up or thumbs down to fine-tune your preferences.  After a few thumbs up, I guarantee you will enjoy 80% of the sites you encounter.

Some of my favorites so far… Jackson Pollock where you can create your own splattered masterpiece.  Here are a couple of my attempts at a beautiful mess.  The first I named, Froggy… and the second was one I made for my boyfriend.

    

Try it out, it’s totally fun!

And you can drool over deliciousness here: Taste Spotting.  Because of this website, my boyfriend and I have decided upon a fabulous evening of making ratatouille and watching Ratatouille.

So, yesterday was the Steamboat Brewers’ Fest and we started the day with mimosas at Creekside Cafe & Grill.  Around mimosa number 3, maybe 4… we decided that costumes were absolutely necessary for our attendance.  Granted, noone else dresses up to go to the Brewers’ Fest, but we felt like we needed to bring the Steamboat Brewers’ Fest up to Tour de Fat proportions.  

So, we head home with visions of grandeur and put together these:

Turns out, costumes were probably the best idea we had all day.  Not only did we have a blast, but everyone was loving it… asking to take pictures with us all over the place.  We even got to do the intro for TV18 (the local station)’s excerpt on the festival.  fun fun.

I think my favorite beer of the festival was the Hades Gold… unfortunately I don’t remember what brewery had it, so I can’t even tell you to go try it out. oops.

After writing for various other sites and trying to come up with topics that would fit in with what they would want me to talk about, I realized something… sometimes I just want to write about things that I’m thinking about… things that I want to talk about whether another site is interested in hearing it or not.  Sometimes I want to rant and sometimes I want to rave and if you want to follow me through this plethora of emotions, then I welcome you to be my guest.  Welcome to the Big World of smallakin. 🙂

A little about me (if you don’t know me), I own and operate a clothing line named Akinz.  We offer mens t-shirts, womens t-shirts, hats, and handmade jewelry.  I’ve been doing that for about 3 years and have recently started focusing on trying to spread the word.  

I also contribute on http://www.seshn.com which is a blogmag that focuses on art, design, fashion, lifestyle, music, skate, snow, and surf, and describes itself as providing you with a way to find out what’s going on with your scene from the source. So if you want to find out what I write about when I’m not here, check out my contributor page at http://seshn.com/author/smallakin/

Lastly, I also am interning for http://www.shredbetties.com which is an online magazine for female snowboarders.  Sorry, no direct feed there, but here’s the link to my most recent article through them,  08/09 Mountain Improvements and I’m sure if you like the site and continue reading, you will find the rest. 🙂

Other than that, my main hobby is learning… therefore I always seem to have a new hobby.  So, you may find me writing about one thing one day and then being super excited about a new sport or new business idea the next… that’s just me.