Minnesota graphic designer Nicole Meyer has taken on the monumental challenge of creating a new logo for one of Minnesota's 10,000+ lakes every day. She estimates it will take at least 27 years to complete them all!

Check out all of her fantastic work at branding10000lakes.com.

Slapping some Brook Trout on the walls

The paint color, that is.

Our new DwellStudio Peacock Dove duvet cover came in the mail last week, and Sunday night, Andrew and I had the sudden urge to repaint the bedroom to match. We had been struggling to find bedding and accessories to go with our dark blue and white walls, and it was just time to do something a little classier.

We've always used Behr paints in our condo, but couldn't find one that was a nice grayish brown to go with the duvet, so we tried a Martha Stewart paint. It covered in one coat and was so easy to work with. That Martha knows her stuff.

BEFORE
AFTER

Easter blooms.

My parents came up to visit for Easter weekend. We had a nice weekend helping mom shop for some dresses for Heidi and Jared's wedding, and my dad and Andrew built some cool shelves in our bedroom. Andrew indulged me and let me get these tulips from Trader Joe's and Byerly's. I took some photos with the intent of painting them someday soon.

Glass Bottles -- in progress.

I'm still trying to learn to paint with oils. Here's another one of my feeble attempts. Still in progress.

They always agree with me.

My growing vacation-turtle collection. The yellow guy is from our honeymoon in Hawaii and the blue guy is from our 2009 Florida vacation. I tried in vain to find a bobblehead turtle in Jamaica. I even made the bobblehead motion to the trinket sellers with my own head, but only got confused stares and questions like "Bottlehead?" Sigh. We found this little stone one in the gift shop at Royal Plantation. He is much more glamourous than his bobbly brothers, and they stare at him in wide-eyed wonder.

Dad's 1941 Willys Americar

My dad has a '41 Willys that he and my grandpa are working on restoring. My grandpa paints farm machinery and cars for a living, so it's right up his alley. Now that my dad is retired, he finally has some time to spend on it.

Here's a before, with the front fenders removed.

And here with the whole body removed.

It's starting to come together with a shiny coat of black paint on the frame.

Here's the really exciting part: the paint! I think he's going with candy apple red on the fenders and a buttercup yellow for the body.

Of course, they'll still have a lot of work to do on the interior, but once you see the paint on it, it starts to look like a real, working machine.


I think once it's done I'll have to make an awesome painting of it like Michael Naples, an artist that I just discovered. I am seriously inspired by his work.

How awesome would it be to be a full-time artist? Maybe someday.

Skol Vikings!

Apparently, "skol" roughly translates to something like "cheers." At least they're not endorsing chewing tobacco.

I went to my first NFL game today! Vikings vs. Bengals at the Metrodome. The Metrodome itself is less than impressive, but it was cool to be so closed to the loved/hated Brett FavRE.