Elaine McVicar » i {heart}

i {heart} knitting

elaine — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 10:53:32 +0000

I love arts and crafts in general, but one of my main hobbies is knitting. I love that it is so relaxing, then at the end of it you have something beautiful, original and generally useful that you have made yourself.

Check out all the adorable little knitting things in this smashing magazine post – The Beauty of Knitting. These kinds of things always give me inspiration. Here is a few of the adorable creations.

Eye of the Beast by kathrynivy.com

Daphne and Delilah the Momma and Baby Monster by Rebecca Danger

I {heart} gradients and rounded corners

elaine — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 10:19:12 +0000

I do. I love gradients and rounded corners, but it’s turning into a sick, sick addiction. Every site I design now is full of gradients and highlights and little rounded corners…but it’s got to stop.

I’m now in the habit of, once I’ve finished designing a page, removing all the rounded corners to decide whether they actually benefit the design or not. However, my gradients and highlights are still a problem. I need to expand my design skills. So, I’m determined that the next site I design will have NO GRADIENTS…just to see if I can actually do it. I’m already a step towards it; the latest illustration that I’m working has no gradients in it at all….um….yet.

i {heart} trebuchet

elaine — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 15:11:16 +0000

When I’m designing a website I normally stick to Arial in most cases, and quite often Georgia if it’s something a bit less businessey (yes, I know that’s not a real word), but I have now discovered my new favourite web safe font.

Look, here it is, Trebuchet MS. I’m finding it very pretty, and rather less formal, so excellent for less corporate sites.

My main problem now is going to be not using it for everything.

i {heart} icons

elaine — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 18:52:16 +0000

Something I really want to spend more time on, is creating icons. Cute little darlings scattered across the internet. From favicons in your address bar to folder icons on your desktop to an extra touch in the design of a website. Little visual cues – telling you what’s going on, what’s it about, or just where abouts you are. Who doesn’t recognise the blue and white Facebook ‘F’, or the Windows Messenger figure.

Even I’ve created my little pixel icons as part of this latest web design (let’s call it v01, just in case I redesign this at some point in the future), which if you really fancy you can download here.

Anyway, here are some free icon sets that I think are really adorable:

Turbo Milk Monster Icons

~dimpoart on deviantART Yummy Icons

Icon Buffet Sushinobi Icons

And, if you want to make your own, try this out Axialis Icon Workshop