News from BelleRinger PR

GROWING LOVE Over the years we've seen a lot of beautiful greeting cards that include seed packets. Some of the newer designs let you toss some dirt right over the package, water it and let it grow. No unnecessary packaging. One of my favorite bloggers, Zem at ecofabulous , keeps me up-to-date with beautiful products and creative ways to live a 'greener' life. Her recent post about Plantable Papers is a great example. Their handmade paper is made of cotton and other recycled materials and is 'seeded' - embedded with wildflower seeds. I particularly love their wrapping paper - 'planting' it takes a step out of a labor-intensive recycling process. This is a wonderful example of a Cradle to Cradle product that makes living a greener lifestyle just a little bit easier.

DESIGN*SPONGE LETTERPRESS GUIDE Today's post at design*sponge included a marvelous directory of letterpress studios. In addition to giving us the scoop on many creative designers, Grace provided the information so that it can be sorted in a variety of ways; custom work, pre-made, e-commerce enabled and many more. Anybody who isn't familiar with letterpress stationary should definitely take a look at these sites. I'm always amazed by the creativity of the designers. Whether you're looking for something with classic fonts in a basic format, fun and funky, ultra-hip or modern, there's a designer out there who's making it. The card pictured on this post is a Bird and Banner creation. Other fun stuff to look at - Zeichen Press cd sleeves , Birdwood Press scrolls , and Invited Ink's Backstage Pass collection.

A MODERN TAKE ON AN OLD ART I stumbled across some gorgeous cards recently. Petite Prints allows you to customize their products by sending in a sideshot picture of a person, animal, etc. Owner/artist Susie makes a silhouette of the photo which can be printed on cards, stationery, notecards, gift tags, paperweights - even t-shirts and needlepoint kits. Silhouettes have always been popular - look at those cool iPod commercials - and Susie makes it affordable to put them on items you'll use and share with others. These would also make great gifts - take a friend's photo and put it on gift tags for her to use. But the needlepoint kits are my personal favorites - Susie has scads of color combinations that she handpaints on the canvas when she receives a photo and order. I just ordered an espresso-colored silhouette on a mustard background (there goes my craft budget for the month!).

TIME TO SEND OUT HOLIDAY CARDS . . . As readers of my blog already know, I love unique and custom stationery and paper goods. There are a lot of fun cards out there but I haven't seen too many postcards. Hammerpress makes a full line of stationery, wedding invitations, cards, and yes, postcards. The company's art is very vintage in its look and feel - you can't get more vintage than pressed lead type! This is one of their Christmas postcards - don't you love it!