Category: Love

#29 Success & Nothing Less

Chaz DeSimone Leave a comment

Click to view full-​size or download hi-​rez image for gallery-​quality printing and framing.
This is a high-​resolution pdf & may take a few minutes to download.
Find printing tips & framing ideas here.

Download to print special size for Balboa students’ notebooks: 8.5 x 11 inches

Amper­Art #29, Suc­cess & Noth­ing Less, was inspired by Bal­boa Ele­men­tary School, for it is their mot­to, and it’s where I learned my abc’s, in Glen­dale, Cal­i­for­nia. (It’s also where I learned the dif­fer­ence betweens it’s and its.)

The type­style is Aachen, same as used on their school sig­nage. The amper­sand is derived from the Z in the team’s name, Blaz­ers. The col­ors used in this edi­tion are, of course, the school colors.
The phrase was made famous by Snoop Dogg on the show Entourage where he said, “Suc­cess and noth­ing less, man!”

One of my favorite quotes about suc­cess is by Jack Can­field: “If you love your work, if you enjoy it, you’re already a suc­cess.” I guess I’m a suc­cess then, for I love cre­at­ing Amper­Art and all my oth­er graph­ic design.

That and many oth­er quotes on suc­cess can be found here. And there’s a Face­book page called Suc­ces­sAnd­Noth­in­g­Less.

The Leona L. DeSimone Award

I have always been grate­ful that I went to three tremen­dous pub­lic schools, all in the Glen­dale, Cal­i­for­nia Uni­fied School Dis­trict: Bal­boa Ele­men­tary, Toll Jr. High and Her­bert Hoover High School. I even went to Glen­dale Junior Col­lege but did­n’t learn much there as I was already more focused on run­ning a graph­ics business.

It was at Bal­boa School, dur­ing 4th Grade, that I lost my father to emphy­se­ma. I was the old­est of four, with a sis­ter and two broth­ers. Our moth­er strug­gled, I mean real­ly strug­gled, to clothe and feed us, hold­ing down a job at a lunch counter in a vit­a­min store. Some­how she always had time for us kids and made sure we were to school on time, and helped us with our home­work. All the while putting up with tantrums from me, the spoiled firstborn.

I’ll nev­er for­get see­ing Mom cry when mon­ey was short, count­ing pen­nies to feed us, going with­out din­ner her­self. Or walk­ing five miles to work in the blaz­ing heat when the bus­es went on strike.

We did­n’t have much mon­ey but I don’t think there was a fam­i­ly in Glen­dale any rich­er than ours with love.

Sev­er­al years ago my sis­ter Roslyn set up an annu­al schol­ar­ship at Bal­boa Ele­men­tary, in our moth­er’s name, for a deserv­ing stu­dent (espe­cial­ly if their fam­i­ly was in sim­i­lar cir­cum­stances that ours was in), and each year one of us sib­lings presents the award.

I was hon­ored to present the schol­ar­ship at the end of the 2012 school year to a spe­cial stu­dent who was also raised by a sin­gle moth­er, and who came to school ear­ly and stayed late to work on the com­put­ers, since the fam­i­ly could not afford their own.

Upon arriv­ing at the school for the pre­sen­ta­tion, I dis­cov­ered the school mot­to is “Suc­cess & Noth­ing Less” so of course that would be an upcom­ing Amper­Art piece.

This year’s Leona L. DeS­i­mone Schol­ar­ship recip­i­ent is a shin­ing exam­ple of one who aspires to achieve the very mean­ing of her school’s mot­to, “Suc­cess & Noth­ing Less.”

Production notes:
Original size: 20 x 30 inches
Program: Illustrator
Font: Aachen
Ampersand: hand-​drawn, based on school team lettering

If you’re an amper­sand fan sub­scribe to Amper­Art here to receive future Amper­Art edi­tions. They’re always fun & fab­u­lous & free. Sub­scribers also receive spe­cial bonus­es.

 

#61 Father & Daughter

Chaz DeSimone 1 Comment

Click to download hi-rez image

Click to view full-​size or download hi-​rez image for gallery-​quality printing and framing. 
This is a high-​resolution pdf & may take a few minutes to download.
Find printing tips & framing ideas here.

I wish my sis­ter could have expe­ri­enced that spe­cial occa­sion called the “Father-​Daughter Dance” when she was in ele­men­tary school, but our father died from emphy­se­ma when she was 7 years old. The father-​daughter dance, also called “Father & Daugh­ter Dance,” “Dad­dy Dance,” or “Dad & Daugh­ter Dance,” is usu­al­ly held in 5th or 6th grade.

Accord­ing to this arti­cle,

The first strong male bond girls have is with their father’s and this event teach­es young girls what it means to be treat­ed with love and respect.  The goal is that father’s will con­tin­ue to be pos­i­tive role mod­els and that these girls will have healthy rela­tion­ships as teens and adults as a result.

For­tu­nate­ly, my sis­ter did have a pos­i­tive child­hood and mar­ried a won­der­ful man who proud­ly took his daugh­ter to their Father-​Daughter Dance … or should I say, she took him?

One last thing about this Amper­Art piece, is that our dad was a bar­ber, so I select­ed a lock of my sis­ter’s brunette hair (via com­put­er graph­ics) as the amper­sand. Dad­dy would have sure­ly been proud of her hair.

listen up!Shoebox Letters: a precious gift for Father’s Day

I had the priv­i­lege of set­ting the type in a very spe­cial book for author Clay­ton Brizen­dine. This book is a col­lec­tion of actu­al let­ters writ­ten from daugh­ters to their fathers. It is pure raw emo­tion, stat­ing every­thing from admi­ra­tion to fun times to bit­ter upsets, but always men­tion­ing love.

 

Shoebox Letters: Daughters to Dads

Every review is 5 stars, includ­ing mine:

I did­n’t buy this book, and I did­n’t read it as a nor­mal per­son would. I set the type.

As I was design­ing this book for the author, I found myself laugh­ing out loud at some of the expe­ri­ences the daugh­ters relayed about the dumb things their dads would do, and found myself sob­bing at tear-​jerking moments of deep love and bond­ing, or of loss and hurt. The most endear­ing part was retouch­ing the pre­cious old pho­tographs and plac­ing them next to words that described the daugh­ters’ most cher­ished moments with their dads. Final­ly, in proof­ing the text, I did read the entire piece front to back, and it was a tru­ly aston­ish­ing com­pi­la­tion of let­ters that range from the great­est love and devo­tion and pride for fathers to sor­row­ful accounts of resent­ment and bro­ken­ness. Every let­ter, how­ev­er, does express a love of some sort for each dad from his daughter.

Clay Brizendine’s pro­found essay for each set of let­ters — and his pas­sion for enlight­en­ing his read­ers, show­ing how to heal and bond rela­tion­ships through the pow­er of let­ter writ­ing — makes this book a real joy to read and to learn from. This is the ulti­mate Father’s Day gift.

Final­ly, in work­ing with Clay I have real­ized he is tru­ly a man of char­ac­ter, hon­est and sin­cere, and wish­es most of all to give his read­ers an enlight­en­ing, enter­tain­ing and mem­o­rable experience.

This could have gone to press soon­er, if tears had­n’t cloud­ed this design­er’s workspace.

Am I pro­mot­ing Clay’s book? You bet I am! This book  is one of the most pre­cious gifts you could give your dad this Father’s Day, whether you’re a teen, mid-​age or a senior daugh­ter your­self. There’s bound to be a sto­ry that both of you relate to.

Read all the mov­ing tes­ti­mo­ni­als, or order a copy for your dad, here.

To all fathers, Hap­py Father’s Day. And to my sis­ter and broth­ers, you turned out real good, even with­out a dad for most of your child­hood. (For­tu­nate­ly, our fam­i­ly was rich with friends and rel­a­tives who stepped in when need­ed. Thanks espe­cial­ly to Gilbert. He deserves his own Amper­Art piece!)

PRODUCTION NOTES:
Original size: 20×30 inches
Programs: Illustrator, Photoshop
Font: Vladimir Script
CREDITS:
Bow image: www​.hawai​ikawaii​.net (a blog by a student in Sweden about “kawaii, unicorns, flamingos, rainbows, and cupcakes…cute and fun in any shape or form”)
Hair color reference: www​.lat​est​-hair​styles​.com (My sister’s a brunette; I think I got the color pretty close.)

 

#30 Prepare & Chance

Chaz DeSimone 2 Comments

Today is Pres­i­dent Lin­col­n’s birth­day, so of course it’s appro­pri­ate to release my Amper­Art edi­tion #30 fea­tur­ing our 16th pres­i­dent on Feb­ru­ary 12. But this piece of art was actu­al­ly cre­at­ed sev­er­al months ago as a gift for a very spe­cial house­warm­ing for a very spe­cial cou­ple. My friends Tina & Doc built their dream­house from the ground up.

It’s called the Pen­ny Palace. (We’ll get to that in a minute.)

When I say spe­cial friends, how many peo­ple would design a pet entrance with its door­bell a foot off the ground? Or cre­ate a tiny door on the mez­za­nine titled “Elves” — & dur­ing their house­warm­ing Open House week­end have an actu­al live elf inside that door? (Tina & Doc are prac­ti­cal, though — the door leads to the attic. Ever hear nois­es in your attic? Prob­a­bly elves.) Every aspect of this house is spe­cial down to the very last detail. The rooms are themed & a recur­ring theme is pen­nies (more on that, like I promised, in a minute). Even the House­warm­ing Open House was spread over sev­er­al days, with invi­ta­tions for cer­tain groups at cer­tain times, each giv­en a tour com­plete with a map & facts guide (a great souvenir).

I’ve only known Tina & Doc for a few years, but they’re the kind of friends you feel you’ve known all your life. Here’s how it all start­ed (final­ly, about the pennies):

Tina came to me as a client. She has a web­site called Pen​nyFind​ers​.com, & asked me to design a Pen­nyfind­ing Guide as well as a new logo. (Be sure to vis­it her site for fun facts, per­haps dis­cov­er a new hob­by?, lots of smiles & joy – such as the symp­toms check­list to see if you have Pen­ny Fever.)

Through work­ing with Tina I real­ized she has a deep com­mit­ment to doing things right, nev­er giv­ing up, find­ing joy in every new chal­lenge, & shar­ing that joy with every­one — I mean EVERYONE — from clerks to con­trac­tors to strangers & of course to friends. In fact, she had me design a spe­cial card that she hands out to every­one she meets, giv­ing them hope, joy — & even a pen­ny (there’s one glued to every card).

The back of the card states The Pen­nyFind­ers Mis­sion:

  • Trust in a High­er Source
  • Be Grate­ful
  • Encour­age Oth­ers through Acts of Ran­dom Kindness

Design­ing Tina’s mate­ri­als was a tremen­dous amount of fun & joy (as she would want it to be). By the time we were done, she was no longer a client but a true friend, along with her hus­band Doc.

Then I dis­cov­ered an amaz­ing feat of hers and Doc’s: The Pen­ny­tales Blog

You’ll be amazed, as I was, at  this com­pre­hen­sive time­line with com­men­tary, pho­tos & video, from ground­break­ing to house­warm­ing, includ­ing all the tri­als & tribu­la­tions of pen­ny find­ing, build­ing a house, & life in gen­er­al. (There are some great tips if you’re think­ing of build­ing your own house…or just enjoy­ing life.)

The blog reads like this, which was about the time they decid­ed to real­ly make this house happen:

“If we are to build this ‘ARK’ [Tina’s acronym for Acts of Ran­dom Kind­ness] then God needs to take charge and be the con­trac­tor.

“A Pen­ny would val­i­date that we are head­ing in the right direc­tion. That is when the 100-​day series began.  After the first few CONSECUTIVE days of find­ing coins, this appeared to be a lit­tle more than mere coincidence.”

As a  Pen­ny Palace house­warm­ing gift, I con­cep­tu­al­ized a spe­cial Amper­Art piece fea­tur­ing a cop­per pen­ny. I was ecsta­t­ic to dis­cov­er, on the lat­est US pen­ny, a depic­tion of Abe Lin­coln sit­ting on a log, study­ing a book, after chop­ping a huge log of wood — to build a house? How appro­pri­ate! Then I found the per­fect quote by Abra­ham Lin­coln (com­plete with amper­sand), for it states in a few words how Tina and Doc came about man­i­fest­ing their Pen­ny Palace:

“I will pre­pare and some day my chance will come.”

Tina and Doc’s house­warm­ing week­end was full of beau­ty, hap­pi­ness & love — not just from the new house, but from all the won­der­ful friends that came to vis­it, giv­ing back the joy that this spe­cial cou­ple is con­stant­ly extend­ing to oth­ers. Tina’s blog elab­o­rates on all the ups & downs they went through in its con­struc­tion, per­mits & fur­nish­ing. It’s an uplift­ing read when one needs encour­age­ment, with many humor­ous moments & a strong reminder that Pen­ny Angels are always watch­ing over us. You’ll enjoy read­ing Tina’s blog.

I have always admired Abra­ham Lin­coln, & now he has some very spe­cial com­pa­ny to share his cop­per coin with.

Hap­py Birth­day, Hon­est Abe. 

May the Pen­ny Angels bless you, Tina & Doc & your beau­ti­ful, enchant­i­ng Pen­ny Palace.

 

PRODUCTION NOTES:
Pro­gram: Photoshop
Fonts: Stem­pel Gara­mond, Berke­ley (amper­sand, modified)
Pen­ny image: U.S. Mint
Pho­tog­ra­phy: rouakcz, graph​i​cleft​overs​.com
Quote: Abra­ham Lincoln