Winnipeg and Awards

Sorry for not writing sooner - I've been moving! I moved from my 2 bedroom suite in a house with a roommate in River Heights to a 1 bedroom apartment by myself in a highrise in downtown Winnipeg. It's quite the change, but I love it.


This is the view out my living room window - isn't it wonderful? I don't think I will ever close my blinds. At night, the whole city is light up and glowing. It's so beautiful.




Anyways, in other Winnipeg news, my work has just launched a new website for the City of Winnipeg. It's an initiative called SpeakUpWinnipeg.com and it's a chance for you as the citizens of Winnipeg to have a part in creating the city's 25 year plan. Essentially, the city is asking for our opinion on six main issues - Sustainability, City of the Arts, Communities, City Competitiveness, Safety & Security and City Building. Sign up to give your opinion on a number of topics in these issues. Believe me, this time they're listening.

Another feature of the website is called Scene in Winnipeg. We're asking citizens in Winnipeg to take one of our handheld video cameras the size of a digital camera and film what is their Winnipeg, their scene, the places they hang out, what truly makes Winnipeg home for them. We want the real Winnipeg, not what the businesspeople, investers, Aspers and Richardsons make it out to be. So go ahead and check out some of the videos already up, or use our camera or your own (it doesn't have to be high quality!) to make your own short film of what Winnipeg means to you. I'll be adding my own video at the end of this week.




And here's my final item of this blog entry. I'm nominated for my first graphic design award! A mere 11 months after graduating from college, I'm up for Best Website of 2008 for the Signature Awards. The Sig Awards are an annual Winnipeg design and media awards show. All the graphic design agencies, TV and radio stations and other media companies submit their best of the best work of the year and a panel of judges pick the top 3-5 entries of each category as nominees. My company is up for 2 awards, but the other one is one which was done before I started working there, so it's a bit less exciting for me.

Our nominated site is Decor Cabinet Company's corporate website (they have 10 sites.... at least half of which are also designed by myself). Graphic design and flash was by myself, art direction by Colin Whitney, photography by Brian Gould, and technical coding and all that was done by our lovely development department. I'm pretty proud. Even if we don't win, even being nominated is something good to have on my resume and portfolio.

You must watch this

A truly unexpected performance. Watch the whole thing.




Just goes to show that you never know what you might get.

Spicy

Ever since I finished my afghan last month, I've been itching to start another DIY project.

During my ongoing design blog readings, I came across a project that sounded relatively easy and very practical.

I have quite a few spices, and I've been on the look out for a decent spice rack for a while now. I haven't been able to find any that I like for less than $50 (I have expensive taste, what can I say??) and my drawer full of little ziplock bags and various containers of spices just isn't cutting it.



Check out this homemade spice rack by Craftynest. I love how it fits 25 different spices, in neat matching containers. The tins fit perfectly and are available to buy online for less than a dollar a tin, and the labels are just the spice name printed on adhesive address labels.

One of my coworkers is a middle-age, father figure type man named Patrick and he's got a big workshop in his garage. He's constantly building things - new desks for work and other various projects. Pat had some scrap wood in his garage and was kind enough to cut all the pieces to the right size for me. I don't have quite all the tools to do that myself just yet.

So this morning when I got to work, there was a lovely stack of wood and a sheet of sandpaper, and off I am! I'm borrowing Pat's air nail gun later to assemble it once it's painted. I'm very excited.


I've also been reading online about stores in downtown Seattle to visit when we go there next month, and came across this really cool store called World Spice Merchants. It's essentially a store where you can buy any kind of spice in the world, including ones you've never heard of before, and at a much cheaper rate than you can find here in Winnipeg.




I'm excited to buy new exotic spices and put them in my new spice rack! Whole vanilla beans for $3.50 (they go for $7 or $8 here), Moroccan saffron (pictured below, isn't it beautiful? I love the color), lavendar flowers (I want to make lavendar crême brulêe; pictured above), Hungarian paprika (I need to find a good vegetarian goulash recipe; also pictured below, isn't the color wonderful?), gorgeous yellow tumeric. I can hardly wait. My sister has a list of things to pick up for her as well!