We received a simple box in the mail the other day. It had my name on it so I had the honor of opening while others gathered ’round. The contents were stacked so it was a bit like peeling the layers from an onion. (notice the culinary reference) Here’s what we found:

• A letter from David Fischer, VP of something
• Book: Advanced Tips from AdWords Experts
• Book: {Keyword: Delicious} culinary impressions from the Google kitchen
• And finally… the apron you see here

And so I’m that much closer to cooking up some new adwords campaigns and maybe some Foie Gras Stuffed Falafel with Compote and Frisee Salad.

This gesture meant a lot to me and evidently we have meant a lot to Google. I did not realize that JeepCollins.com has been an AdWords user from the beginning of the excellent pay-per-click service around 2002.

It is because of the huge success of AdWords that Google is able to give away so many free services such as Google Apps. We use it for email, shared calenders, docs, and project management.

Now, if I can just find a goose…

We have a new addition to our design team, an intern. Penelope, Penny Lane, we call her Penny. Her job is to sleep in our laps, play with stuffed pink hippo, and tinkle outside.

She came to us in the form of a 22nd birthday present. Penny is in training to do more useful things, like fetch coffee. For now, she does an excellent job of keeping up morale.

The other day we took pictures for our Spring 09 market campaign. Here is a preview with a little Lara mixed in.

I am a big fan of Saul Bass. Although many have not heard of him, I am sure most would recognize his work. He is famous for his collaboration with Alfred Hitchcock. He created the title and end credits for Psycho, North by Northwest and Vertigo, just to name a few. To show my admiration I created this little piece of art. Hmm…I’m thinking Saul Bass inspired t-shirt collection. Stay tuned. 

I am struck by the contrast of the present and past.

Representing the past we have Tolstoy’s War and Peace , or more specifically, the Tolstoy characters. They communicated in lengthy longhand letters and bountiful ballroom banter. The letters go on for pages and tell of events covering months and perhaps years. They are the stuff of novels.

And today… we have Twitter who asks, “What are you doing?” Oh, and you only have 140 characters to tell me. What?! A Tolstoy character would use 140 characters in the salutation.

Would Tolstoy Tweet?

Perhaps you’ve heard of Toms Shoes. When you buy a pair of these simple canvas slippers, Toms gives a pair of shoes to a child in need. Toms says they have given 60,000 pairs of shoes to children in Argentina and South Africa.

Not too long ago, I went to tomsshoes.com and got my pair of black Toms. Problem is, they were too small.

And so I ask, when I return a pair of Toms Shoes, does a child lose his pair of shoes?

One spring afternoon the Collins 5 (Tim had to work) set out for Enchanted Rock. With camera, mac, t-shirts and picnic in hand we captured the Civies Summer shirts against the beautiful natural backdrop of boulders, trees and cacti. Although the sky threatened us with rain and wood platforms proved to be be less than adequate for climbing, we came away pleased with the day’s work. Check out the photoshoot at civies.net

Just the other day Rachel, Lara, and I sat down on the patio for an afternoon meeting of strategic planning. And as we began, I was handed this nice mug full of green tea. But this was not an ordinary mug full of green tea otherwise you wouldn’t be reading about it here. They were showing appreciation for the “unpaid” work I do. (I thought I was getting stock all this time.) But let me back up a little.

They know I like grids—no lemme back up more.

In 1957 there was this guy named Max Miedinger who lived in Switzerland and who gave Helvetica to the world. Thanks Max. And thanks sisters.

There is a rather tall stool in our studio. Tim welded the base from steel and attached a wood seat to the top. I brought it in a while back as a potential prop for one of our photoshoots. I thought it would be quite fashion forward. That didn’t work out so well. Never-the-less, the stool stuck around, until we found another use for it. Now we ask ourselves, “How did we function before we had the Announcement Chair?”

Whoever calls a meeting or has an announcement, idea, or just something special to say climbs atop the stool so as to gather everyones attention, and automatically has the floor or “has the chair,” as we like to say. Mom of course requires a couple of extra hands to get on top (bad knee), but we are always happy to assist.