I spent a good portion of the day working on a flyer for a community carnival our church is hosting in July. Thankfully I have amazing friends and when I put out a desperate call for David/Sarah play time, I received nearly an immediate response and within 20 minutes they were buckled into my dear friend Julee’s car and on their way.
Thank you, Julee!! It was incredibly helpful to have those two little sweetie pies out of the house for a few hours. I really needed to concentrate and give this project my complete attention.
Who me? I’m not distracting am I?
In the process of working on the brochure in Publisher, I discovered two online color scheme generators. Selecting colors, fonts, and graphics is always challenging for me. I am NOT a graphics designer or an artist of any kind. Frankly, I do NOT have that type of creative gifting so I appreciate any type of help I can receive in this area.
Color Scheme Generator is designed by wellstyled.com. When you select a color on the color wheel, three other colors come up in a box. You can then choose mono, contrast, triad, tetrad, and analogic for colors that compliment or contrast the original color. You can also vary the shades within the color groups. Very helpful.
Another fantastic color site is Color Scheme Online. You chose a color and fifteen coordinating colors come up in boxes, complete with RGB or Hex values (an absolute dream when you are customizing colors in Publisher). You can darken or lighten the palette as you wish.
I’m afraid I’m not describing these programs very well. It’s late and I’ve already used all my creative energies today. Click on the links and you’ll quickly see for yourself.
Joshua helped put the training wheels on Sarah’s new bike. This photo has nothing to do with the blog but it does feature an awesome big brother.
Of course, this discussion of colors and computer use wouldn’t be complete without telling you about an easy-to-use, tiny (free) utility program a friend shared with me last year. Pixie is a color picker that includes a mouse tracker. In order to run it, simply point to a color and the Pixie box will list the hex, RGB, HTML, CMYK and HSV values of that color. I’ve used this numerous times when designing retreat booklets, flyers and brochures. It’s the perfect way to coordinate graphics and images with font colors, borders and other design features.
I love working with the computer and wish I was more artistic. Of course, raising my children, managing my household, loving my husband, serving the Lord and occasionally posting a decent blog takes nearly all my energy and brain power. 
Kathy
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