Recently I completed a new blog theme for UI&us, a blog about user interaction and how people use stuff by Keith Lang. Last week I received this email from Keith:

Of course Keith’s site wouldn’t have been featured if his blog didn’t contain a lot of quality content, but it’s really nice to know that I played a small part in his success. This just goes to show that a combination of good design and good content can bring a lot success to a website, and is absolutely worth investing in!

I decided, on a whim, to join a Handmade Mushroom Swap run by knitsonya. The aim is to create 5 handmade mushrooms in any media and send them to Sonya,  who will then send back five mushrooms from other participating crafters. I love mushrooms and have the beginnings of a collection of them, so I had to join!

I’d been in meaning to make some larger clay mushrooms for a while, so decided to stick with that for this swap. To save a bit on clay and baking time I made the general shape in aluminium foil and wire, then layered the clay over it.

You’d think such a simple shape would be easy to do, but it’s so hard to get the parts smooth! In the end I had to settle for some bumpiness and hope that it would add ‘character’, heh.

After spending almost an entire weekend sculpting, baking then painting these guys, I finished them just in time!

They are now making their way to the US via airmail, and will hopefully arrive in time for the swapping. There have been some incredible designs posted in the Flickr group for this swap, I can’t wait to see what I get back!

A bit over a year go I posted instructions for creating an Internet Explorer Voodoo Doll, and was amazed at the huge response from web designers and developers all over the world. I didn’t expect it to take off in the way that it did, and I definitely didn’t expect this story I’m sharing with you now.

Not long after posting the tutorial I was contacted by Jörn, who runs a company in Germany. He liked my idea enough to ask a tailor friend of his to make one for each of his staff members as a Christmas present, beautifully packaged and everything.

IE Voodoo Dolls from Jörn

I thought it was fantastic, especially seeing photos of so many of them! But that wasn’t the end of it. Just after Christmas this year, Jörn contacted me again. He said that after calling his tailor to tell her how successful the Christmas party and presents were, they started talking more, going out together and fell in love.

In October they were married in Berlin, and guess what they decided to model their wedding cake after in memory of how they got together?

IE voodoo wedding cake

Yes, that is a giant Internet Explorer voodoo doll cake, complete with a giant needle!

So there you have it, a tale of love, voodoo and Internet Explorer. Thank you to Jörn and Julia for allowing me to post their story, and I wish them all the best for the future.