Sweet Summer Favorites

With every company releasing new summer product lines, sometimes it is really hard to tell what is worth your time. Millions of companies are pushing their new merchandise, telling you "it's the best!" or "you have to have one of our luxury items" when in reality, they can't all be the best. Although summer is just beginning, I have labeled a few things as must haves in my book for summer 2014 (and after, of course):

Pictured: State Traditions Pasadena Gameday Hat Blue

Little bit of an action shot taken from the State Traditions Instagram. This is the Pasadena Gameday Hat in action featured in gold rather than blue. I think the gold is my favorite! 

State Traditions is a company based out of Birmingham, Alabama that has grown, and is growing, exponentially. After accessing their website here, you can search their products by state. Some states have more merchandise to offer (like southern states that have traditional and game day shirts), but they are quickly expanding to bring their full brand to all states. The California line may be small now, but hopefully the trend catches on before my time here is up! They also just released a new line of  American swim shorts and tanks just in time for that vacation you're going on!

Pictured: Sugar Paper Hugs and Kisses to the new Mr. and Mrs.

I have completely fallen in love with the Sugar Paper brand and don't mean to gush, but I have got to share with you my favorite card of them all. From the new wedding line (designed by the lovely Erika), this card is absolutely perfect for summer weddings. What's not to love? Pristine hand crafted liners, letter pressed perfectly. Luxury letterpress is it, y'all!

Brandy Melville Silver Open Triangle Mid Ring

While doing a little shopping I stumbled across what I thought to be a local boutique down in Westwood Village. Little did I know it is a huge chain on the west coast full of free spirit clothing and accessories. Mid-rings are very popular out west, maybe this is a trend that I can bring back home with me! I now love decorating my fingers with not only regular rings but also thinner less accented mid rings that sit right around my knuckles. And to top it all off, Brandy Melville only sells these for $4 a pop. The accessories here are extremely affordable, as well as majority of the clothing (if you shop online). 

Sugar Paper "Sweet Thank You" Single Card

Last but not least, it is vital that everyone have a go to thank you note. With the handwritten note becoming obsolete, I am very grateful that letterpress companies still come out with wonderfully handcrafted thank you cards. Whether it be after a job interview or to simply thank someone for a gift, you will never run out of reasons to write a thank you note at any age! This one is my favorite from our thank you single card line, but if you click the link you can browse through all of our single cards as well as note sets/thank you note sets. Personalized calligraphy does not get any finer! 

Love Always,

Kendall 

The 21st Year

Happy Birthday to me! I am beginning to wonder if I will ever have a birthday where I am at home; I cannot remember the last time I celebrated with my family on my actual birthday. Nonetheless, it was a great day! Conquered the last "landmark" birthday until I turn 50.

How can you not have a great day when you get these beautiful flowers delivered to your work?!

Although I spent the actual birthday with friends from LA, my first visitor finally made their way to the west coast from Alabama! It was a jam-packed weekend with Matt only being here for three days, but we managed to eat way too much food and make it all the way to Anaheim to see the Angels top the Rangers in extra innings. All in all, it was great to see a familiar face. Lucky for me my mother and sister get here on Wednesday! The fun is only beginning. 

Being inches from Yu Darvish and seeing Howie Kendrick lock in a game winning hit made was exciting.  After a very boring start, we couldn't have picked a better game to go and see. 

After sending Matt back off on his flight, my roommate loaded me up and took me to her hometown Lancaster, CA. It was very nice to be somewhere that reminded me of home; it was 90 degrees and beautiful but without humidity! After dinner and church, it was a good day exploring other areas of California other than just LA. 

Just a (blurry) snap of roadside Lancaster. Beautiful plains, light breeze, and open skies.

Such a fulfilling weekend! Matt, baseball, and church were very good experiences to make me feel a little less homesick. With it being Monday I was out of vacation world and back into reality going to work, which isn't bad! I am learning a lot at Sugar Paper, but the art of gift wrap is my favorite by far. 

I will never wrap a basic-looking present again! Pictured: Black Reversible Wrap (Sugar Paper),  Kraft Heart Gift Tag (Sugar Paper), and turquoise jersey ribbon.

For the lack of a long post I will save the rest of what I have up my sleeve for another day this week, and I also promise to step up my game with the posting. I am just having too much fun out here to keep up with my own commitments! Kidding, mom and dad, kidding. That was a joke. 

Bless your heart,

Kendall 

Pull, Pack, Ship, Repeat.

After two full weeks of interning, I have finally stopped being homesick and have settled in. To be honest, working 8 hours a day 5 days a week was intimidating since I have never worked full time in my life. What I was surprised to learn though is that doing what you love is not work, and I love the brand and company I work for and thoroughly enjoy every day I spend in the office.

Little view of part of the office. Sugar Paper recently attended the National Stationary Show in New York, which would explain the extreme number of boxes lying around waiting to be shipped. 

As an intern, I am typically just pulling orders from the stock room from our wholesale customers. Following, I pack it and prepare it for shipping, process the order, and ship it out. I work under two very influential bosses, Ellen & Emily, who make my days a lot easier with all of their friendliness and encouragement. They are very patient with me as I learn how it all works.

Part of the stock room. It is all assorted by SKU and whether it is a single card, boxed note set, monogram note set, tag, calendar, binder, or place cards, etc. It is far more organized that you may originally think!

 

Also, Kourtney Kardashian and I are best friends. As I was walking to the bus from work, she stopped and let me cross the street and even waved at me to cross while having her typical unhappy face on. That basically means we are besties. I am sure she will invite me over for the next episode taping of KUWTK, so keep an eye out. Other than that, its funny how at home we see celebrities as these great beings but here they are just people. With a co-worker in the grocery store (Trader Joes) we encountered the main character from Burn Notice. I suddenly recognize him and kind of freak, where as my co-worker was not even phased. Kind of humbling, at the end of the day even the millionaires are people just like we are, they just get their picture taken more often. 

In case you were wondering, this would be a pulled and packed order. We receive tons of these per day, this one was just rather large. It is now ready to be shipped!

The order from above is really large in value. We have a ton of huge orders that "look" huge, because they are binders/organizers/large in size items. This one though, is a $3,000 order that is almost entirely single cards. I almost lost my sanity, but it was encouraging to see that someone loves the Sugar Paper brand as much as we do. 

All in all, my experience thus far has been very rewarding! I am surrounded by a family at Sugar Paper that has been more than helpful for my transition, and roommates that I get along with. My birthday is next week, Matt is visiting weekend after next, and then my mom and sister are visiting as well!  My best friend growing up, Mary Layson Gottfried, is also returning to LA for the summer soon from studying abroad, so I have a lot to look forward to this summer. Thanks for keeping up! Make sure to check out the links on the left side of the page; you can order some really great products from both companies! If you do happen to order anything from Sugar Paper via our website, let me know! Then I can make sure to stick a sweet something in the box before it ships :) 

Kendall Watson