Most of you know that I maintain a second website for my freelance work. In general, I try not to get all salesy with my work here, because that’s not really what this blog is for.

HOWEVER.

I want to kick off 2012 by reaching a wider audience of people. I want to work with a roster of clients that do awesome things and want to share the awesomeness with the rest of the Internet. And I know that category includes a bunch of you guys.

I also know that cost can be a prohibitive aspect to getting good work done – you can’t afford a developer, so you end up trying to hack something together that maybe isn’t as good as you’d get if you could afford to pay someone who really knows how to do it well…which means you spend a ton of time on trying to make it work instead of working on the thing that you do best [blogging, decorating cakes, making hats, training dogs].

So for a little while, I’m going to eliminate the cost as a prohibitive factor for people who want to work with me.

Starting right this minute, I’m offering two pay-what-you-can packages to kick off the new year.

Package The First: I will build you a custom WordPress theme from scratch, or modify an existing one. This is perfect if you’re just starting a blog or a website, or if you’re converting to WordPress from another blogging platform. This package includes three rounds of design revisions, full hand-coding, and cross-browser testing. I’ll host it for free for a year on my hosting. [The typical cost of a project like this: around $1000 for around 25 hours of work.]

Package The Second: I will help you set up a Mailchimp list, with a signup form on your website and a template for the emails. This is great if you already have a site you love, but want to take your marketing to the next level. I’ll help you with copywriting, split-testing, and design for four campaigns. They can be weekly, monthly, or quarterly. [The typical cost of a project like this: around $800 for around 20 hours of work.]

The Fine Print:
1) You must pay something. Even if it’s just a little bit. I’ve given you the approximate values of these packages so you know what they typically cost [depending on the kind of bells and whistles you need], but you can pay me whatever you think they’re worth to you and whatever fits in your budget right now.
2) I’m capping the hours on each project – not because I’m trying to short-change anyone or pull a quick bait-and-switch, but because I want to make sure this is as good an experience for me as it is for you.
3) You can use these packages anytime in 2012, but you have to purchase them by January 15. So that means if you want to launch a project or a new blog later in the year, but still want to take advantage of the deal, you’re golden.
4) You can buy one package or the other, but not both.
5) I’m only doing seven of each. So if you want one, you have to be one of the first seven to purchase.
6) If you buy one and I do an awesome job for you, you must [or all!] of these things:

• Write me a sparkling testimonial for my site
• Recommended me to your friends
• Include a backlink to my portfolio from the work I do for you

So if you’re ready to rock the web in 2012, get in touch. I can’t wait to work with you.

P.S. If you don’t need this kind of thing yourself, but you know someone who does, send this post along to them. I’ll be forever grateful!

P.P.S. I mean what I said about this being done on January 15. I’m not sure when I’ll be doing something like this again, so if you want to get in on it, you gotta let me know soon. Got it? Cool.

Related posts:

1. An Announcement
2. An Announcement
3. I Made This: Tot Dogs website

a) Ignore the question. Repeatedly, if you have to.
Them: “So when are we going to hear that you’re getting married? You’re not getting any younger!”
Me: “Did you know there are over a million bricks in the Empire State Building?”
Them: “That’s nice. But didn’t you say you were dating a nice boy?”
Me: “The funny thing is, I’ve never been in the Empire State Building. Can you believe that? I lived in New York for almost three years and I just never did it.”
Them: “Hmm. So tell me about your boyfriend. Is he marriage material?”
Me: “The thing is, I really hated the touristy stuff in Manhattan. I get anxiety in crowds like that. And everyone’s like, trying to take photos…so weird!”
Them: “It is weird. I’m going to freshen my drink.”

b) Give them way too much information.
“Been there, done that. Not going back again!” [Works best when a significant other is present and willing to nod knowingly.]

“Well, we’re trying to get pregnant first. Man, it’s been fun.” [Wink here. If they pry, name-drop sex positions and go into detail about your menstrual cycle.]

“I’m having way too much fun being promiscuous. Did you know that the World Health Organization’s definition of promiscuity is only three sex partners a year?” [Chuckle after you say this. If you feel inclined, talk about the wild night you had last March, and the pictures that are somewhere on the Internet.]

c) Turn it around.

“So will we hear wedding bells in your near future?”
“Wow. That’s a really personal question. I didn’t know you and I were that close. By the way, how’s life in your bedroom?”

“I’m not sure. When are you going to get divorced?” [Only works on married people.]

“I’m waiting until all my gay friends can get married in this state. We’re going to have a big gay wedding. Want to be a bridesmaid?” [Works best on homophobes or xenophobes.]

d) Lie.

“I’m saving up for a Harry Winston. Actually, I have a Kickstarter where I’m raising money. Would you like to donate? The minimum donation is $450.”

“I’m actually holding off on marriage until my band is on MTV. Here’s our single. Want to be on our street team?”

“I’ve just been so busy! My [insert obviously fake business name] business isn’t going to run itself, you know!”

“I’m planning to elope to Vegas. Like, soon. I don’t think any of you are invited. Sorry!”

e) Up the sketchiness factor.

“I can’t answer any questions like that without my lawyer present.”

“My therapist doesn’t like me to talk about my relationships with anyone except her.”

f) Change the subject.

“Oh jeez, I need another drink. Can I have some of yours?”

Related posts:

1. Business Professional: Oh HELL No.
2. Business Professional Dress: WTF?
3. Tutorial Roundup: 6 Great Ways to Repurpose Your Clothing
4. Eleven Questions to Ask Before We Design, Buy, or Specify Anything
5. Throwback Thursday: Eleven Questions to Ask Before We Design, Buy, or Specify Anything

First of all, check out this sexy treasury of knitwear made by RosieOK and featuring yours truly!

On top of that, I was featured in this What is Style? article over at 365 Days of Style. This is the first in a series of weekly discussion questions on style and fashion, featuring some cool talk from cool people. Get on over and check it out!

And finally, I am hard at work on a little something to show you guys starting next week. Are you ready?

Related posts:

1. Guest Post Fun Times!
2. Ten Things You Love About Amanda Lee: 12.4.2008
3. New Prints in I Love Life I Love You!
4. I Love Life I Love You at Second Sunday on Main in Cincinnati, Ohio!
5. I Love Life I Love You: Shop Update

My site averages around 250-350 unique views a day, featuring around a dozen posts a week on style, creativity, and happiness. My visitors come from all over the world, but are mostly concentrated in the United States, Great Britain, and Europe. They are young professionals and students, eager to support companies and causes they love. My readers value thrift and design alike; pride themselves on DIY and supporting independent designers and businesses; and appreciate aesthetics as much as intellect. Are you a fit?

Sponsoring my site could take several forms – sidebar ads, RSS banners, or newsletter issue sponsorship. I could also get the word out about special upcoming events. Alternately, if you have other ideas, I’d be glad to discuss them!

Sponsor spots will be available on a weekly or a monthly basis, with pricing plans constructed to reflect the sponsorship agreement we work out. What’s more, for sponsors who want to sign on for the long haul, I can offer discounts for 3-, 6-, and 12-month sponsorship plans!

I’d love to talk further with you about ways we can work together. If you’re interested, please get in touch with me at amandalee@amandalee.org Thanks!

No related posts.

So, I’m getting ready to move. Again. And I’m getting ready to clean out my closet. Again. I spent some quality time with my Mint.com account today and realized that in the past year, I’ve spent more on both food and craft supplies than I have on clothing. Score for minimalism and fiscal responsibility! I’m finally feeling a teensy bit successful in achieving the utilitarian, minimal wardrobe I want, where every piece of clothing is something I want, need, use, and love. There’s none of the sentimental hoarding I used to engage in ["My mom bought me this dress when I was 14 and 20 pounds lighter! It was 1996! It was special!"], and quite a bit less of the impulse buying ["This purple sequined tank dress doesn't look anything like any clothing I've ever had or desired, but it'd be a great way to branch out in my style! It'd go over great on Lookbook!"].

However, my wardrobe continues to seem unwieldy and excessive. I daydream about the day when I don’t have to choose which outfits I bring with me on vacation, because they all fit into a suitcase. I daydream about replacing all the clothing storage furniture in my apartment with workspace, lounge space, a baby grand piano – something that doesn’t have drawers full of undies, because my undies fit in the closet with all my other clothes. As of now, though, my undies have to go elsewhere, because there’s no room for them between my bathing suit, two winter coats of varying heaviness, tights, sundresses, sweaters, and an old bridesmaid’s dress [which to be fair is headed for Goodwill this weekend].

I don’t think I’m alone in this, either. I am exceptionally well-versed in going through my friends’ cluttered closets to try and find order, and pretty much every one of us has stuff in their closet that they can’t wear all the time, but can’t get rid of, because they need, want, and love it and use it reasonably, given its purpose.

So why do even the queens of order and organization have all this clothing? Lots of reasons, it turns out.

• Fluctuating weight or size means one of two things: either you wear poorly-fitted clothes sometimes, or you double your clothing consumption. There’s a stereotype of a woman hoarding her “aspirational” clothes that definitely don’t, and probably won’t, fit ever again ["I've got to get into my PROM dress, guys!"]. But I’m talking about people who know their own body’s variations and prepare for them sartorially – with extra clothing. Some people change sizes based on how often they’re going to the gym at any given time, or they gain or lose weight routinely from summer to winter. Some gain or lose a few pounds from day to day because of stress. Some women go through two or three planned pregnancies and they keep their maternity clothes, just because they know they’ll be using them again in a couple of years. Some women even vary a couple of sizes in the course of a menstrual cycle.
• Extreme weather changes mean that you have to have more items that only work in one season. Like I said above, I have two winter-weight coats and at least four fall/spring jackets, plus the requisite tights, socks, gloves, boots, and sweaters that the extreme cold necessitates. And for the summer, I’ve got at least nine sundresses and countless sandals that are in no way winter-appropriate. My real home is New York; I doubt I’d feel as comfortable on the West coast; but San Francisco’s uniform temperature without as much seasonal variation sounds awesome to me.
• Differing expectations for how you should dress in certain situations mean that there can be a distinct divide between clothing for work and play, daytime and nighttime, brunch versus an evening wedding. A smart shopper knows that a lot of these can overlap, but that depends on a lot of things: the formality of your work atmosphere, how frequently you’re invited to formal events [and whether it would be frowned upon to wear the same dress to several events], how casual your downtime attire tends to be [leggings and tanks versus twill dresses], and how often, if ever you dress up to go out. The don’t-wear-it-twice rule kills me – I don’t know a single person my age who has the disposable income [or frankly the desire] to buy a new dress for every single wedding, dance, party, and event, just to avoid being seen in the same one twice – but some people think it’s really important, and it bloats their wardrobes like crazy.

I have a post ready for tomorrow on how to combat wardrobe excess. Until then, I’m wondering: who has a huge wardrobe that’s full of beautiful functional things, all of which you use regularly? How do you deal with wardrobe excess? Any creative/resourceful solutions?

Related posts:

1. Essential Sewing Skills for Wardrobe Maintenance
2. Six Items or Less

It’s been silent around here for the past couple of days, and I’m sorry. I’m amidst a launch of a big project at work, sometimes putting in almost seventy hours a week between my office and my other job…and it’s catching up with me. So hold tight. I’ll be right back with you later this weekend. If you need your Amanda Lee fix before then, you know where to find me.

Much love, kids. I’ll see you soon.

Related posts:

1. An Announcement
2. Pay What You Can in 2012: An Announcement From My Other Website
3. An Announcement and A Dash of Gratitude

[All together now: "I wanna/I wanna/I wanna/I wanna/really really really wanna ziggaziggaaaahh!" Yeah, you know you were singing it to yourself. And I know too. Yeah.]

All right, kids. I’m ready to step up my commitment to blogging in 2010. So tell me: what do you want to see more of? What do you love? What void exists in the Internet that you think I could easily fill? What do you hate and never want to see again?

Comment below. Or, if you have something to say in private, email me. You know the drill. Thanks for your feedback, guys?

Related posts:

1. Things I Learned, Accomplished, Did, or Came to Terms With During My, uh…Long-Ass Blogging Hiatus [And How This Affects You, Dear Readers]

How you look matters, people. And since we’re not always at liberty to change our own height, weight, bone structure, skin condition, or disability, nor is any one of us going to completely change the mindset and habits of immediate judgment inherent in every human being on the planet, the fact that it matters isn’t going away anytime soon.

And because of all this,fashion matters, too. What you wear is the only capacity in which on a daily basis you make decisions that communicate who you are, what you value, and how you feel. Obviously, every decision you make communicates those things, but think about it—does anything change as frequently or vary as much as the things you choose to wear?

Think about it. Your fashion choices demonstrate how you want people to perceive you—are you hiptastic, or do you have other things to worry about? Do you take your professional ambitions seriously, or do you have any at all? Are you confident, meek, sexual, reserved, wealthy, poor, individualistic, or a trend-follower?

What’s more, what you wear demonstrates how you perceive yourself. Do you feel good about your body, or do you dress to hide your so-called problem areas?

Fashion is a key showcase of your consumption choices and thus, your values. Do you go crazy for trends, or do you look for pieces that can be worn over and over again ten years from now? Do you pick out disposable pieces, or do you buy for lasting quality? Are you a green shopper? How does child labor and third-world manufacturing affect your buying decisions? No matter what your values are, they’re evident in what you wear. When I see a girl wearing skinny stonewashed jeans, for instance, I can tell she places a high value on current trends. Someone wearing head-to-toe organic cotton clothing and TOMS shoes likely values the environment and economic charity at least as much as fashion-forwardness. New Yorkers (or tourists!) who wear sneakers instead of heels definitely value their own comfort over their trendiness.

Also, think about it this way: it’s impossible to dress in a way that communicates absolutely nothing about you. If you dress as though you don’t care, the people around you might not be able to see how interesting and unique you are—less able than, say, if you wore your favorite colors or styles every day. If you follow a uniform code to the very letter, you’re still communicating something about yourself—your affiliation with the organization whose uniform you’re wearing [and also perhaps your loyalty to it—that you value the organization you belong to more than you value your individual expression, or maybe just that you value your job enough to follow the rules and thus not be stripped of it]. Likewise, if you choose not to wear anything, you’re making a pretty specific statement about your values and your feelings about your own body! And if you go really grungy (read: you skip on teeth-brushing and shampoo once a week at most; you wait six months or so before doing your laundry; and every item of clothing you own is stained, stretched out, and torn), you’re being unabashedly honest about the fact that you don’t give a damn about what you look like [or what anyone thinks of it].

[Sidenote: I used to know someone like this. And I'm not entirely sure how he held a job or met anyone, because he looked a hot mess all the time. I'm not talking about wearing clothing that was out of style or unflattering…I'm talking about holey, smelly, unlaundered clothing paired with once-weekly showers, if he was feeling super-motivated. Ew.]

So don’t ever let anyone tell you that fashion is dumb. It’s not.

Related posts:

1. Throwback Thursday: Why Fashion is Important
2. Why Fashion Matters
3. Cincinnati [and beyond!] Design, Fashion, and All Sorts of Win
4. Getting Back to the Important Stuff
5. Fashion Confessions You May or May Not Already Know

So I wrote yesterday about my hiatus and why I took it—mainly because I wasn’t loving what I was doing. So, it’s time for a change. Here’s a heads-up as to what you guys can expect over the next few weeks.

• You know my Love It! posts? Well, I don’t love them anymore. All my past Love It! posts will remain archived on the blog, but I won’t write any more of them. Why? Well, mostly because the content is harvested from my own personal journals. And while I still write down items of gratitude every day, it’s growing difficult to find both a) unique things to post each week and b) items I really, really want to share with the world. The last thing I want to do is get boring…and if I’m bored, I’m pretty sure you guys will be too.
• But…BUT… my Window is changing. Instead of merely showing pictures and places, I’ll be telling you a bit about my week—what I’ve been up to, where else I’ve been writing, notable items from my friends’ work, and the like.
• I’m going to do something a little different with my Etsy picks—choosing categorically rather than by seller. You’ll see what I mean tomorrow.
• My Click It! posts were, likewise, boring me. (Can you see a theme here? I’m disliking all the laundry lists that I’ve been posting in every category.) So they’ll be less frequent, and hopefully more informative as a result.
• But…BUT…I’m going to start a new feature this week and next. I’d love your feedback. Let me know how you like them!.
• Finally, you guys have noticed I have issues with my WordPress themes. There’s something I dislike about almost every theme I find, leading me to change my theme every week or so. I’m doing my best to get super-intimate with theme-building tutorials (and, let’s be honest, with a couple of super-savvy friends [Jon and Jeremy, both of whom rock my socks off]) to get it figured out. Be patient with me.

Kiddos, what do you want to see more of? What do you hate and never want to see again? I want to keep this interesting for you and me alike. Give me feedback!

No related posts.

• Unimportant things: I learned to crochet, courtesy of inspiration from Katherine and an amazing gift from her: a crocheted cowl scarf and a bag of coffee from Ritual Roasters in San Francisco. I visited Jamie in Philadelphia, and then she came to visit New York. I had some other guests as well—Ken and Jesse visited too. I worked a lot. And then I worked some more. In fact, I even worked some overnight shifts, which wreaked havoc on my sleep schedule and my ability to function as a normal human for awhile.
• Things of greater importance: I started a project. Well, I didn’t start it…it was something that Katherine and I had been working on for awhile. But we got it off the ground. Details are coming later, I promise.
• Things of paramount importance: I had a freak-out. See, in an effort to follow the footsteps of some of my blogging idols, I set the bar pretty high while simultaneously forgetting to think about what I wanted from this whole blogging experiment. So I proceeded to fail. Froze up. Stopped writing altogether. Questioned my ability to function as an adult (though that might have been the sleep deprivation talking; see above under “worked some overnight shifts”). You know how it goes. You might have to bear with me—I’m always working to be better. But I’m mostly done with it now, thanks to some good reads from Havi.

At any rate&38230;it’s good to be back. How have you guys been?

Related posts:

1. Dear Readers…
2. Good things about taking…uh…four months off from blogging.
3. Curation! Or, Why I Learned to Tumbl.
4. How to Avoid Freezing Your Ass Off in Mid-Winter
5. The Fan Page, the Frustration, the [now former!] Friend: One Marketing Lesson I learned from Facebook

Not the singer. I mean, I haven’t been here.

Sorry for that. Things will be back to normal on AmandaLee.org tomorrow. Pictures (including last week’s Window and my costume!) will be up as soon as humanly possible, as well as all the list-y, link-y, New York-y goodness you’ve come to expect—nay, require—from Amanda Lee. I promise.

But tonight? Tonight? Tonight I’m celebrating something amazing that’s been a long time coming. It’s involved the drive and devotion of many, many people, and that makes me so proud, grateful, and glee-filled all at once.

[photo courtesy of ObamaMedia]

America, you’ve made my progressive heart proud. Everybody go have fun tonight. I can’t wait for January 20. Can you?

Related posts:

1. Pay What You Can in 2012: An Announcement From My Other Website
2. An Announcement

We now return to regularly-scheduled AmandaLee.org programming. Enjoy!

No related posts.