About
Me (Nicole Balch)
I’m transforming my so-so house into a lovely home. Follow along, offer advice, or just get a glimpse into the creative process!
When I’m not working on my home, I’m working on my business, Pink Loves Brown. I design and sell cards, stationery, gift sets, bookplates, pins, magnets, and pocket mirrors. Running my business is my full time job, and I love it. When I have extra time, I take on additional design work at Smart & Lovely.
My husband Brandon loves movies and video games, tolerates the color pink, and makes me laugh. Often. We just had our beautiful daughter Eleanor on April 29, 2009. We’re totally in love with her but we’re also fairly sleep-deprived. Oh, and we have a dog named Murray, and three cats in varying sizes: Violet (S), Mabel (M), and Kili (XXL).
I should probably write more, but here’s something I can tell you… I like to use ellipses too much – and I don’t use em dashes nearly enough.
Contact Me
You can send me an e-mail, or write:
Nicole Balch
P.O. Box 1268
Oak Park, IL 60304
My Photos
I use a Canon EOS Digital Rebel XT and the lens that came with it. I don’t know much about photography (other than “don’t use flash”), but I know a thing or two about composition. I fake the rest with Photoshop.
I have a Photo Gallery here on the site, and I also put all of my photos up on flickr.
This Webite
I started blogging on Blogger in January 2007, and switched over to WordPress in January 2008. WordPress and I are now besties and we’re very happy together (sorry, Blogger).
The blog design was done by me.
Active WordPress Plugins
For those that are curious about the technical side of things…
- Add Meta Tags
Adds XHTML Meta tags to your blog, automatically (for SEO). - Akismet
So good. Hardly any spam makes it through these days. - Comment Referrers
Includes a “Referrer” line to each comment notification email. - CompleteRSS
Ensures that your feed will display the full post, even when I use the <more> tag in WordPress (because I love my subscribers!). - Dagon Design Form Mailer
An easy to use, secure php form mailer script. - FeedBurner FeedSmith
Lets me keep track of subscribers (from Google Reader, Bloglines, etc.), all in one place. Neat. - Flickr Photo Gallery
LOVE this. I’m using it for my Photo Gallery. - Highlight Author Comments
Super easy way to style your comments differently so they stand out. - Less
When you click on the “Read the rest of this entry »” link, it displays the whole post instead of only the remainder. - Subscribe To Comments
I love keeping track of replies when I post comments to other blogs, so I use this plugin to let you keep track of your comments here. - Twittar
Displays twitter avatars or Gravatars next to comments. Want your picture to show up? Sign up for twitter or Gravatar (or both – they’re free). - Twitter Tools
I’ve been enjoying Twitter. Whenever I want to share something that’s too inane for a full blog post… it’s Twitter to the rescue. This plugin puts my tweets up in the sidebar. - WordPress Downloads Monitor
Lets me keep my downloads organized and see how many people have actually downloaded them.
