Here’s a new wallpaper for you- MAY YOU LIVE IN INTERESTING TIMES. I’ve heard it’s an ancient Chinese curse (though no one seems to be able to attribute it to China). This thing took ages to make, and I exhausted all my resources for public domain images.

Also, five new backgrounds. Four of them have a nautical theme. Did you know that the Titanic sank 99 years ago today?

Also I made a background of the cutouts from the wallpaper, since there was some good color to be had.

In my next life I’ll be a minimalist who finds harmony in beige and taupe. They say taupe is very soothing.
-Sarah

Download the new PDF or See all available gift tags

This year the labels are también disponible en español because ¡porque no! Also I think the words for ‘To’ and ‘From’ are the same in Spanish and Portuguese, so that means they are also disponível em português. Oh yeah that’s right, I’m all international now. En serio.

Also I drew this wallpaper.
This really pessimistic wallpaper.

Happy Holidays and Feliz Navidad and all that. I will try to stop lapsing into Spanglish sin razón but I make no guarantees.
-Sarah

Somebody wrote to me a while back and asked me to make a wallpaper with John Collier’s painting Priestess of Delphi, so I thought, yeah, sure, what the hell. So here’s a new wallpaper that ties in with two previous ones that I’ve made.

I’ve also made three new tiled backgrounds, all in blue. A shiny new penny to anyone who can tell me where the term "buffalo plaid" comes from.

I uploaded 16 iPad backgrounds on Flickr. They’re either new colorways of previous designs or all new creations. I know ya’ll are getting one of those iPads dealies for Christmas, so here’s to making it fabulous.

Today I worked the 3AM Black Friday shift. YOU’RE WELCOME, shoppers of America.

Don’t be tardy for the party.

-Sarah

I’ve added three new backgrounds, seen here…

…And two new wallpapers.

This one features the mythical jackalope, a taxidermist’s fusion of a rabbit with antlers that roams freely (and fictionally) in the Southwest. I was sort of fascinated with these things as a kid. And really, any excuse to draw a bunny.

And this one is a quote from Walden, by Henry David Thoreau. I am trying to read lots of the classic books that I’m told everyone reads in high school (though I don’t think anyone actually does anymore, because I definitely didn’t). As hard as I am trying with this, I had brief relapse from the scheduled reading plan when I picked up a copy of Twilight (and shut up you know it was awesome. It’s like eating candy for dinner).

Love,
Sarah

I’ve added a new wallpaper to the site:

I’ve also made three new backgrounds:

…And a new font. Cursive fonts are terribly difficult to make, especially with the cheesy free software I’m using, so this typeface is a little wonky looking. Probably works better at smaller sizes.

That’s all for today!

Yours,
Sarah

First off I want to thank all the fantastic people who have been linking to this site lately. I’ve been getting so much traffic in the past few days that I had to buy some emergency bandwidth transfer (twice!) to keep this site from closing down. Hopefully I should be good until the end of the month, but in case I’m not, then I’ll see you in March!

I’ve added two new wallpapers to the site:

More backgrounds, a new font, and a new embroidery are all in the works and should be added pretty soon. Until then, please enjoy this picture of the Vancouver Olympics mascot Quatchi squashed onto a scanner.

HAVE A GOOD DAY.

-Sarah

I’ve got four new backgrounds up, all in autumn colors:

Also one new wallpaper, this time illustrating some famous superstitions.

I was not a superstitious child. At age seven I intentionally walked under a ladder two times (14 years of bad luck) just to prove to myself that luck was not controlled by forces as arbitrary as construction equipment. Many years later I thought about that day, and figured that if I really did receive 14 years of bad luck then very soon the spell would expire. Somehow, magically, my life would improve in every way without this ‘ladder curse’ weighing me down.
The next day when I came home from school there was an abandoned ladder positioned directly over the only door to my apartment. Seems I’ve got seven more years of bad luck ahead, and I’m destined to live my life under ladders.

-Sarah

I’ve made two new wallpapers, up in a variety of sizes:

"Bad fortune ne’er should daunt me, for I am young and the world is wide"

I designed the above wallpaper to keep myself from getting too down lately. I’ve been spending my time applying fruitlessly for every job I can find. I can think of a few words to describe this economic recession, and most of them are plagiarized from George Carlin.

Proverbs from around the world

There’s also this wallpaper with proverbs. When searching them out for use here, I came across an interesting one from China: Do not remove a fly from your friend’s forehead with an axe. I hope this doesn’t mean that 600 years ago in the Forbidden City some poor soul found this out the hard way.

I’ve added five new backgrounds, this time a very eclectic collection. I’ve got three collage-style backgrounds that I assembled out of junk mail and old magazines, a deco design in teal and orange, and a background listing some 1930s diner lingo.
To be fair I’ve never actually heard anyone use diner lingo in my entire life, but I’d love to hear the workers at McDonalds shout out "Burn one, take it through the garden and pin a rose on it" every time somebody wants a burger.

I’ve also uploaded 12 new iPhone wallpapers to Flickr.

You go, Glen Coco!

If you are Marketplace beta tester over at Spoonflower, you can now purchase a few of my designs as fabric. You can take a look at the designs available if you like, and when the Marketplace opens to all users you’ll be able to buy as many yards as you could ever need.

With love,
Sarah

Finally I have gotten around to getting some updates on this silly website.

I’ve got four new background patterns for you:

I’ve made a new wallpaper, seen below. This wallpaper is available in six sizes, and also as a tiled background.

For my birthday I got a larger computer monitor. It is awesome on so very many levels, and I’ve learned that Dreamweaver is really a million times easier to use when you can actually see what you’re doing. But sadly there is a down side to all this awesomeness: Not a single one of the nearly 80 wallpapers I’ve created over the years actually fits my screen. So in an effort to get with the times, I’ve updated many of the old papers so that they are available in a variety of wide screen sizes. I’ve uploaded over 60 new images today and dealt with quite a lot of code, so if you find any errors on the wallpaper page please let me know.

I’ve also updated the travel section with some new photos of Los Angeles. I was there for three days in June, which finally gave me some time to see some of the touristy stuff that all Californians are required to know about. I feel like such a bad Californian sometimes; I’ve lived here my whole life but I’ve never been to Disneyland, Alcatraz, or Yosemite.

Remember that if you want to enter to win some bowls from All Modern, this is your last chance! Really, RIGHT NOW. A winner will be chosen on the the 13th.

That’s it for today.

-Sarah

I’ve created another embroidery. This is what it would look like if Dr. House (from the TV show House) took Vicodin (as he often does) then fell asleep and dreamed that he was in Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.

What can I say? Some people handle unemployment better than others.

Oh, and seriously WTF with Amber’s ghost reappearing? The writers of House really deserve a gold star for the wacky stuff they think up.

I also made a wallpaper featuring feral versions of famous furniture. In college I was required to take a class in interior design (for reasons that are not entirely clear to me), and it left me with the ability to identify the name, designer, and year of creation of many chairs. This bizarre talent really amused my friends and family, and so for months they pointed out chairs for me to identify. I would call out the answers:

Eames Lounge, Charles and Ray Eames, 1956!
Selene Chair, Vico Magistretti, 1969!
Bistro Chair, Micheal Thonet, 1859!

Most of these facts have fallen out of my head by now. Recently I was looking up to see the prices of some of these chairs that I had to memorize, and all of them are wildly expensive. Perhaps one lucky day I will stumble upon a garage sale of some foolish person who doesn’t know the true price of a 50 year old plastic chair, and then all this knowledge will have served me some practical purpose.

Anyway, please enjoy this preview of an angry Eames lounge. RAWR.

-Sarah

P.S. If you leave a comment here, please don’t include the word “Vicodin” because my spam filter will eat it.