New York Trip

My husband and I spent a fabulous 5 days in New York at the beginning of the month. It was so much fun exploring the city together and having some alone time. New York is such a magical place and I'm already dreaming of the next time we can go.

See more details about our trip on my family blog here.

Amazon Store, Giveaway & Freebie!

I have a lot of exciting things for you today. First, I have created an Amazon shop with all of the fun items I have been telling you about on the blog. Things such as washi tape, envelopes, software, etc. That way if you are ever in the need of some of these items you can easily go to my shop and find them all in one place. How awesome is that?!?

Becky Young Designs Amazon Store

Next up is a fun giveaway. One lucky person will win a $5 gift certificate to my Etsy shop. And remember that I do custom orders, so if you don't see what you are looking for in my shop already, just email me and I can create something custom just for you!

Here is how to enter:

{1}Simply leave a comment below with your favorite item from my Etsy shop.  

(Everyone must do this in order to be entered.)

Want more entries?

{2}'Like' Becky Young Designs on Facebook.

{3}'Like' Becky Young Designs on Pinterest.

{4}Follow the Becky Young Designs blog.

{5}Post on Facebook or Twitter about this giveaway to all your friends.

That's a total of 5 entries you can have.
Please make sure to leave a separate comment for each entry.
Good Luck!

(You have until Thursday, May 24th at midnight to enter. Winner will be announced Friday, May 25th.)

And last is an awesome new freebie!

I have for you a set of dotted circles in 2 different sizes. These are so much fun to add a cute element to your cards or pictures or blogs. Below is an example of how you can use them. In the below photo of my baby I used both size and layered them and made each one a different color. There are so many different things you can do with these. 

Download Dotted Circle Freebie Here

Creating Your Own Digital Cards | What Program To Use

I'm going to start doing some tutorials and tips on my blog about how to create your own digital cards. I hope these help you create custom designs and inspire you to be more creative.

 Digital cards are so much fun to designs for all kinds of occasions and you can easily print them off or you can even email them or post them to your social medias.

What Program Do I Use?
The first thing we need to talk about is what program to use to create your designs. There are so many different programs you can use and everyone has their own opinion about which program is best. My personal opinion is, for the price and ease of use, the best program is Adobe Photoshop Elements 10. Not only can you create cute custom designs and artwork but you can also edit pictures and so much more.

The price is only $74.99 on Amazon. This is a lot cheaper than the full version of Photoshop or other programs that run hundreds of dollars. $75 is pretty doable for a program you can use for years.

Also, Photoshop Elements is pretty easy to learn to use and is very user friendly. I have self taught myself everything I know in Photoshop Elements. All of my design tutorials on this blog will be shown with this program.

So make sure you purchase this software if you want to follow along with my tutorials or if you already have it you are one step ahead. Also, check back weekly for new tutorials.

What are your thoughts on what is the best design program? What program do you use?

Color Me Rad Race

My husband and I, along with some family and friends ran the Color Me Rad 5k a few weekends ago. It was a blast getting all dirty and colorful and throwing powder at each other. If the Color Me Rad race is coming to a city near you I would definitely recommend running it! Actually there was more playing than there was running. That is my type of race:)

Check out more details and pictures on my family blog here.

My Favorite Fonts | Part 1

Thank you SO much for all of the wonderful responses I got from my last post about what types of freebies you all want. It has given me lots of ideas so keep an eye out for those in the future.

Today I want to start a series called "My Favorite Fonts." I think the number one thing you can do to make your designs creative and fresh is to use fun fonts. There are so may free fonts out there you can go crazy downloading them all.  So I'm going to show you some of my favorite ones right now. Keep in mind that I am always looking for new ones and falling in love with a new font each week. I just can't get enough of them. So quit using all of those boring fonts that com per-installed on your computer and download some of these fun ones.

Here is Part 1 of "My Favorite Fonts."
And the best part about it is these fonts are all *free*!!

Hope these are helpful! Enjoy!

1. | 2. | 3. | 4. | 5. | 6. | 7. | 8. | 9. | 10.

What are some of your favorite fonts? I'd love for you to share.

Freebies - What Do You Want?

I would love to offer more freebies on my blog. It's such a fun way to meet new readers. I just need a little help with ideas and I want to know what types of freebies you all like and are looking for. Would you take a moment to let me know and fill out the form below? Thank you!

Advertising Spaces

I just wanted to let you all know I have some space available on my sidebar for a few *free* ads as well as some larger paid ads. Check out the details and rates here.

Contact me if you are interested in doing some advertising or giveaways on Becky Young Designs!