Preamble to the profile
MN Week was born out of the discovery of people I admired online. If I dug them enough, I would click on the About and find a Minnesotan. A few of these discoveries happened in quick succession and I didn’t have to be hit with a snowball to see a pattern.
One thing to note: these profiles are not journalistic, but more personal. I’ll leave the professional writing to the, uh, professionals. Enjoy discovering these talented people living in a place that celebrates music, food and creativity…
I admire funny. When you combine it with talent, energy and accessibility, I get downright enthusiastic! Cathy Zielske has been a graphic designer for 19 years. When she began scrapbooking in 2001, Cathy relied on her design skills to create clean and simple pages. Her focus was, and still is, on the photos and words to communicate her everyday life. Good design transcends any medium and Cathy’s eye has helped introduce clean, graphic layouts to the scrapbooking world. Check out the example of the beautiful layout below. Cathy used one of her templates (available at Designer Digitals) to focus on a large photo and write about one ordinary family moment in time.
Classic Foundation Cardstock (Katie Pertiet); Avenir font
You can visit Cathy on Vimeo for a tutorial on how to create this page for yourself!
I’ve mentioned that Cathy is funny, yes? Well, you would know that if you follow her on Twitter. I thought I would include a few of my favorite tweets…
“This new hair dye job takes at LEAST 17 months off me.”
“Me, making small talk with my daughter’s 9th grade boyfriend. ‘I had a great apple today.’ #parentswithoutpersonalities”
“Damn @Oprah, the Celine thing? with the tenor dudes? And Hallelujah? Who’s gonna make me cry when you’re off the air? Who?”
“I was going to say a fresh snow fall and Tom Waits on the iTunes is a match made in a boozy, snowy heaven.”
“Thinking of wearing black today. Then, if the Vikings lose, I’ll already be dressed for mourning . If they win, I will simply look thinner.”
I think I relate to Cathy for a few reasons… we’re the same age, we think that this will be the year to conquer our health/food issues and we’re family gals, trying to enjoy all that comes with growing up as a family unit. Plus, she loves Crowded House, one of my personal faves. CZ was kind enough to send back responses to the Minnesota food and music questions:
Name your 3 favorite foods to eat in MN.
veggie samosas from Taste of India in Maplewood
veggie fried rice from the Village Wok in Minneapolis
and french fries…from any where.
First rock concert you ever saw: who? where? and why?
Journey, at the Seattle Center Coliseum, because they were AWESOME.
There are many places to find Cathy Zielske on these interwebs. Besides the goodies you can find at Designer Digitals, her tutorials on Vimeo and her tweets on Twitter, she teaches workshops and classes at Big Picture Scrapbooking.
Her books, Clean&Simple Scrapbooking, and Clean&Simple Scrapbooking: The Sequel are available at Amazon.com. Aren’t they pretty?
And, of course, her phenomenal blog. If you know me, you know I’m a fan of good writing, and that’s what you’ll find there. Thanks to CZ for participating in MN Week!
Finishing up MN Week is print maker extraordinaire, Laura Brown. She’ll dispel the process of printmaking by rockin’ a little haiku on you (and a few more words to boot.) See you tomorrow!
