Yes, I said it. It’s my birthday on the 19th and to celebrate, I am joining up with PrintRunner to do an awesome business card giveaway! Because I’m super nice and believe in the Hobbit tradition of giving away presents on my birthday. To one lucky winner anyway.

But first, I have a request for you. I would LOVE it if you could donate to an organization that is near and dear to my heart. No, it’s not required to enter the giveaway – it’s just something nice you could do for me on my 26th year of life (and for them).

My Birthday Nonprofit: Amazon CARES

This is a personal plea from me. Amazon Community Animal Rescue, Education & Safety (CARES) is a nonprofit organization that was founded by my good friend Molly Mednikow. This is a one-of-a-kind organization that operates in Iquitos, Peru, that offers animal rescue, spay and neuter services and education to the Amazon community, runs a no-kill shelter, and is the only charity dedicated to animals in the entire Peruvian Amazon region. The amount of good this small organization does for a very large area is astronomical.

Unfortunately, earlier this year, the Amazon was hit with a tremendous amount of flooding that devastated the organization – the shelter they had spent years building was destroyed. Molly and her trusted troupe of staff and volunteers carry on the work they have dedicated their lives to, but they struggle as not enough funding goes to rebuilding and less goes to the animals. They need your help.

For my birthday, I want everyone who reads this to donate $5 or more to the Amazon CARES ChipIn and help them raise the money to rebuild their organization and help give relief to the animals of the region. You can donate and see updates at this page, or you can donate via the ChipIn widget below.

Thank you. From the bottom of my heart. It would be the best present ever to see Molly and Amazon CARES continue the good work they do.

Edit: Molly just put this post up and it breaks my heart. If you were thinking about donating, now is the time! They could use all the help they can get right now! Let’s do this!

And Now… The PrintRunner Giveaway!

I haven’t done a giveaway in awhile, so I was totally excited when PrintRunner asked if I wanted to take part in theirs (and get my own cards too). I was also super stoked when I discovered the green aspect of the company – they’ve adopted some pretty stellar eco-friendly printing practices, which y’all should know is important to me. You can try PrintRunner’s online business cards printing through their online printing services.

Giveaway Details

Business Card Size and Style Business Cards: 2×3.5 (Standard)
Quantity: 250 cards
Colors: 4/4 Color Both Sides
Paper: 14 pt. UV Coating on Front, 14 pt. UV Coating on both sides,
Proof: NONE
Rounded Corners: NO
Ready To Ship In: 3 Business Days
Awards: May 31st, 2012
*Giveaway is open to US Residents only, ages 18 years old and above.

Deadline

This giveaway is open NOW and will close on my birthday, May 19th (at 11:59PM CST). What do you need to do to win? Comment on this post and, just for fun, tell me what your favorite charity or cause is. I would love to see what you guys care about. Don’t forget to follow PrintRunner on Twitter and Facebook – they’re pretty great. I’ll pick a winner on Sunday via the Random.org generator.

Hope you’re all having a wonderful May and happy Giveaway!

Creature Spot

Quick update! I just needed to tell you all about my absolute new favorite blog: Creature Spot. It’s basically a blog for a bunch of different concept artists to come together and share their sketches and creations and I am in LOVE with it. Amazing work and extremely inspiring to someone who once dreamed of joining Weta Workshop as a concept artist (I have no given up on that dream – someday it will happen!).

Anyway… a few favorites:

• The Explorer’s Guide to Drawing Fantasy Creatures by Emily Fiegenschuh
• WoW: TCG Cards by LD Austin
• Talisman: The Dragons by Christopher Burdett
• Dog Women, Fish Men, Cat Monkeys and Ox Horses by Ryan Firchau

Go check them out and much more over at Creature Spot!

The Start of a Career

I keep putting off writing this post. I feel like if I actually put it down, then it’s real. Dumb, I know. Hundreds of thousands of people have already written it down. It happened. It’s over. Steve Jobs, iGenius himself, has left us.

So here’s my story. I was a freshman in high school and there was one iMac in the whole school, in the corner of my home away from home: the art room. It was a huge blue box-y thing and it kind of sucked to work with because the screen kept flickering in and out of different colors. But I was in love with it. Totally different from all the other computers at school. Sleek. Clean. I found it easier to use AND it had art software on it. This was also my introduction to Adobe but it’s not as important right now. What was important was that I had discovered a new way to create art that no one had ever showed me. On that Mac, I taught myself how to scan my artwork and draw and color and quickly took this new-found knowledge to the Photo room where I began teaching some of the other kids how to manipulate photos. I also teamed up with other geeks on learning video and movie software.

What I’m getting at is, I would not be where I am, a digital artist, a cartoonist, a web and graphic designer and social media strategist, if it hadn’t been for that Mac. I wasn’t completely in love with computers until that one. And that one changed my life. So I, much like many people I work with and many people sharing their own stories, have an entire career to thank Steve Jobs for. Oh and Pixar. Holy crap, Pixar. Thank you, Steve, for Macs, iPhones, pretty little gadgets, and some of the best movies in history.

I’m seriously thinking about getting an iDream tattoo somewhere. iDream of [Apple logo]. We’ll see. Thanks for everything, Mr. Jobs. RIP.

So if you hadn’t heard, Snailbird recently made it into the popular online magazine Mashable. Now we’ve been featured in quite a few online articles and showcases, but I think it’s a safe bet that Mashable is the biggest and most well-read site that has given us a few visitors. And not just a few – our visitors and hits have gone through the roof! Thank you Mashable! Interested in the article? You can find Snailbird featured in 20 Resources for Displaying Twitter Updates. Check it out, comment, and adore our cute little twitter bird!