The Perfect Holiday Gift for Women with Moxie!

Well, it’s been about 6 weeks now, but our book is finally out and available both online and in stores.  The IT Girl’s Guide to Blogging with Moxie debuted to a great response and it only gets better.  It’s been in the top 10 of blogging books on Amazon several weeks in a row and we think it would make a perfect, reasonably-priced addition to anyone’s holiday wish list.

If you’ve recently hired us to build a blog for you, you’ve recently started blogging or you just aren’t sure

to start, pick up our book, The IT GIrl’s Guide to Blogging with Moxie.  We share the ins and outs of setting up your blog for the first time, the pros and cons of various blogging tools as well as dish on how to get the most from your blog.  We even include great beauty tips, cocktail ideas and relaxation goodies to keep things lively.

And of course, everything is delivered in our usual trademark style, full of fun and cheeky humor. Check out Amazon for our latest reviews, along with our Flickr group of happy Blogging with Moxie owners.

We hope you’ll consider adding The IT Girl’s Guide to Blogging with Moxie to your library!

Happy Holidays!

Shaking Things Up

With all the book stuff going on, we’ve kind of let this site simmer on the back burner for a bit.  Now that we’re approaching our final edits on Blogging with Moxie, we’re ready to start thinking about the future!  We have a lot of plans for the Moxie Girls over the summer and into the holiday season. We hope you’ll stop by from time to time to see what’s new.  Since we’ve been so quiet, you may wonder what we’ve been up to…

Kathy put together a fabulous site for virtual assistant (VA), Mia Chambers.  Her company, Acumen VA, was looking for a new logo, as well as a completely overhauled website using a green and purple color palette.

Kathy also did this very traditional design for return client, Athenian Properties.  For their business, they requested a more “gothic architecture” style with minimal color, which Kathy delivered in an elegant, sophisticated format.

Brandi Baldwin wanted a fun design with a sexy blonde woman and lots of

for her home bakery business in Wyoming, Brandi Bakes!. Brandi definitely wanted “more Anna Nicole, less Martha Stewart” and requested the popular palette of pink and brown.

FashionJunkie was one of the biggest projects we’d worked on to date.  Utilizing lots of illustrations by Micho Illustrations, the client Dara Fleischer requested a bold design with lots of color and action.  This site utilizes lots of bells and whistles and features a variety of scripts, plug-ins and modules.

Wifeville, the online wife-wear boutique created by Jen Gorman, was a bright, cheery design project with a whimsical concept. This project was design-only and developed by a another firm.

It’s a rare opportunity that I get to meet my clients, but I did get the pleasure of meeting Carol Flake at our 2006 SXSW Panel.  She hired us to create a logo and an inviting design for their woman-centric financial website, Woman with Portfolio.  This project was completed in summer 2006, but the client is still finalizing a launch date.

Whew!  So, in addition to a book and a handful of small projects, this is what we’ve been doing with our time.  We also are working on a complete overhaul of this website (including pre-designed exclusive blog templates and small business website templates for those of you looking for instant gratification), as well as the impending launch of our Moxie Girls website which will feature so much cool stuff, I don’t even know where to begin.

And, of course, don’t forget to grab your copy of The IT Girl’s Guide to Blogging with Moxie available for pre-order now from Amazon.  It’s been selling like hotcakes (or so we’re told) so make sure to get in on the action!

Moxie Girls Asked to Author the 1st Book in a New Series!

Kathy and I have finally been given the green light to announce the Big Secret we’ve been keeping for months.  If you haven’t figured it out yet… we’re writing a book!  *cue the confetti*

Late last year, we were approached by Wiley Publishing, the fine folks who put out the “for Dummies” instructional book series.  On recommendation from our colleague Susie Gardner (who I had the pleasure of sharing a panel with at SXSW in 2006), we were contacted by one of their acquisitions editors (Hi Melody!) about authoring the first book in a brand new series they’re launching called The IT Girls’ Guides.

The series is a technical instruction series with “girlfriends” conversational style.  It’s perfect for the savvy woman who’s interested in learning more — in our case, about blogging, podcasting, blog design and the hottest trends for women in the blogiverse!  Action-packed with all the juicy content you want and very little of the dry geek speak that bores you to tears.  Toss that waterproof mascara, ladies because The IT Girls’ Guide to Blogging with Moxie will be hitting a bookseller near you (and Amazon!) in Fall 2007.

So there it is, the cat’s outta the bag!  For more information, keep an eye on our site for more details as they develop!

Happy Holidays to You and Yours!

This year has been incredible on so many levels.  We’ve experienced a great deal of growth in 2006 that required cat-like reflexes!  We learned a lot about what to do (and what not to do!).  We also experienced growing pains that somewhat smarted, but one can’t complain about growth, right?  Yay for that, we say! 

We still can’t discuss the most exciting thing to happen to us this year (soon!), but I’ll touch on some of the highlights. In 2006, we…

• ... garnered a full 30-second glowing testimonial on Air America’s Majority Report from our fabulous client, David T. Harris, which totally made us make dolphin-like girl noises and clap a lot.
• ... were asked to participate on a panel of esteemed judges for the Six Apart Style Contest.
• ... flew to Austin, TX for SXSW Interactive 2006 and participated on a panel called “How to Make $$ with Your Blog Design Skills” (listen to our podcast!), which made the Honor Roll for best panels.
• ... were interviewed and featured by the fine folks at pMachine.
• ... were each interviewed by Six Apart Pro Network.
• ... participated in a charity fundraiser for our client, Hot Sauce Blog, by designing a label for his signature hot sauce. $5.00 from every bottle purchased went to the American Cancer Society.
• ... were featured on Designers-Who-Blog.com (thanks, Cat!)
• ... supported and participated in the 2006 Boobiethon!
• ... had two (not one, two!) of our Moxie Signature Cocktails featured as Drink of the Day on Extra Tasty.
• ... became a registered trademark (well Moxie Design Studios℠ did! — ® status is processing).

and last, but not least…

• ... welcomed a new Moxie tot — Kathy’s gorgeous (and I do mean gorgeous) son, Reilly (a.k.a. Mr. Poop, which is what I call him).  I could eat that boy with a spoon, I tell you.

Amidst all that, we also managed to accomplish quite a bit of work, completing projects for Chick Chat Radio, The Panama Gourmet, Oh! The Oxygen Network, Mommycast, Architexture Studios, Darby Creek Dog Bakery, madTV-regular Crista Flanagan, Legal Mojo, and author Paula Schmitt, just to name a few!

We are so grateful for all of our patient and wonderful clients, some of whom have been with us since the beginning, some of whom are welcome additions to our Moxie family.  We wish each of you a beautiful, healthy and happy holiday with your loved ones, whatever holiday it is that you choose to celebrate.  May 2007 bring you peace.

And lots of martinis.   Merry Christmas.

Moxie Makes the Honor Roll!

SXSW Coordinator, Hugh Forrest, emailed an announcement that “How to Make $$ with Your Blog Design Skills” made the “SXSW Honor Roll” of best panels.  Wahoo!

This means, to paraphrase, that after processing all of the panel feedback forms from this year’s event, the panel we were involved with made the so-called “Honor Roll.”  Our panel tallied an average score of 4.0 or above (on a 1 to 5 scale) on the feedback forms submitted by attendees at the end of our session. 

How encouraging! I know that we are interested in participating again, so this has given us experience to grow from. We look forward to both being able to attend SXSWi 2007.  Thanks to all who attended and voted for our panel!