It kind of crept up on us, but it’s that time of year again!  Kathy and I have been working diligently to finish up projects before we take our holiday break starting tomorrow, December 23rd through Friday, January 1st. We’ll be back in the office on Monday, January 4th, ready to rock n’ roll in 2010.

We’ve been incredibly busy this year—not only with amazing clients, but Kathy gave birth to a beautiful baby boy last July, which has kept her pretty busy away from the office as well.  We worked with a lot of great clients this year and have more lined up for 2010.  We are booked through March, but we are accepting requests for Spring.  We’ve got quite a few on our list for meetings in January for Spring projects already, so if you’re interested, we recommend submitting your request for proposal at your earliest convenience. One of us will contact you as soon as we can in January to schedule a phone meeting to discuss your project in more detail so we can prepare your estimate.  But please do fill out the request as thoroughly as you can.

What else is on the docket for the Moxie Girls in 2010?  A brand new site for one!  After seven years together, we’ve had several incarnations of this site and next to the flight attendant Moxie Girls, this may be our favorite yet.  We’re very excited to expand our boutique business in 2010 to offer more services to provide our clients with an even more multifaceted Moxie experience. 

If you’re looking for a last-minute gift for the new blogger in your life, we heard there’s a book you can buy….   Pick up The IT Girl’s Guide to Blogging with Moxie by… well, us, of course! You can snag it at your local Borders, Barnes & Noble or on Amazon.  You can still get it in time for Christmas!

Kathy and I would like to take this opportunity to wish you and yours a very safe and fabulous holiday season. We’ll catch you on the flipside!  Look out 2010!

• 1 1/2 parts Absolut Vodka
• 1 part Hiram Walker Gingerbread Liquer
• 1/2 part Kahlua
• 1 /2 part Milk
• Garnish: whipped cream, nutmeg

Combine ingredients in a shaker with ice. Shake vigorously and strain into a martini glass. Garnish with whipped cream and a shake of nutmeg.

Recipe and photo courtesy of one of our favorite cocktail sites, CocktailTimes.com

This is just a note to wish you and yours a wonderful Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanzaa, Festivus, Solstice, what have you…

We will be taking the remainder of the year off to recharge our batteries for the fabulous projects we have scheduled for the New Year and will be returning to the office on Monday, January 5th to kick start 2009. Kathy and I both are so grateful for the amazing clients we’ve had the opportunity to work with this year, along with all the cool people kind enough to hang out on our waiting list.  Thank you for your business!  And if we haven’t worked with you yet, we look forward to doing so soon.

Happy Holidays and a safe New Year!

xo

• 2 cups red wine
• 1 cup vodka
• 1/4 cup spiced rum
• 1/2 cup Ocean Spray Ruby Tangerine Grapefruit Juice Drink, chilled
• 2 cups Ocean Spray Cran-Raspberry Raspberry Cranberry Juice Drink, chilled
• 1/2 cup green or red grapes, sliced in half
• 1/4 cup fresh cranberries
• 1 lemon, sliced
• 1 lime, sliced
• 1 orange, sliced
• 1 apple, sliced
• 1 cup sparkling water or club soda

Combine wine, vodka, spiced rum and juices in a punch bowl. Add fruit and chill. Add sparking water just before serving. Makes approximately 10 5-ounce servings.

I know everyone is preparing for their holiday traditions and office parties so a bowl full of cranberry punch might ease everyones holiday stress.  Especially if they aren’t done shopping!  I like to freeze juice in ice cube trays to keep this kind of concoction cold longer and the spirits higher.  Enjoy your holidays everyone!  Cheers!  *spikes*

(Recipe & photo courtesy of Cocktail Times, our favorite mixology website!)

• 1 1/2 parts Grey Goose vodka
• 1 part peppermint schnapps
• 1/2 part simple syrup
• 1/2 part cream
• Garnish: Candy cane or peppermint patty

Mix all ingredients in a cocktail shaker filled with ice. Shake vigorously until the outside of the shaker is frosted and beaded with sweat. Strain into rocks glass filled with crushed ice. Garnish with candy cane or peppermint patty.

Ok, so I’m not loving the name, but the recipe sounds good… if you’re one for creamy drinks. I generally am not, but I’d give this a go. I had a great peppermint martini at Bing Crosby Lounge called a “White Christmas” — this kind of reminds me of that.  Let us know if you try it!

(Recipe & photo courtesy of Cocktail Times, our favorite mixology website!)

We were remiss this year in offering up some of our holiday wallpapers.  If your desktop has that not-so-festive feeling, try one of these on for size!

Shameless plug: Have you picked up your copy of The IT Girl’s Guide to Blogging with Moxie yet this holiday season?  It makes a great gift!  Hint hint. HINT HINT.

Happy Holidays!

• 1 oz Monin gingerbread syrup
• 2 oz Bacardi Big Apple rum
• 2 oz apple juice
• splash of lemon juice

Place 1/2 cup of simple syrup and 4 tablespoons of graham cracker crumbs on separate plates. Dip outside rim of martini glass into simple syrup, then into graham cracker crumbs several times to ensure coverage. Set aside. In a cocktail shaker, combine rum, gingerbread syrup, apple juice and lemon juice. Shake with ice in a cocktail shaker and strain into rimmed martini glass. Garnish with red apple slice.

Doesn’t that sound delicious?  Yum!  This recipe is courtesy of our favorite cocktail site, CocktailTimes.com!

It’s that time of year when the bell-ringers are out, the smell of pine trees fills the air and people will cut you for the last Thomas the Train, but it’s also a time for giving. And we think you should give Blogging with Moxie for the holidays this year.  We’re very subtle like that. 

We also have some great announcements!  We’ve received wonderful reviews on Amazon and the book has been doing steadily well!  The fine folks at Expression Engine offered up an adorable video review for their readers and several bloggers have shared their thoughts both on Amazon and on their personal blogs.  Our publicist CJ has also beenbusily pimping us (we love her!) and on December 19th in the evening, Kathy and I will be appearing on the Derek & Romaine Show on Sirius Channel 109.  Tune in and listen!  We’ll also try to get a transcript or a recording of the interview to post here, as well.

HOLIDAY HOURS: For the holidays and because we are working diligently to roll out many new internal projects we’ve been working on before the New Year, we will be CLOSED from December 19th - January 2nd. We really need these two weeks for administrative and year-end wrap-up, and like you, we wish to spend time with our loved ones for the holidays. We appreciate your consideration and will respond to inquires sent during that time on our return in the order in which they were received.

We are booking for the first quarter of 2008 right now and we’re wading through a stack of inquiries that came in over the last week or so. January is almost booked solid for me, though Kathy may still have some openings. We will also be out of the office March 6-10 for SXSW Interactive in Austin, TX. — just a heads up. Our schedules fill up fast and we are doing our best to respond to all of the requests in our inbox as quickly as possible.    We didn’t forget you!

If you are interested in having us design your blog or small business website, please fill out a Design Questionnaire. If you submit a request for a quote without completing a questionnaire, you will just receive an email from us asking you to please fill it out, so if you’re serious about working with us, please take a few moments to fill that out… yes, even the bit about the budget and timeline. Thanks!

I hope everyone has a wonderful, safe and joyous holiday season.

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 where 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!

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.