April 18. Tuesday Night.

Hi Journey.

Monday was a day of client troubles, but we're into our website today, and I'm head-over-heels excited. Overall, the comments from the staff we're decent—no big fights.

Eddie showed up around Ten; Brady blew in a few minutes later, and the Bloom Team meeting started just shy of 10:30 . Shelly's designer friend, Mary Robertson, crafted a splendorous graphic design for the site. Of course Shelly told her how much I love Cobalt Blue, so she garnished the site with just the slightest fragrance of that wonderful color. Still, the overall design is actually rather light on graphics, with just enough white space to make you feel like you are in a room that seems a bit bigger than it actually is because there's plenty of space between the furniture and the walls.

Journey, you'd be amazed at how much of our home design work is actually removing something—pulling out a coffee table and replacing it with a single accent table in between a couple of recliners to gain a needed foot and a half of space; or swapping out an end table and attendant lamp beside a couch with some focused overhead lighting.

Dana is aces at walking her clients through what she calls the flow of the room. She diagrams out each piece of furniture's footprint—pretty standard—but then she pushes a step beyond, tracing the route each family member takes as they go about their tasks in the room. It's a technique that works especially well for areas that are shared by several people. Dana hates—loathes—when people come anywhere near bumping into an end table or the corner of a couch. I've watched her agonize over six inches in a Great Room, desperately trying to pull together the look the client wants, and yet maneuvering the space to make sure the client's sixteen year old son won't clip himself mid-thigh every time he races by the couch to turn on the TV.

And so Eddie toured us through the brand new Crystal Designs website.

“The flow is great,” Dana said. “Now, as long as we don't jam up all this scrumptious space with a bunch of extra copy….” She winked at me as her voice trailed off. I feigned shock that she might suggest such a thing, and was about to rebut, but Eddie beat me to it.

“We'll work that in so it's not overbearing.” He smiled at her. Of course, he'd been checking her out non-stop since we all sat down for the meeting in Tethered Helium. He was trying to be discreet, but I've watched Eddie rapid-scan enough waitresses to know what he likes, and Dana is definitely to his taste.

Page 2.