Welcome To Freckled And Fun

Sometimes life throws you a curve ball. Sometimes you need to start fresh and clean. This is one of those times in my life.

I was not planning to change my blogs and design work. I made a mistake by not going out and purchasing the domain names for Freckledfun.com and FreckledFunDesigns.com when I started blogging. I had no idea that when I started making blog banners and watermarks for friends, I would grow to love it. I had no idea that my blog would grow into a small business. I had no idea that I had to protect my name and the Freckled Fun name.

This past February, I inadvertently typed in Freckledfun.com and was directed to a fellow stamper's website. I was shocked. I typed in Freckledfundesigns.com and was immediately sent to the same website. My shock turned to anger when I realized who owned this website. Not only was it a fellow stamper, it was someone whom I have known for years from a website which I frequently visit.

This individual had purchased those two domain names with bad faith. I do not use those terms lightly. Although I did not have the copyright on Freckled Fun, I did choose the name Freckled Fun and Freckled Fun Designs for my blogs and had established those names as part of my creative identity. Those names had been mine for about 2 years when this woman purchased the domain names. There was nothing freckled or fun about her blog. It was merely a competitor in the blog banner business. Shame on me for not getting the websites initially, but
SHAME ON HER for trying to deceive people into believing that her website was Freckled Fun. Shame on her for trying to lure people to her website using the Freckled Fun and Freckled Fun dot com name.

There is so much information on Cybersquatting and Bad Faith domain name registration online (just do a google search on those keywords). It is pretty boring stuff. Despite my lack of legal background, I could clearly read online that what this person did was completely wrong and unethical. I attempted to contact this individual via email, phone and mail. I received a short, rude response via email and decided that I either had to spend thousands of dollars to copyright my name or spend a lot of time changing my Freckled Identity. I chose the latter. Why spend needless hours engaging in a battle which I will never win. This person is clearly out to hurt me and I will not engage in this ridiculous game any longer.

So FreckledAndFun was born as a collaborative effort. I consulted friends (thank you to all my friends online and in real life who let me run my ideas past them) and my family. My children think that this new name is perfect (although even this morning they asked why "that woman took Freckled Fun".) I needed to keep Freckled in the title (it's so ME) and I wanted to Keep Fun (because clearly my designs are fun).



I also am not deleting the old blogs, but there will be no more updates to either one. I will post a link to here on both blogs (in case you forget the new website). You can get to the blog by typing in either http://www.freckledandfun.com or http://freckledandfun.blogspot.com

I have a new feedblitz feed on the sidebar {please sign up for regular updates!} I will continue to tweak the blog here and there, but have come to the realization that I need only ONE blog. SIMPLIFY!!! I will clearly label whether the item is a graphic design, a stamping project or just generic family fun. You can easily click on the labels portion of the sidebar and see all the labels. Pricing for the design work will remain the same and I will keep that pricing information on the bottom of the blog for you to easily access.

I am also still continuing to stamp and hope to do that just as much or more in the future. I love stamping, it is what got me where I am now. I will always continue my passion for papercrafting. I will continue to serve as the Hostess for the Featured Stamper on Splitcoast Stampers. My gallery {myprecious} is updated there on a regular basis. I will still Demo for Stampin' Up! and design for Hanna Stamps!, Kitchen Sink Stamps and dabble with Scor-Pal!


I will also have a new FreckledAndFun logo. If you would like the HTML code for the new logo, send me an email at freckledandfun@gmail.com

You can reach me at freckledandfun@gmail.com with questions, comments, feedback.

Thank you for your support during this transition!