What the?

Valentine’s Day is this Sunday?

THIS Sunday?

OK, don’t panic. Take a deep breath and check out this Valentine e-kit complete with suggestions, links and tips – created for all those who’ve left their Valentine’s Day preparations until the last minute.

Or forgotten entirely.

Print your own card

If you’re feeling crafty, make one of the cards below. Just click your favourite design, print the pdf, cut along the (very pale) dotted lines and and make your own Valentine’s Day card. Remember, you get bonus points for home-made these days and everyone loves getting something special in the mail. And why not find some nice paper to run through the printer for an extra lush look.

Send a Valentine’s e-card

If you don’t have time to send your Valentine’s Day card, you can send it as an e-card to anyone with an inbox.

	Print out your PDF
	Send it as an e-card

	Print out your PDF
	Send it as an e-card

	Print out your PDF
	Send it as an e-card

5 last-minute gift ideas

If grabbing a bunch of flowers from the local servo isn’t your style, here are a few fun (and fast) ideas for Feb 14.

1. Magazine subscription.
   Nip down to the local newsagent, pick up a magazine and arrange the subscription online.
2. Handpicked flowers.
   They’re more personal than a store-bought bunch. Tie ‘em up with some twine for a home-made look.
3. Heart shaped cookies.
   Spend a couple of hours baking your own and you’ll really get into the good books. Here are some of our favourite recipes.
4. Book of poetry.
   Get to Borders this weekend, or tonight – most are open until 10 or 11pm.
5. Max Brenner Chocolates.
   Sure you can get a box of choccies from any old place. But Max Brenner chocolates are truly lush and come beautifully packaged so you don’t have to wrap them. Win-win.

Hope this helps you enjoy a happy (and relaxing) Valentine’s Day.

Adorable animation. Super creepy short film.

Detailed, engaging, warm and fuzzy animation – it’d be great to see more TV commercials using it.

Alma from Rodrigo Blaas on Vimeo.

Nobody on the internet is an island.

And because we’re a sharing kind of agency, here are three of the blogs we check out daily:

Copyblogger is essential reading for anyone who writes.

It describes itself as providing ‘copywriting tips for online marketing success’ but it offers far more than that. Not only are the tips useful, but the way each post is written is a demonstration of good, clear writing.

For more persuasive business writing, start reading.

Three of our favourite copyblogger posts:

Now featuring benefits

The art of the paragraph

Seven bad writing habits you learned in school

Again, this is a blog that is easy to read.

And damn inspiring!

Dave Trott illustrates his points about creativity and marketing with anecdotes from his life in advertising to create the type of posts you print out and stick on the wall.

So if you need inspiration, food for thought or a kick in the pants, you’ll find Dave’s posts here.

Three of our favourite Dave Trott posts:

Shake things up

If you’re creative, create

Objective – good, subjective – bad

Seth Godin is the American business author and entrepreneur who introduced the idea of permission-marketing. His posts are short and sweet and tend to get you thinking about your own business from a different perspective.

Three of our favourite Seth Godin posts:

Fear of bad ideas

How to protect your ideas in the digital age

Some people are better than others (this is the philosophy CUBED has embraced from Day One)

We recently tweeted about a fantastic social networking presentation found by our general manager, Troy.

The quote that stuck with us was “if you’re not on a social networking site, you’re not on the internet”. Wise words.

And the screen grab below is a good demonstration that this is true.

We get 10 hits on the first Google search page. Six of these are from our social networking sites – linked in, flickr and twitter. Looks like something’s working…

Of course, the longer you’re around and the more active you are online, the more often your business will show up in searches thanks to sites like these.

So if your business is also networking on the net, we’d love to meet you.

Just comment on this post with your twitter, facebook, flickr or linked in address, or drop us a line, and we’ll hook up with you -  wherever you are on the world wide web.

We’ve just seen these gorgeous typographic paper-cuts by UK illustrator Kate Forrester, who created 10 different illustrations for the John Lewis (UK department store) Christmas campaign.

The detail in these pieces is incredible.

And the hand-created typography gives the advertisements a warmth they wouldn’t otherwise have, making them incredibly engaging and impactful.

See more here.

An interesting video – both because of its content (the future of computing) and because of the elegantly simple animation.

It’s a particularly neat way of showing a timeline.

Trillions on Vimeo.

It’s probably not a true story, but this Picasso parable is a great reminder of the value of experience.

In any field.