So often we focus on what’s in the envelope, we forget the envelope itself. But this collection embraces the envelope as a creative form. Devised by a group of talented designers, these unique handmade envelopes come in all shapes and sizes. Some involve embellishing commercial envelopes with surface treatments, such as stamping. Others require folding techniques, and a few use unconventional and recycled materials. There are projects for packaging CDs, photographs, gift cards, and more.

Pushing the Envelope is packed with triumphs, wit, and wisdom gleaned from Harvey Mackay and the super-successful people he’s learned from over the years as a marketing whiz and bestselling author. The man who taught us how to “swim with the sharks” is back with a boatload of tips and techniques for becoming more savvy and successful in everything you do. To Harvey Mackay, “pushing the envelope” means pushing the boundaries and pushing yourself to maximize your advantage—to be better, faster, and smarter and to get the results you want, in business and in life. In his new book, Pushing the Envelope: All the Way to the Top, you’ll learn • How to get the order • The art of negotiating the best deals for you • The essential qualities all leaders possess • Fail-safe ways to move up the corporate ladder • Business titans’ secrets to achievement • The keys to balancing work and family • How to use laughter as a productivity tool • And much more! Humor. Honesty. Fairness. The ability to get others to see your vision. Judgment. Guts. Respect for the bottom line—and all the lines that lead to it. These are the values that have made Harvey Mackay the business and civic leader he is today. A born communicator, Mackay distills the lessons of his forty years in business into pithy, punchy chapters that cut to the heart of everyday problems and situations. As usual, Mackay has his trademark, no-nonsense lists, including: • 5 ways to ruin a good sales force • 11 questions to ask a job prospect • 10 New Year’s resolutions • 7 things not to do with a friend • 12 ways to ruin your next speech Both practical and entertaining, charged throughout with Harvey Mackay’s inimitable style, humor, and entrepreneurial wisdom, Pushing the Envelope puts the fun, the creativity, and the challenge back in business. Whether you’re at the top of your company or determined to get there, this is one business book that will earn your stamp of approval. Praise for Pushing the Envelope “What would our nation be without Minnesotans? Besides Post-it notes, the state has given us the sublimely American town, Lake Wobegon; the spectacularly American wrestler-turned-Governor, Jesse Ventura; and the quintessentially American businessman, Harvey Mackay.”—The New York Times “A refreshing delivery of advice.”—USA Today

Illustrated with real projects--successes and failures--undertaken by DEC, Ford, Hewlett-Packard, Eastman Kodak, and Chaparral, this insightful book details seven critical elements that manufacturing projects must have to succeed in product and process development. 51 line drawings.

Are your greeting card sales at a standstill? Do you want to move your sales beyond the local store to stores across the country? Have you thought about working with sales reps but have no idea where to begin? This is the book you've been waiting for. Finally, everything the small greeting card manufacturer needs to know about finding, recruiting and retaining a winning sales force can be found in this easy-to-read handbook. Written from both the manufacturer and sales rep perspectives, this nuts and bolts guide is full of industry information, sales tips and guidance for building successful and profitable rep relationships. Are you ready to push the envelope?

From Bill Yenne, author of the military histories Big Week and Aces High, comes the stirring true story of the Eighth Air Force in World War II. Barely a month after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the U.S. Army formed its Eighth Air Force, the first bomber command on either side to commit to strategic daylight bombing, with the goal of defeating the Third Reich from the air. The men of the Eighth paid the price in both lives and blood. Hit the Target introduces readers to those who made the Eighth Air Force the formidable juggernaut it soon became. Men of all ranks, from General Tooey Spaatz, the hard-driving founding commander, to Colonel Jimmy Doolittle, the hero who led the first air raid on Japan, to Maynard “Snuffy” Smith, the irascible first airman in Europe to be awarded the Medal of Honor. The story of the Mighty Eighth is told through these men, whose careers paralleled the early history of aviation and who helped to revolutionize airborne warfare and win World War II. INCLUDES PHOTOS “Bill Yenne scores another bull’s-eye with Hit the Target...This is a story everyone should know.”—Robert Bruce Arnold is the co-author of Wilderness of Tigers, A Novel of Saigon and grandson of the Air Force’s only Five Star General, Hap Arnold “The story of the mighty United States Eighth Air Force is one for the ages.”—Brian Sobel, author of The Fighting Pattons

After a day's work is finished, take a look around at your company. Do standard production processes and day-to-day operations leave you with loaded trash bins from the front office to the factory floor-and every place inbetween? Such "solid waste" does far more than squander resources and imperil the environment... it's undoubtedly eating up countless dollars of your profits. Corporations throughout the nation are learning to tame solid waste, by implementing improved management of materials. Preventing Waste at the Source demonstrates how more than 50 companies have effectively reduced solid waste throughout all departments-and achieved dramatic reductions in operating costs. Beginning with a strategic framework, readers can then zero in on wasteful practices affecting all aspects of a business. Paper reduction measures for administrative offices, for instance. Ways to minimize packing materials over in the shipping department, while still protecting the product. There's also steps where suppliers and customers can take part in waste minimization efforts. Case histories prove it can be done, to everyone's advantage. Researched and compiled by the Indiana Institute on Recycling, Preventing Waste at the Source offers practical, on-the-job assistance to environmental managers, plant managers, manufacturing and quality engineers. Put its techniques and real-life guidance to work. You'll save more than money: you'll help save the environment.

Finding meand Them: Stories of Assimilation is a collection of ten stories. They are autobiographical. They are nonfiction. They are fiction based on fact. Each story tells the authors life as an individual with or (fictional) without a disability. All of them find the author. They show different phases and challenges in his life, from rehabilitating from a head injury at age five to learning the logistics of an after-life. In ways that co-mingle genres, the stories in my book are related. There are central themes concurrent in all of them. Many of the stories are written from the perspective of someone growing up with an ambiguous disability. A theme is how I found the world to perceive me. Family is a theme. Wandering, exploration, the search for identity, are central themes in my stories. My book is learning to live (physically different). Its learning to love. Its learning what faith can do and whats offered in worlds we cant see. In Finding me and Them, Michael Amram shows his versatility as a writer, combining stories of fact and fiction, often with poetic lyricism, to tell the story of his life, a life he says is influenced by the disabilities caused when a distracted teen driver hit the then 5-year-old boy. In reality, its a life that reflects Amrams abilities his ability to see joy and sorrow in life, his ability to observe the ironies of life, his ability to appreciate that overcoming takes many forms. Amram blends humor and poignancy to engage readers as he portrays lifes simplest interactions as meaningful. Never preachy, each of the 10 stories in this collection teaches us something about living the fullest life we can. - Ellen Weingart, editor

Thirty years ago, three high school friends were closer than sisters, but a dark, emotional secret tore them apart. Now, back together at their high school reunion, each of them are tormented and haunted that their greatest fear will come to light. Renetta Jones' childhood had been anything but happy. After her mother walked out on them, Renetta was left to live with an unsympathetic father and her own insecurities. She fell for the first man to come along after high school, and spent years in an abusive marriage with a man named Vincent, who used her secret to control and punish her. That is, until he suffered an untimely stroke, under questionable circumstances. Phyllis Neville sacrificed everything for her career, including her marriage to a man she'll love forever, and a positive relationship with her adult daughter. But when she is passed over for the promotion of a lifetime, it's just the first thing to go wrong in her once perfect life as the past rears its ugly head. Freddie Palmer is bored by the routine that her life has become. Married thirty years to her husband, Don, the two of them have become empty-nesters and Freddie is anxious to start the next phase of her life. After meeting successful author, Bianca Hightower, at a local bookstore signing, Freddie decides to take her passion for reading to the next level and signs up for writing classes being taught by her new author friend. But Bianca sees potential in Freddie that transcends simply writing, and introduces her to the kinds of experiences a woman like Freddie never even knew existed. But when the past catches up to her, it becomes one more dark secret she's not sure she'll be able to keep. Tasha Darden has lived her life in foster care, and has finally gathered up the courage to try to find her birth mother. One of the three women holds the answers she seeks and she will stop at nothing until she gets them.

Lifelong athlete and sport enthusiast Dane Vemb loves nothing better than finding the back of the net with a puck or pounding over hills on his mountain bike, but one day, he wanders into a Bikram yoga studio. By the time he leaves the hot room, sweat soaked and inspired, he’s completely hooked and determined to master this new “sport.” Unlike most aspiring yogis, though, Dane’s not averse to a can of Red Bull or a puff of weed to enhance his spiritual and physical endeavours. Now and then, he even goes off to Peru on a quest to explore the visionary properties of ayahuasca. Early in his dedicated at-home and in-studio yoga practice, Dane comes to realize his 26 posture sequence has plateaued and sets out on a pursuit for answers to better depth in each of the postures. After a decade, he is given the intel from a ‘yoga whisperer,’ and with the same energy he uses to hustle his way down the ice playing hockey, Dane develops a balanced and much-improved practice. In this hilarious and insightful part memoir/ part-yoga manual, he wittily chronicles his physical and emotional journey into thriving rather than merely surviving. In a series of beautiful photos of his daughter Stephanie demonstrating yin postures and before-and-after shots of Dane measuring the gains in his own practice, readers are provided with a practical, step-by-step guide to a better yoga practice. But more importantly, they are gifted a blueprint for a happier, more creative, and fulfilled life. And they’ll be laughing every step of the way.