When I put shortcuts in my Quick Launch toolbar, I like to change the icon to something really appropriate, so I can find it quickly.

I know how to change the icon but only to an icon that's already in my machine, and they're scattered all over the place anyway.

Is there any way I could make a simple icon using visual basic that I could then access in the change icon window?

I create icons for Word and Excel macros all the time but I can't figure out how I could use one for this purpose.

Any suggestions?

You don't need Visual Basic.
Any decent graphics package such as paint.net will do.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms997636.aspx may be of interest.