Christmas is OVER!

Whoo hooooo!  I've survived another Christmas at the Post Office!  I left early yesterday, have today, tomorrow and Monday off.  I'm planning on spending some time in the stamp room.  I have lots of things to play with since I ordered goodies from the preorder.  (I really LOVE being a Stampin Up! demo!)  I actually even ordered off the clearance rack and those will be here next week.  AND I have some energy and creative ideas to play with. So, come back soon and I will have some stuff to show you.

Ugh.. Christmas is coming....

Seems Christmas is coming early this year.  For those who don't know me, I work for the USPS.  Christmas is NOT my favorite holiday.  :)  I love what its about, I am just TIRED by the time it gets here.  My part time employee transferred to another office a week ago and I finally got someone new in my office today.  Its been a LONG week.  10 - 12 hour days and I'm tired already.  I was planning on having a card buffet this Sunday, but it is just not going to happen.  Sorry to those who were thinking about coming.  I will try and make a couple more posts with pictures before Dec, but it will pretty much be dark in here until Janurary and I have a chance to catch up. 

I have been a SU demo for  a year and have loved playing with all the goodies.  This year I plan to do more than being a hobby demo, so keep an eye on the blog.  :)  Planning some fun  classes and plan to add some card kits to the line up.  Have some requests?  Let me know...  Have a stamp set you have and want some ideas for it?  Just send me a comment or email and let me play...  :)

Just remember, December won't be a good time for me.  Expect answers in January. 

Stamp Camp/Card Buffet

Ok.  I am changing the format of the class this go around.  We will be doing a card buffet.  It's just what is sounds like.  I will have different cards for you to make and how many you make is up to you.  There is an 8 card minimum with the base fee of $15.  You are more than welcome to make more at $2.00 per each additional card.  I will be posting a few pictures of some of your choices, but not all.  :)  Have to have some little surprises in life, right? 

I've scheduled it for Sunday, November 20 at 3 pm.  Space is limited in my little house, so let me know early if you will be coming.

We are officially Empty Nesters...

Yep, the last little chicky left the nest.  I'm sure he would hate the fact I just called him a chick.  :)  He will live.  But, since he doesn't read my blog, he will never know.  I thought that since his bedroom was in the basement (part of the garage), my husband would take over his room.  Last weekend, my wonderful, thoughtful and all around pretty incredible husband told me he was going to fix it up for me.  My very own craft room.  Yes, its true.  This is what it looked like last weekend when I started moving stuff in. 

Wow!  What a MESS!

So, thats the quick tour.  We found the desk a few weeks ago at a flea market.  My DH asked them how much they wanted for it and they said make an offer.  He offered $40 and we ended up getting it for $55.  I think we did really well with $55.  It has a real leather top and is a dream to rubber stamp on.  I absolutely love it.

I've put away most of the stuff you see all over the floors.  Then yesterday, my husband says lets go to Lowes.  Oh no.. not Lowes.  This is what I ended up with after the trip.



 No, silly, not the Big Shot!  The shelves.  He bought wood and stain and made me a shelf.  For WHAT you are thinking.  Well, lookie here.

 It holds all my punches except my edge punches.  I've rearranged it a dozen times and I realized the last time that if I moved all the medium punches between the feet, I could move my older style of punches to the top.  I will have to take another picture.  Isn't this a wonderful present?!  Now I can play with my punches without having to unstack a bunch to get to the one I want.  I'll take some more pictured when I get more organized, but this is soooo much better than what I was doing before.

I have spent most of the day in the craft room.  I really need a name.  It's obviously not a Man Cave, can it be a woman cave?  No, thats not right either.  Give me some ideas.  :)

This is my card for the day.  I think my little room in the basement is working pretty good for ideas.  Both this card and the thank you card I used for swaps for Louisville were made there. 

It was a good day.  :)

thanks with gently falling

OHHHH... I really like this stamp set!!  It's Gently Falling from the Holiday Mini Catalog.  I used the Spice Cake Designer Paper and the First Edition Specialty Paper for the backgrounds.  Aren't they pretty?  The button is actually a paper button from the button's #5 Sizzlits die.

So, tomorrow I will be going to Louisville KY for a day or two.  I get to go to the Stampin Up Regional.  Whooo hoooo!  Yea, I'm pretty excited about it.  The above card will be my swap card.  I made a BUNCH of them.  I used three of the four buttons from the die and tied each one differently.  It was kinda tough.  But, I think it was worth it. 

Recipe for the card: 

 Paper:  Spice Cake DSP, First Edition Specialty Paper, More Mustard CS, Cajun Craze CS, Very Vanilla CS

Ink:  Cajun Craze, More Mustard

Stamp Sets:  Gently Falling, Sincere Salutations

Accessories:  Decorative Label punch, white bakers twine, Buttons #5 Sizzlit, sponge daubers

Have a great weekend!

Hi!

whhhh... whhhhhh... whhh..  cough cough.. sorry.  Don't mind me.  Just blowing off a little dust from the blog.  Where on EARTH does time go??
I did a Fall bazaar today.  It was the same one I did last year and it was just as bad.  After having such a bad time last year, I told myself I wouldn't do it again.  I did it again.  Sigh... I don't learn quickly, do I.  I didn't even bring my camera this year.  My darling daughter came with me again this year and she did take a picture or two on her phone.  If she sends it to me, I will put it here.  Since I really didn't sell anything, I will take some pictures of what I made and post them, also.

Next Friday I will be in Louisville KY at the SU! regional.  I am SO excited.  I've never been to a regional, and I hear they are pretty fun.  My upline is going with a few other demos in the Dayton area.  Mary, my upline, is actually one of the presenters.  HOW exciting is THAT??!!

I will be posting some pictures of some cards in the next couple days.   My pictures library is kind of messed up right now.  I have GOT to get organized...  :)

September 11

It's been awhile again since I've been posting.  Been just a busy summer.   I just mainly wanted to post today since it's 9-11.  10 years after the World Trade Centers came down.  I remember hearing my mother talk about all she remembered when President Kennedy was shot and I could never understand what could cause such an emotional response.  I fully understand now and I pray that my children don't have something in THEIR lifetime that affects them this way.  I was at work when the first plane hit the first tower.  Of course, I thought it was a terrible accident... until the second plane came in.  It bothers me even today to watch the coverage.  It's been an emotional day for me.  No, I knew no one in the towers and no one I know had anyone there either.  Why is it so emotional for me?  I just can't understand the mentality of a group of people that have no respect for human life.  Everytime I see the pictures and hear the stories, it breaks my heart. 

I have no pictures to post today.

oops....

June 12... huh.. has it been that long??   Its not that I haven't been doing anything with rubber stamps, I have.  I guess I just really didn't realize how much WORK a blog is!!  Maybe not the blog itself, but all the picture taking and downloading and cropping... sigh..  Awww.. quit yer whinin'!!  On to what I've been playing with!

This was a card I made for my daughter's boyfriend's brother (ok, now THAT sounded confusing!).  He is in the middle east and is turning 21 at the end of the month.  His mom sent out a request for birthday cards for him since he is serving our country in a FAR away country on one of the biggy birthdays. 

This card was harder than I thought it should be.  I didn't think that putting 3 panels on a card would take a lot more hand/eye coordination!  Oh, well, let me tell you it DOES!  The paper is retired.  I don't have my catalog with me at my chair, so I'm not listing all the supplies.  If anyone out there is interested, let me know and I will dig everything back up.  :)

Have a great night!

Another Card Challenge

I mostly like clean and simple cards.  I probably do better at clean and simple cards.  Ok, so I really stuggle with things that AREN'T clean and simple.  When my upline and I were working on some card designs for the Operation Write Home event we did back in October, she sent me a link to a blog for this type of cards.  This week, I decided to do one of their card challenges.  I'm not sure I like the card I did, but I am going to enter the challenge anyway.  : )   Clean and Simple Blog

My entry: 


I'm thinking ... it's crooked.  Hmmm....

It's kind of different for a birthday card, isn't it.  Well, some of my friends and family are creeping up to the big 50 year thing that seems to bother so many people. So I made it in black.  hahaha...  (I'm not there YET, so I don't know if it will affect me.  I honestly don't think it will.  I mean, geez.  It's just a number.)  Anyway, I also hate to throw stuff away and decided to use the little teardrop shapes that punch out of the Blossom Bouquet punch that is in the summer mini.  I scooped them up, used tweezers to hold the tiny little pieces, glued them, then stuck 'em down in no apparent pattern.  I ran the black piece thru the Big Shot with the Square Lattice EF.  Used the (retiring) Spiral Border Punch on the edge.  The sentiment is just the Decorative Label punch, the 1 3/4 x 7/8 oval punch and the (retiring) 1 3/8 x 5/8 oval punch.  Finished it off with three Basic Pearls.   Am I using enough retiring stuff??  Probably will be seeing a LOT of it for the next couple weeks. 

I think I really like the look of the teardrops embossed into the paper.  Not so sure it looked exactly like what was bouncing around in my mind, but thats ok.  I do that a lot!  And now, I have a 'reason' to keep the leftover stuff from the new punch.  :)  I don't have the doily one.  It looks like it might have some fun stuff to keep, too.  *I am NOT a hoarder!

Cribbage and Crystal Effects

This was supposed to be done yesterday, but while I was trying to download some pictures, Blogger decided it was time to do some maintenance.   Geez... I was doing important stuff here!  :)


My husband and I play cribbage.  I'm not very good, but he puts up with me.  Our biggest problem is remembering who's crib it is.  While we were in Florida, we came up with a way to keep track.  We had a lotion bottle that we would pass back and forth.  Whoever had the bottle, got the crib.  Last night we were playing here and there was no bottle of lotion, so this is what we came up with.Isn't he CUTE?

Don't they look alike??

Ok.  Enough of that.  I have a couple of things to show you tonight!  The first is the new In Colors.  I hope you can see well enough. 

The top right one is the pool party color.  I like them....

This is something else I learned how to do.  It goes by many names, but what it IS, is crystal effects with re-inkers.  Punch an image with your favorite SU! punch.  Place the punched paper on a non stick surface like waxed paper.  Cover the whole thing with Crystal Effects.  Put a few drops of re-inker of your choice of colors in a lid (keep them seperate).  Take a straight pin and touch it to the first drop of ink just to get ink on the pin.  Touch it to the CE.  Add a couple other colors.  Don't do too much or it will look muddy.  Drag the pin thru all the colors to swirl it around.   It's really pretty.  :) There are three colors in this one.  All new colors.  Oh and by the way... THANKS BUFFY...  Better directions here!

Get readyfor the new catalog and some pretty cool new colors!

Today I was playing with the new In Colors from SU!  The first time I saw them I thought they were pretty nice.  Now I've decided that the ink colors are WONDERFUL!  I think I can show them, but I want to make sure I really can.  They have SO many rules on what can be shown before the release date.  I know I can TELL you what they are.  Maybe tomorrow I can post pictures.  The bummer about that is that you can't really see the colors the way they are. 
Wisteria wonder - a light purple color
Calypso Coral - its kind of a orangy color (don't get me wrong... its purdy)
Island Indigo - looks a lot like Not Quite Navy, but maybe with a bit more green
Pool Party - aqua-ish
Lucky Limeade - hmmm.. well.. lime green but maybe just a little darker

I really like them.  I wasn't quite certain about the Pool Party, but I used it on just Whisper White card stock and yummy!  Maybe I will keep them!  I will look over some rules and maybe post a little something tomorrow with the colors.  I didn't order any of the pre-order stamp sets this go around.  I'm waiting on a BIG order July 1st so I can get my hands on the new HOSTESS  sets!  LOVE them! 

Did I tell you I LOVE the new colors?  Oh, well, just in case you missed it the first time (or two!).  Until tomorrow...

the taste of Cincinnati

So, my husband decided we should go to Cincinnati and enjoy the Taste of Cincinnati this weekend.  Have any of you gone to an event like this?  We went to Chicago last year; Dayton has one every year and this year, was Cincinnati's turn to host the Cosca Family.  :)  We were 3/4 of the way down when I realized I didn't have my camera.  DANG IT!!  DH wouldn't turn around and get it, so NO picts for YOU!  :) 

Today, tho, I worked on some stuff, so even tho there isn't stuff from Cincinnati, I do have other things to share:

I REALLY like the Pretty Postage Stamp set and the Postage Punch.  I used the new Triple Layer Punch-Blossom Bouquet with the Pretty Postage set and Punch.  I also pulled out the Newsprint DPS for the layer.  Don't you LOVE the ribbon??!!  My wonderful upline Mary Brown has a tutorial for it here.   I am SO not a ribbon user, so she has made my life SO much easier!

This was my other project for the day:

This is me and my wonderful husband of almost 22 years.  Isn't he handsome??  I love the picture on the bottom.  My oldest daughter took that while we were walking under the pier at Cocoa Beach.  I didn't know she took the picture until much later.  I was talking, my husband was smiling and listening (he does that SO well) and we were just enjoying each others company.  This is one of the scrapbook pages from Florida that someday will be done and shared.  :) 
Almost all was done with Stampin UP! product.  I did have to use an un-named die cut machine,  because I don't have much in the way of Big Shot Alphabets.  Oh, I  WILL, but not yet.  The 12x12 main sheet was also from somewhere else, but its on my list of things to buy. 

Have a great Memorial Day Weekend!  My daughter (the one who look the picture) is in the Air Force, so make sure you thank ALL weekend warriors or all who serve our WONDERFUL country!!!  Even if you don't agree with all that happens here, you have to agree that there is no better county on the planet!

Back and ready to play

Whew.  I think I've discovered that a two week vacation may NOT be good for me.  Well, a LONGER one would be the best, but its REALLY hard to get back in the swing of work and actually having a house to clean and take care of and all the other little things in life.  sigh.  Ok, it was the best vacation EVER!
But.. I really missed my stamping stuff.  I took some with me, and wouldn't you know, I forgot the blocks to stamp with.  Yea, I brought everything else I could think of (at the risk of really irritating my DH), but forgot the blocks.  So, no stamping.  The last week has just been catching up of 'stuff.'  

This card is the swap card that should have been mailed by the 6th.  OOPS.  :)

This is the inside--under the vellum.  I used the "D" block and just inked it up with Crumb Cake ink, then stamped the 'invoice/passenger list' stamp over the top. 

Since I used such dark paper, I added a layer of Very Vanilla and used the anchor to finish it up.  Whatcha think?  I absolutely LOVE this stamp set!

Paper:  Not Quite Navy, Very Vanilla, Vellum Card Stock
Ink:  Crumb Cake, Early Espresso, Not Quite Navy, Night of Navy, Basic Grey, Cherry Cobbler
Accessories:  Night of Navy Brads, Bakers Twine--Early Espresso

On Vacation!

Taking two weeks off from work and spending a little time in sunny Florida!  Loving life, but only have internet access if we leave the complex and go hang at Barnes And Noble or something like that.  Spending LOTS of time at the pool, so car trips aren't common.  :)  Be back the first week of May and will tell you ALL about it.  Should give me a lot of fun pictures to scrapbook with.  Maybe I will post some of those, too.  Be a first on the blog for those.  I'm not REAL good at it, but I try. 

Its in the 90's today and I REALLY like it!

New Summer Mini Goodies!!!

Whooo hoooo!   Don't you just LOVE to get something like this on your front porch!  It's like Christmas everytime I start tracking the UPS box.  The only thing better would be if it was a USPS box.  Yes, well, I'm biased.  :)



Ohhhh and then you OPEN it and see all this!!  I LOVE Stampin Up!  Can't wait to be able to spend some time with all my new goodies!  Will be posting stuff soon.  I promise!  Got some fun stuff running about my head with the new Postage punch.  Yes, I KNOW.. I'm biased, but its a COOL punch!!  Don't know if you can see the StampinUp Logo in the back, but it's now on my truck.  Will have to post picts of that too.  :)

My first sketch challenge

I am doing my very first sketch challenge today.  I've been thinking about it for awhile, but just wasn't sure how to go about it.  So, I chose the Challenge at Create with Connie and Mary.   This is my card:

The base is Daffodil Delight.  The first layer is whisper white and I ran it thru the Big Shot with the Texture Plate (I think its called Daisy.)  The stamp set is Peace Within.  I used LOTS of Stampin Write Markers (too many to try and list them all out.)  The punches are 5 Petal Flower, Jewelry Tag and Scallop Trim.  The piece of paper under the main image is from the SAB Ice Cream Parlor Designer Paper.  The ribbon is retired -- Pumpkin Pie striped grosgrain ribbon.  This was fun.   I may have to try other ones.  :)







Something other than stamping!

I was really busy yesterday.  My Darling Husband decided we needed to work on the front of the house.   We bought the bench and flower pots last year and put flowers on them.  We liked it so much, we (he) decided we would do it again.  After MANY hours of looking for just the right ones, this is what we found.  

It was a fun day, but I can multi-task.  THIS is what I was thinking about.  I put it together this morning.   I really like it.  Its kind of clean and simple, and it's also colors I don't normally use.

My husband (who I make look at all of my cards and scrapbook pages!)  thinks the pearl on the sentiment doesn't do it.  What do you think?

Paper:  Crumb Cake, Chocolate Chip, Paper Patterns/In Color Blushing Bride
Ink:  Chocolate Chip
Accessories:  Beautiful Wings embosslit, Scallop Rectangle Clearlit, Basic Pearl jewels, Eyelet border , Sponge
Stamp Set:  Elements of Style

Grab Bags and a new promotion!

Stampin Up is SUCH and awesome company!!  Have you ever looked at the Clearance Rack on the web site?  Go here and play!  Clearance Rack  If you have a designer paper addiction   love like I do, it is a wonderful place to shop!  Even though its not considered current, I may just have to spend some more money there.  They are also having Grab Bags.  What an interesting idea.  Not sure what is all on there, but it looks like you can get some fun goodies at a seriously reduced price.

Now, how about this?

And now you know why I don't blog.  LOL!!  Sorry for the blurry pictures.  I'm sure its because I took them off the SU Demo website and made them bigger.  The stamp set and paper is a sneek peek into the new Idea Book and Catalog that will come out in July.  As long as you buy $20 worth of goodies, you get the opportunity to buy this set and paper.

Four Frames Stamp Set


W: item 123440  $20.95
C: item 123442  $15.95

Paisley Petals Designer Series Paper

item 122367  $9.95

OR... you KNEW there had to be an or, right?  OR... host a workshop with me of  $350 before tax and shipping and the stamp set and paper is yours FREE.  This promotion is only good thru the end of the month, so get yours soon!

trying it again... :)

Ok, well, the first run didn't pan out, so we are going to try this again.  I will try to do better on the blog, so maybe, just MAYBE if anyone ever reads this, there will actually be something to read.  :)   Alas, tho, there will be no pictures tonight as it seems I have lost my adapter for the camera memory card.  I am absolutely sure it will be where I left it, unless one of the dogs had a little snack. 
I have been a Stampin Up demo for 9 months.  Wow!  I have done workshops, card classes in my home, a charity card making event with my upline and played with ALL kinds of cool new toys and paper.  It has been a great 9 months.  Maybe I will do it for another 9 months and see if maybe I like it.  :)
Soooo... I've been in a couple swaps these last few months.  One started back in November.  We mailed cards to 5 people once a month and in return got 5 cards back in the mail.  How fun to get some mail that is personal and beautiful.  The second swap was from a group I am involved with (on the outskirts, 'cuz I am not nearly as fun and funny as they are.)  We made cards and sent them to each of the members of the group.  A 'normal' swap would be to make 20 cards, send them to a 'host' and she would split them up and mail packets of cards to each member.  I think I like the individual cards the best.  As one of the group said, it was fun 'stalking' the mailman.  :)  I'm sure he enjoyed it too.