Swaps, swaps and more swaps!!

Hello!  Told you I would be back! :)  One of the most fun parts of convention is the swapping! You get the opportunity to meet lots of new folks and see all kinds of amazing creative talent.   People make all sorts of things ranging from cards to lots of different 3-d items.  I participated in several organized swaps and  made oodles of swaps for general swapping.  I love the swapping!!  People swap all over the place!  It starts as early as the plane ride into Utah!  They swap in the airport and at the surrounding restaurants!  They swap while waiting in line at the Momento Mall and before General session! Lots of swapping happens at lunch and in hotel lobbies!  Fun, fun, fun!  Here are a few of the swaps I made to take with me this year:

This one was for a MAsculine card swap!  I made 100!!  50 in this color combo and...

50 in this one!

                                        

         (Sorry about the quality of the photo...poor lighting!)  This one was for general swapping!  I made 40 in this color and...

40 in this color combo.

Kept this one super simple!  Made 60 of these for general swapping!

Also, for general swapping!

This one was for an AWESOME swap!  It was a technique ATC swap!  When we were done we threaded all of them through a ring and wound up with an oodle of mini technique samples! I did the brick wall technique.  Lots of work, but totally worth the effort!

This one was for the Jammies swap! Really fun swap!  We all showed up in our jammies and played a game and then swapped over 50 cards!  It was a hoot! 

This may have been my favorite swap!  It was a punch art swap and I just love all things punch art!!  I made 42 of these little cow pages.  I punched out over 1600 pieces!!  Took me 5 solid days to make these between punching, gluing and sponging everything! 

A close up of my little cow! :)

There you have it! Swapping fun at it's best!  I wound up with some really beautiful swaps this year!  Love having all of the inspiration to draw from!

I will be back soonest with a few more Convention goodies to share with you and then I promise to get back to some fun projects!  It feels great to be blogging again.  I have really missed it!

Have a wonderful day!

Better late than never...!

Hello!  I am back!  Sorry to have gone missing, but I have been super, duper crazy busy with life and all of it's going's on!   Things have finally started to calm down some for me though so I am planning to get back to regular blogging again!  During my absence my family and I were busy, busy, busy... relocating!!  We moved to the beach!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   We have talked about doing it for a long time and so we finally took the plunge and just did it!   I am thrilled to say that I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE it here!!  I {{{HEART}}} the beach!!   It has been such a wonderful experience so far and I am really happy being here!  Also, on the big, hairy, crazy plus side my oldest kiddo moved along with us so my family is all back together again under one (beach-y!!) roof  for a while! (Happy sniffles!!) Since I am crazy about my kids and crazy about the beach it has been all win-win for me!!  Big, cheesy grin! :) Yay!!

Also, (there is more!!) I attended the Stampin Up! Convention in Utah!!  It was a wonderful, wonderful thing!!  This was my second year attending and I had a ball!  LOVED it!  Thought I would share some pictures with you:

These beautiful ladies were my partners in crime all week!  We had so much fun!  Here we are at our usual breakfast spot...The Marriott Starbucks!!  Starting on the left: Kaye, Coleen, Nena, Caroline and Kavi

First stop on our agenda was to the Distribution Center.  It is really neat to see how things work!  This facility is absolutely beautiful!

View from the foyer as you enter.

This is where all the magic happens!! Orders are filled and shipped from here.

This is Coleen chilling!  Those bean bag chairs are giant!

This is the view from outside of the building!  Gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous!  

The welcome party theme was Garden Party and we had the option to make and bring along a creative hat.  Lots of ladies made them, but because we couldn't quite figure out how to travel 'cross country' with one and none of us wanted to wear them through the airports we sat this one out! This is a shot of one of my favorites though!

A couple more!

Stampin Up! always has the neatest displays!  These are a few of my favorites!

How cute are these?!  Loved them!

A close up!

How adorable is this?!!!!   All made out of paper! 

So pretty!

These were amazing!! Look at all that detail!! I may have actually drooled on myself a little over these! 

The whole gang!  We really had a super time!  I am so glad that I was able to go.  There were so many fun things to see and I learned so much and met so many wonderful people!

(Kavi, myself, Nena, Coleen, Kaye and Carolyn)

I already have a count down clock set for next year! Cannot wait! :)

I will be back tomorrow to share some of the swaps I took with me this year!  Have a great night!

Testing! 1, 2, 3!

Hello!  Working on a new look for my blog!  Bear with me!  Be back soonest! :)

Goodbyes are always hard!

Well, fellow stamper folks...it is that time again!  Time for Stampin Up! to release their Last Chance List and make room for a whole lot of new stamp sets and goodies!  You will have until June 30th to purchase anything that may be going!  Accessories are on a "While Supplies Last" basis though so you will want to act quickly!  Here are links to each of the Retiring product lists:

Retiring Stamps
Retiring Accessories

Interested in shopping?  Click here!

There are several sets that I am going to be sad to see go, but I have had a sneak peek at the new catalog and your socks are going to be blown off!!  Mine were!!  Lots of fun, new beautiful sets!!  New catalog goes live July 1st!  I cannot wait!

I will be back soonest with lots to share!  Have a good day!

Rock N Roll Vintage Vogue

Hello!  Middle of the week already! I tried a new  (well new to me!) technique yesterday and wanted to share this card with you!  It uses the Rock N Roll technique that I have steered clear of for a really long time because I thought it was super complicated!  Boy, was I wrong!  It is actually quite easy and really fun!

Stamps: Vintage Vogue and Just Believe

Paper: Whisper White, Garden Green, Chocolate Chip and Vintage Springtime DSP (retired)

Ink: Old Olive, Melon Mambo, Cherry Cobbler, Marina Mist and Choc Chip

Extras: Rhinestones

Close up of the flowers.

To get this effect (Rock N Roll) you ink up your image in one color and Roll it around in a second darker color.

I have a super long To Do list today so I am outta here!  Hope that you have a great day!

Simply Adorned fun!

Hello!  Happy Tuesday!  I am in a Simply Adorned jewelry swap at Convention so I have been playing around with the Simply Adorned charms!  If you haven't seen the SA jewelry, you don't know what you are missing!  I have gotten so excited about these!  SU! offers three different sizes of the necklace charm.  All of them open up at the top locket style and you can remove and replace the insert to match your clothing, your mood or the holiday etc!  I have signed up for all three sizes in the swap so I need to come up with some cute ideas!  Here are some of the ones I threw together this morning:

These are the 1" X 1 1/4" size.  They are so much fun to make and you can throw one together in no time! :)  

I also have something else cute to share with you!  I was at gymnastics one day waiting for my daughter to finish up and  there was a mom there making beaded lanyards for her daughter's girl scout troop!  I wound up buying one on the spot; in part because they were so pretty and in part because I am such a sucker for a good cause!  Anyhow, I thought it would be perfect for the SA charms!!  I thought it might be fun  to make a few to match my charms that match my clothes! LOL

Here is the one I bought from her:

Here is the one I made after studying hers:

 Aren't they pretty!  I have another one in the works that I will share soon!

I hope that you have a wonderful day! :)  I will be back soonest with more to share!

Brick Wall Trial Run!

Hello!  Monday, Monday all day long!  Hope yours is a good one!  I have had a nice day!  I spent the morning playing with a technique that I have never tried called Brick Wall.  I needed to figure out how to do it because I have signed up for the neatest swap at Convention!!  What's that you say?!  You read it right!! C-O-N-V-E-N-T-I-O-N!!!! The little count down timer on my phone says it is only a mere 57 days away!!!  That means only 56 sleeps until I leave! Waaaaa-Hooooooo!!!! Anyhow!!  I signed up for an ATC (Artist Trading Card) Technique Swap!  You choose a technique and use that technique on your ATC.  When we get them all swapped out at Convention (!!!!) we will each leave with 28 different technique ATC's! They will all fit onto a keyring and will be an awesome tool to use for a series of technique classes!!   I chose the Brick Wall Technique because I happen to think it is a really cool idea!  Of course, as usual I put very little time into thinking ahead and it took me about 30 minutes to make one of these mini little masterpieces! LOL  My hubby pointed out to me that I would be devoting 14 hours to these! LOL  Ah...how we suffer for our craft! :)  After trying it out and despite the detailed work and time it will take I LOVE IT!!!  They are so pretty!  Here are my first attempts:

This is the first one I did.  You stamp your image and then cut the image into 1/2" strips and then each strip into tiny pieces.  They are supposed to stagger like real bricks, but that is much more difficult than it sounds when you are working with these tiny little guys!  After you cut it all apart you sponge all of the edges of each piece and then reassemble your image!  Easy Peasy! 

Here is my second attempt:

The colors are showing a little off in the photograph.  It actually turned out quite  pretty!  So what do you think?  Try it!  It is really cool! :)

Tons to do today, so I am off to do it! Have a wonderful day! I will be back soonest with more to share!

Paper Quilt

Happy Sunday!  How are you?!  It is pouring down rain here today...perfect day for some craft doing!  I have the neatest card to share with you!  I was blurfing one day and came across the amazingly talented Christena Bagne's quilted cards!  They are just gorgeous!  I thought I would try my hand at a simple one and had  so much fun putting this quilt square together!  After making one I thought it would be a really neat project to make several and piece them all together and frame them or make a scrapbook page from them!  Mine is in need of some minor tweaking, but I was pretty pleased with the way it came out!  Take a look:

You cut the pieces just like you would for a quilt and piece them together!  I used Tombow Adhesive from SU! to piece this one.  After it is all assembled and 'quilted' you run the whole thing through an EF using your Big Shot!  It is really very pretty in person!

I used the Extra Large Label punch and Word Window for the sentiment. I punched once and put it back into the punch to create the smaller sized matte. :)

Ok, I am off to take advantage of the icky weather and try to squeeze in some more craft-ing! Hope that you have a wonderful day!

Graduating class of 2011...

Hello!  I would like to introduce the Graduating Class of 2011 to you!  Isn't this a handsome, wise looking group of graduates too?!  We home school and every year our home school group has a graduation ceremony, dinner and dance.  Our group has graduated 10 kids so far and will be graduating 5 more this time!  Two of this years graduates are my children!  It has become part of the tradition to make some sort of little souvenirs for the guests that attend the ceremony to say thank you!  This year we made these little cuties:

Aren't they cute?!  My wonderful SIL and I spent an entire day making these!  Of course, there was lots of gabbing and chocolate consumption too!  Thank you for your help, Catherine! :)  Couldn't have done it without you!

Here is a close up of one of the thank you owls: 

Each owl has his own diploma and has one Hershey's Nugget to share!  Isn't he just too smart?!

Punches Used:

Cap: Curly Label, Word Window, Jewelry Tag

Head: Extra Large Label

Eyes: 3/4" Circle, 1/2" Circle and Hole Punch

Beak: 5 Petal Flower

Body and Wings: Scallop Circle

Feet: Itty Bitty Punch Pack

 Colors: Chocolate Chip, Pumpkin Pie, Basic Black and Whisper White

I hope that you have a wonderful day!  I will be back soonest with more to share! :)

A little Mother's Day love!

Hello!  I think Blogger is acting a little wonky!  I posted two posts yesterday and now they are no where to be seen??!!  So, I will repost! :)  I am so sorry that way over a whole week has gone by since my last post, but I have been up to my eyeballs in busy lately!  I wanted to share a few of the cards I made for Mother's Day with you!  Before I do though I have to say how absolutely fortunate I am to have the world's BEST mother.  She is not only my mother, but also my friend.  We kind of grew up together and she has always been there for me.  She is smart and funny and fun!  She has taught me so much.  I love her a lot! :)  I am also super lucky to have a wonderful grandmother!  She is also quite amazing! :)  And as if that were not enough...I also have a fantastic Mom-in-law!  I could not have done any better if I had hand picked her!  I really am very, very blessed to have all of these strong, wonderful, amazing role model Moms  in my life!  :)  Ok, moving on past the mush!  Here are the cards I made to go along with Mom's Day this year:

The heart is from the Always stamp set and the flowers are made from the Itty Bitty Punch pack.  I am hooked on making these little guys!  The tag is the jewelry tag punch and the sentiment is from Tiny Tags.  I ran the base piece through an EF and faux stitched around the edges.  I layered a button on with some twine for that hand made feel and sponged around all the edges with the coordinating color of the card stock. These cards were fun to make and came together really easily!  Love it when that happens! :)

I had a wonderful Mother's Day!  All of my children spoiled me rotten.  I really love those guys! 

Ok, I have a ton of stuff to do today!  Hope that your day is a good one!  I will be back soonest with more to share!

May is National Scrapbooking Month!

Promotion Dates: April 29 through May 31, 2011

Promotion Details:

Give scrapbooking a try with our National Scrapbooking Month promotion! SAVE 30% on a wide selection of Stampin' Up! scrapbooking products including:

• Select rubber stamp sets
• Select professional print products for My Digital Studio
• Special digital download bundles for My Digital Studio
• Save 30% on the Stampin' Up! Digital Starter Kit (now $122.50 for $320 in value) and optional Stampin' Memories Add-On (now $35 for $75 in value).

Click here to view or print the complete list of products being offered at 30% off.

Click here to shop!

Have a great day! :)