Open House!

Here are a couple of photos from my open house yesterday. I posted the make n takes here. I think everyone had a great time. They bought a LOT of my retired stuff. Plus I now have two more customers, (Hi Denise & Jennifer). Jennifer has also joined my stamp club.

Jennifer's Mom was one of my daughter's teachers when she went to Queen of all Saints in elementary school. She recognized her. Now thats pretty good, considering my daughter, Jennifer will be 30 years old in June! Plus her hair is no longer blonde, but dark brown. Such a small world!

I can't believe I forgot to take a photo of how I set up everything in my living/dining room.

Carol won one of the door prizes. She is part of my downline.

Sharon won a stamp set!

Here is My Frame!

Okay, so here is MY frame. I purchased my frame at the "M" store on sale for 55% off, so it cost me $23. I went to Home Depot with a piece of Pear Pizzazz card stock and they color matched it perfectly. They have these pints you can buy for $2.99. The chicken wire I got for FREE from a friend. I sanded the frame a little so the paint would stick. Did 3 coats using a foam brush, my husband stapled the chicken wire on for me. I just have no strength. I'm sure most of you could do this your self. And you are done! Just add your cards. I'm really happy with the way this turned out. My craft room is painted blue, almost a Marina Mist color, so I thought Pear Pizzazz would go perfect. This photo was taken with the frame leaning against the wall for my open house.

For the flowers I used the Fun Flowers die on page 39 of the Occasions mini catalog. As you know, its one of my favorite things in this mini. For the dsp, I used the level 1 hostess item with all the In Colors that are 6 x 6, I just used all of the Pear Pizzazz dsp and also some of the First Edition dsp on page 25. After I cut my flowers out using this die and dsp I crinkled them all up and the flatten them out a bit and started layering. Some I used the new Rosettes, (page 16), a couple using the Vintage Flower Adornments, (page 15) and a couple I used the Big Springtime Vintage Buttons, (Page 16), and also the Antique Brads, (page 187 of the big catalog), for the center of the flowers.

The one on the bottom right is the Flower Folds die, and I layered it the same way. I used hot glue to glue all the flowers together, to the frame and the center pieces.

These are the magnetic book marks that Stampin' Up! used to hold the cards up.

Here you can see how I did it. I found they didn't hold my cards very well. Maybe mine are too heavy, so I'm probably going to get some new clothes pins to pin them to the chicken wire.

Edited to add: My frame is 22 1/2" x 26 1/2". Thanks to all of you for your kind comments. They mean the world to me!

Frame Card Holder from Stampin' Up!

While at Leadership, in Momento Mall (where you can get all the Stampin' Up! logo stuff) they had these frames that were so so cute. They were done in all of the "In Colors". So I took a photo of all of them and thought I would like to make one as well. I'm getting ready for my open house this afternoon and then I will post MY frame. It was so easy to make and I will give you details on my next post, but I thought it would be fun for you to see the ones SU made.

Valentine Fun Flowers Table Decoration

Here is a fun table decoration I did using the Fun Flowers die on page 39 of the Occasions mini catalog. I LOVE this flower die. Here I decided to make a Valentine's arrangement, and used Real Red & Basic Grey card stock along with our Love Impressions dsp on page 7. I just cut out a bunch of pieces, sponged them (of course) and started stacking them, large first then smaller ones. Added one of our BIG buttons that has Linen Thread through it. The sentiment is from the level 2 hostess set in the mini too. All of us at Leadership got this for FREE from Shelli along with some other items. Stampin' Up! is so good to ALL of us. This is what I ended up with. The little heart container I've had for a couple of years. I think I bought it at the "M" store. After I got my flower made (I used hot glue to glue them together) I sandwiched a skewer between 2 of the larger flowers. Added some floral foam inside my container and covered the foam with that filler stuff, I can't remember the name of that stuff.........This whole thing took me about a half hour to make. Sorry about the bad photo. We haven't seen sun here in Northern California, (you know sunny California) in a few days now.

Here are some close ups of each flower. I also forgot to mention that I used my bone folder to curl the edges of my flowers. I really don't like "flat" flowers.

Leadership Samples

I thought I would show you some amazing samples from Leadership.

This was made with our new Rosettes in the Occasions Mini catalog, (page 16).

Stampin' Up did some pretty amazing stuff with our BIG designer buttons. These are the Springtime Vintage buttons on page 16.

This snake uses our Pompon Trim, page 35.

For these flowers they used the new die, Fun Flowers, page 39.

And then these yo-yos are made with our Springtime Vintage Fabric, page 38 and the matching buttons. Wouldn't these make cute flowers for your cards or scrapbook pages? Sorry about the shadow.

New Friends!

I wanted to share with you all my new friends. Patty put me in touch with Lisa Lange, and here we are during the make n takes Friday night. It was so fun to hang out with Lisa and her roommates.

Here is the five of us. l-R

Lisa Lange, me, Karen Kruse, Betsy Crang & Wanda Johnson. Thanks Girl's for letting me hang out with you guys!

Open House Make n Takes

These are the two make n takes that we will do at my Open House, this Sunday, 1-4pm. This is a FREE event. If you are interested please RSVP by: Thursday, January 27th. We will be making this Valentine card and the Candy Wrapper box. I will have door prizes, food, retired stamps and c/s and more. You don't want to miss it!

Sale-a-Bration Starts Tomorrow!

Tomorrow starts Sale-a-bration! You know what that means, right? With a $50 order (before shipping & tax) you can pick any item in our SAB (sale-a-bration) catalog for FREE, yes for FREE! This also includes over 60 stamp sets in the big catalog. Don't have a catalog, I'd be happy to send one to you if you don't already have a demonstrator. Just shoot me an email. The catalog will go live on my SU website, www.cincraft.stampinup.net, Tuesday morning. I will add the link. (not available until then).

Stampin' Up! has done it again; We have another sign up promotion.

15% off regular kit price of $175 (so your kit would be $148.75) thats over $300 worth of stampin' stuff for $148.75, such a deal!

Plus, a $50 bonus bundle worth over $50.

So that is like getting $76.25 off your kit!

Contact me today if you would like/love to join my team!

More Leadership Make n Takes

Here are the last of the make n takes from Leadership.

First up is this Clear-Mount Stamp case that has been covered with the Botanical dsp on page 26 of the Occasions mini. This was fun and only a little bit of stamping with the Clearly for You stamp set, page 28. Notice the 1/2" Seam Binding Ribbon, page 16, and the Trinket Key, page 24.

Next up is this cute card. I have to admit, I was just too tired to finish this one at Leadership and finished it when I got home. The card base is Baja Breeze, (remember this is my favorite color right now). The bottom third of the card is run though the paper crimper and then you take your Versamark pad and ink just the ridges. I thought this was really cool, never thought to do that. I originally thought is was dsp on the bottom of the card. Then comes the strip of Old Olive that was stamped with the small back ground stamp in the Clearly for You set, page 28), that was adhered just above the crimped part on the bottom. The next layer is the textured 2 1/2" circle punched in Soft Suede and crumpled up. Next is the Old Olive Taffeta ribbon. The Crumb Cake is punched using our Petal Card Extra Large Double punch. We stamped the berries on that piece. Then we punched a 1" circle punch in More Mustard. The butterfly was inked with markers and cut out, raised with a dimensional. And the "for you" is stamped in Soft Suede on Old Olive and then we punched it out with the 1" circle punch and sliced off a piece on the top and bottom. Never thought to do that either!

This is the card we learned how to do in Sara Douglas' My Digital Studio class. SU provided the white statin ribbon and I added the glittered heart with a dimensional. We also got an envelope. Fast and fun all in one.

So that is all of the projects we did at Leadership. You can see that Stampin' UP! truly spoiled us.

Awesome Leadership Make n Takes!

Can I just say, Stampin' Up! treats us like queens? Can you believe these make n takes? OMG!

This flower pin is made using the new Fun Flowers die on page 39 of the Occasions mini, First Edition dsp, page 25 and those FABULOUS Beveled Windowpanes, page 28. Add some seam binding ribbon & a Paper Daisy, oh and don't forget those awesome Trinket Keys, page 24. We starched the fabric and crumpled it up in a ball and let the pieces dry, then hot glued them together. Such a fun flower pin.

In our box we had the large Simply Adorned Charm, yes the biggest one and a chain to go with it. You can see them on page 189 in the big catalog. On all of our projects we used the stamp set, Clearly for You. Added some Baja Breeze seam binding to the chain and also some strips of fabric & lace ribbon. Makes the chain so fun.

Stampin' Up! even gave us one of the crown trinkets and the Simply Adorned Baubles, both on page 24, for our chain.

Then came this insert, along with another key trinket and Black Statin ribbon in place of the chain.

This is the last insert we did. This one has a Chantilly 1/2" lace ribbon for the chain.

This is only part of the awesome make n takes, more tomorrow.

HELP WANTED! FREE Starter Kit!

This is an AMAZING OPPORTUNITY!!!! I just got back from the Stampin' Up! Leadership Conference in Nashville with a phenomenal offer from Stampin' Up! to grow my team by one person by this Friday (January 21st)... with a no-cost kit. That's right!!! Stampin' Up! is giving me a FREE STARTER KIT to give away to someone that would like to join the Stampin' Up! family and start their own business!!!!

Yes, you read it right, a full starter kit and all demonstrator benefits at no cost to you... to begin building your own Stampin' Up! business.

Some of the benefits are:

• A FREE starter kit (value of more than $350)
• Be on board for Sale-a-bration (our biggest sale of the year and best time to jumpstart your new business)
• 30% discount on your first order
• A great tax write off for all that fabulous product you buy anyway...
• A maintenance free - low cost website from Stampin' Up!
• A 24/7 ordering/training/resource site inside StampinUp.com
• Add extra income to your household, save for a vacation or new car!
• Discover lasting friendships
• Flexible schedule (you work when you want)
• A fun career demonstrator as an upline to enhance your success, encourage and guide you
• And so much more...

We are on a really tight schedule....the paperwork has to be postmarked and in the mail by this FRIDAY, January 21st....so I'm asking you to answer the questions below by Friday at 10:00 am to qualify to be selected for the FREE Starter Kit! I will be drawing the winner on Friday morning and contacting you on Friday to get the ball rolling!!!!

Reply to this email as soon as possible and answer the following three questions:

1) Why do I want to be included in this opportunity?

2) What would a goal for your demonstratorship be?

3) Are you willing to build a team of your own? And do you already have someone(s) in mind?

Please include your name, phone number and email address. Send to: cindee@pacbell.net.

If you'd like to talk in person, you can call me at (925) 778-8266. I look forward to hearing from you... and remember, the clock is ticking towards Friday (the date that the kit and contract must be postmarked by).

If your name is drawn - I will walk you through the paperwork to customize your kit on Friday!!!

Swaps for Leadership

Here are my swaps that I'm taking to Leadership.

First up is a little gift card holder. Inside is a Ghirardelli Chocolate, but you could also put a gift card in the pocket too. Lisa Freeman made these for Christmas, Thanks Lisa. You take a 4 1/4" x 7" piece of cardstock, score at 1" & 4". On the 4" side you will use the Heart border punch. Add a piece of dsp, I used the love Impressions on page 7 of the Occasions Mini. For the inside,( sorry I didn't take a photo of the inside) you will fold up the 1" side and add a brad to each side to form a pocket. Add your chocolate or gift card and then I used a ribbon all the way around to hold it closed. Stamped the LOVE from XOXO stamp set, page 6 and popped it up with dimensionals. Done. Simple and cute!

Next is a swap using the Tiny Teacup (single stamp on page 20 of the big catalog). I stamped the cups with Tempting Turquoise, Perfect Plum & Pear Pizzazz. This color combo comes from Mary Brown. She made a cute card with this set, using these colors. Loved it! Matted with Perfect Plum. The card base is Pear Pizzazz & embossed with the Polka Dots embossing folder. The dsp is from the In Color Hostess item on page 11. I used my Tasteful Trim die and the dsp to make the bubble border. Added some of our WONDERFUL Pearls and the Just for you, which is also a level 1 hostess item, and punched out with the Wide Oval punch.

The next 2 cards are for the Sudsol Swap (this is a yahoo group for SU demos). I needed to make 51 of these babies, so I used different papers from the Springtime Vintage dsp package. Here are 2 of them. I cased this from someone, but can't remember who. If its you, let me know and I will add a link to your blog with your name. I hate when I can't remember.......

I used the Framed Tulips, (page 28 in the Occasions mini)in Crumb Cake for the second layer. The first layer is either Always Artichoke or Baja Breeze. Then comes the Springtime Vintage dsp, then a layer of Vanilla that is stamped with the Thinking of you, from Curly Cute, (page 149). The bird cage is from Aviary stamp set, (page 121), it was stamped with Crumb Cake and then the bird matches the 1st layer. Finished it off with Vanilla Ribbon.

Cupcake & Box Gifts for Leadership

If you've been following my blog you know how "computer challenged" I am. My husband has been bugging me to put a button on my blog for people to be able to sign up to be a demo. Well I had no clue on how to do that, or if I could do it. Well thanks to Patty Bennett, she found out for me. So now I have my "Join my Stampin" Up! Team" button just below my blog header. I need to now make up a new blog header, but since I leave early tomorrow morning for Nashville, to attend Stampin' Up's! Leadership conference it will have to wait until I get back home next week.

So now on to some fun stuff:

I was feeling a little bummed because I don't really know anyone who is going to Leadership. But, Patty to the rescue (what would I/we do without her), she hooked me up with Lisa Lange. So now I want to take some little gifts to give Lisa and her roommates for letting me hang out with them for 2 days.

So here is what I made. A little cupcake with a box. I even made some carmel to put inside my cupcake.n (this photo was before I had the carmel made) These were super easy and fun to make. The cupcake is from Becky Roberts 12 days of Christmas tutorial. The box is also on her blog for free. She is so clever.

This is the box with the cupcake inside. Too cute! I made all different color boxes.

Beveled Windowpane Necklace! Oh My!

Look what I got from my Upline, Patty Bennett. You can see the one she made for herself on her blog. Since she is unable to go to Leadership this year, she asked me if I would swap for her. I said to her, "are you kidding me?" of course I will swap for you. She made some really cute hybrid cards with MDS. I will share with you tomorrow.

So this is the gift she gave me for swapping for her. Isn't it gorgeous? She used our new Beveled Windowpanes in the new mini, (page 28). So many new products, I will list them for you:

Beveled Windowpanes, page 28

First Edition dsp, page 25

Trinket Crowns & Keys, page 24

Rosetts, page 16

Basic Black 3/8" Taffeta Ribbon, page 191 of the big catalog

Crumb Cake 3/8" Taffeta Ribbon, page 191

Antique Brads with the legs cut off, page 187

Crystal Effects for the "glue" page 197

Lovely Letters Alphabet, page 160

This is the back side.

And then if that wasn't enough, look what she put the necklace in. I'm so getting that Alphabet stamp set......Lovely Letters, page 160.

Thank you Patty, for this "BEAUTIFUL" necklace. I will wear it proudly.

Valentine Card

I saw a card very similar to this one on Lynn Pratt's blog. I really love the bride card she did with the woven ribbon. It took me a few try's to get the heart to look like Lynn's card, but I think it does now.

I first die cut the heart with the Curly Label die and the heart, (Page 209) from Whisper White card stock. Then I did the ribbon, (several times)and sponged with black, very lightly and mounted this piece onto a Black piece of card stock, that has the bottom trimmed with the Scallop Trim Border, (page 200). I put a piece of Victoria Crochet Trim on the bottom just above the Scallop Trim Border. Stamped the Love from XOXO stamp set in the Occasions mini, (page 6) in Real Red ink, punched out with the 1 1/4" circle punch and matted that onto a 1 3/8" black circle. The card base is Real Read and I used the Framed Tulips embossing folder for that layer.

Valentines Card, XOXO

My posting for today is very late. Been one of those kind of days......

For this card we used the stamp set, XOXO, (page 6 of the Occasions mini catalog) and the dsp is the Love Impressions, (page 7). The base of my card is Pink Pirouette, added a piece of the dsp that was matted on Basic Grey card stock. Stamped the xoxo on Whisper White with Basic Grey Ink, and matted it with Basic Grey. Added a bow with Grey Taffeta ribbon and a couple of the clear bitty buttons and some linen thread. Added 3 Rhinestones on the right side. I figured its a Valentine's card, needed to have some bling on it.......right?? Opps, almost forgot about the button on the bottom. That has a linen thread bow.

Build a Blossom

This next card we did, I cased from the Occasions Mini Catalog. I changed the colors (used my color coach to pick my colors, love that tool!) and added one of the flowers from our new die, Fun Flowers, (page 39).

My card base is cut at 4 x 8, Not Quite Navy textured card stock. The first layer is the larger flower from the Fun Flowers die, in Peach parfait. Next I stamped the smaller petals using the Build a Blossom stamp set, (page 12) and punched them out with the Blossom Petals Punch, (page 12). You will use 5 punched petals per layer. I glued them down with glue dots and added the middle of the flower, which is stamped in Pear Pizzazz and punched out with the 1/2" circle punch. I stuck it down with a dimensional. The Just for You is from Just Believe stamp set. I just happened to have it setting out while making this card. I stamped the leaves on Pear Pizzazz and punched them out using the leaf on the same punch. To finish my card up, I used the Scallop Trim Border punch in Peach Parfait. Oh, and don't forget the Champagne Shimmer mist!

Sale-a-bration Sneak Peak!

Last night my club gals were here and I will be showing you the cards we did. This is the first card. On of my gals, (hi Pamm) wanted to do this quilt pattern, so I thought this was a good opportunity to do this type of card again.

We started with a Crumb Cake base and embossed it with the Framed Tulips embossing folder, (page 28 of the Occasions mini). The we took Vanilla that was cut at, 5 x 4 and using the 1 1/4" square punch and the Springtime Vintage dsp (page 15) we punched 2 squares from each of the 6 designs. I have a great tip for this next part; Instead of putting snail on each square we used the Big Shot Mulipurpose Adhesive Sheets, (page 39). I cut 2 strips at 1 1/2" for each card, just lay your squares in the order you want to put them on the Vanilla card stock onto the sticky side. Then transfer them to your Vanilla card stock in a row, close together. This goes much faster using this adhesive. My gals were impressed. Ok, now you're ready to lay your Vanilla piece on the Top Note die, FACE DOWN, make sure that you are getting the pattern paper inside the die and run it through. Then we ran that piece through with the Vintage Wallpaper embossing folder. Added some Vanilla Seam Binding ribbon and one of those great BIG buttons. The stamp is Punch Bunch, which is a Sale-a-bration stamp set that you can get FREE with a $50 order starting January 25th. We colored in the stamp with markers and punched with the scallop circle punch. This dsp is perfect for this kind of card.

Be My Valentine!

Here is a card I made up using the Be My Valentine stamp in the new mini (page 43). Its one of the single stamps you can purchase in the back of the catalog. I've also used the new embossing folder, Framed Tulips (page 28). I can't seem to get enough of it. As you can tell. Every card I've made this week I've used it. The other new item I used was the Love Impressions dsp found on page 7 of the mini. I did use one of the buttons from the last mini......hey, it matches PERFECTLY. And if you didn't get any of those buttons, then you should try some of the new Big Designer Buttons, (page 16), they are yummy! I ended up stamping the heart twice, once in Real Red and then again in Basic Grey. I cut the Real Red heart first, then cut just the ribbon in the grey heart and mounted them both with dimensionals. I matted my dsp with some Pink Pirouette card stock and added a Grey Taffeta ribbon.