Peggy’s Village

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Peggy came to visit one day last week and brought her version of the Village of Cuteness:

Peggy's Village of Cuteness

Can you stand it?  She decided to interpret her Village as a Christmas Village, with wreaths on the front doors, a string of lights, a palm tree, and – be still my heart – two little blow-up Santa Village People!!!!

Look at her Christmas Hale:

Peggy's Christmas Hale

Don’t you love that palm tree, and the bouganvilla spilling over the window box at top?  I may have to do another village.

And in case you are wondering, that’s not “hale” (rhymes with whale), it’s “hah’ ley”, kinda rhymes with trolley (if you said it tra-ley!)  It’s the Hawaiian word for house.

Something special for the hostesses

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I brought back Convention tote bags for the members of my hostess club:

Convention Tote bags

I loved the prints and colors – which are now available as My Digital Studio downloads – but I knew I would need to find a way to tell them apart.  The solution, of course, is a tag:

Hostess tag up close

These tags are made with coordinating Designer Series Paper (On sale – do I need to say it again?? – buy 3 get one free!) with an initial and a paper flower.  I love making these paper flowers because they involve smushing.  Smushing is a very scientific term for beating-the-stuffing-out-of-a-wad-of-paper.  Don’t you have days when a little smushing would do you a world of good?

My Workshop hostesses in August and September will also get one of these exclusive tote bags – call me if you’d like to put together a special event for a few of your friends.

Saving my change…

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There are many people who contribute to my growth and success as a Stampin’ Up! demonstrator, and one who has made a big impact is Janet Wakeland.  I met her a year ago at convention and was encouraged and inspired by her energy and strong business.  After convention this year, she encouraged us to start saving for next year right away – a brilliant idea.  She suggested a change jar, and I came up with this:

Change Is Good

I used Paisley Petals Designer Series papers on the jar (on sale, buy 3 get one free!) and a bunch of new stamps from the 2011-2012 Idea Book and catalog to collage a couple of tags.  I LOVE the font on my new Alphabet – the Spencerian Alphabet Lower – and the fact that it’s a Clear Mount set made stamping the words a breeze even WITHOUT the Stamp-a-ma-jig!    I’ll confess that I did each letter twice on two separate tags just in case, but using the Clear Mount stamps was so easy that I ended up with two sets of tags 🙂

Goodies on the Change Jar tag

A Trinket Key, a Clear Bauble and some ribbon finished up my jar and it’s ready to be fed.  This one is designed to coordinate with the colors in my bedroom, but I’m going to make another one for the laundry room.  It’s my opinion that any and all cash (coin or bills) found in the laundry belongs to She-Who-Washes-The-Clothes.  I consider it tip money.

At a minimum, I’ll need it to be able to pay the second-checked-bag fee next year.

Stamp theory

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In theory, you only need a couple of stamp sets – change up your colors and your layout, and you have a completely different card:

It's Raining Concord Crush Flowers

  • Raining Flowers and Teeny Tiny Wishes stamp sets
  • Very Vanilla, Melon Mambo and Concord Crush card stock
  • Melon Mambo, Always Artichoke, Daffodil Delight and Concord Crush Classic ink pads
  • Eyelet border punch
  • Piercing tool, template and mat
  • Always Artichoke Seam Binding
  • Stampin’ Dimensionals
  • Big Shot and Fun Flowers Bigz L die
  • Crystal Effects

In THEORY, I said – after all, we all know there is no such thing as too many stamps.  Not enough room to store your stamps, yes, this is possible.

If you look closely and compare today’s card with the previous Raining Flowers card, you’ll see many of the same elements – the Fun Flowers Bigz L die, Crystal Effects, and Two-Step Stampin’ – but these are very different cards.  Of course, there are no pancakes in this post, so this card suffers by comparison, but that’s just the way the Ricotta and Mango Stuffed pancake crumbles.

I’ve gotta stop thinking about those pancakes.

It’s Raining Flowers

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What a perfect name for a stamp set!


It's Raining Mambo Flowers

  • Raining Flowers and Fabulous Phrases stamp sets
  • Whisper White, Melon Mambo and Early Espresso card stock
  • Pocketful of Posies Designer Series Paper
  • Baha Breeze, Melon Mambo and Early Espresso Classic ink pads
  • Medium Jewelry Tag punch
  • Big Shot; Two Tags Bigz and Fun Flowers Bigz L dies
  • Early Espresso 1/8 inch taffeta and Rose Red Seam Binding ribbons
  • Stampin’ Dimensionals, Stampin’ Sponges
  • Crystal Effects

Don’t forget – Designer Series Papers are on sale this month – buy 3 packages and get one free!

Speaking of free, Raining Flowers was one of the many free stamp sets I brought home from convention (talk about excess baggage – next year I’m bringing an extra suitcase!).  It’s a Two-Step Stampin’ set, but even better, the various pieces coordinate and layer really well together.  It’s almost like Stampin’ Up! MEANT TO DO THAT!!  (I know.  What a concept.)

Speaking of things I’ve been meaning to do, I finally got my two bites (ok, three) of pancakes.  My son has been on the mainland for a month and he flew home yesterday.  To celebrate his return home, the two of us had breakfast at Longhi’s this morning.  A couple of weeks ago, Mr. Maui Stamper and I had breakfast there, and he rejected my suggestion that he order Longhi’s famous and perhaps even more fabulous Ricotta and Mango Stuffed Pancakes.  Mr. Maui Stamper cares about his health, and I care about my waistline, and neither one of us could justify an entire plate full of such decadence.  But I wanted some of those pancakes, so I convinced my son that we should go out to breakfast this morning since his dad is now away.  Of course, I would be happy to order for him.

I have been anticipating those pancakes for two weeks, and when our server told us we had JUST (by 3 minutes) missed breakfast I was in shock.  I told him how much I’d been looking forward to those TWO BITES of pancakes, and he returned in a couple of minutes to say the chef wouldn’t mind making us an order of Ricotta and Mango Stuffed Pancakes.  WOW!  Did that ever make my day!

Would you like to see the pancakes?

Longhis Ricotta and Mango Stuffed pancakes

Look carefully…there are two forks.

I had exactly 3 bites and my son polished off the rest no problem.  They were DIVINE.

Exploring Wisteria Wonder

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How can you not love a color with Wisteria in its name?

Wisteria Wonder In Color Class project
Wisteria Wonder fills a real gap in the Stampin’ Up! color palette, and I know I’m not the only person who is happy about that.  I wanted to explore how each of the 2011-2013  In Colors coordinate with the Stampin’ Up! color families, so I came up with a set of classes that will explore each of the colors in turn.  Guess which one will be first?

This first class will be Wednesday, August 10 and will feature this note card set (made with the Easy Events stamp set) and two other projects.  Cost is $10, and you can RSVP at my Online Store.  Just click on the event in the calendar on the landing page, and it will take you to the class description and a big ol’ RSVP button.  Hope to see you there!

Color you can learn to love

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Some things just need a little time to grow on you:

Best Friends Forever in More Mustard

  • Best Friends Forever and Teeny Tiny Wishes stamp sets
  • Whisper White, More Mustard, Lucky Limeade and Island Indigo card stock
  • More Mustard, Lucky Limeade, Cherry Cobbler and Basic Black Classic ink pads
  • Timeless Portrait fabric
  • Lace Ribbon Border punch
  • Linen thread
  • Regals Designer Buttons

I didn’t like the colors when I first saw this Make and Take card at convention – I’m not a real fan of More Mustard – and I wasn’t sure if I liked that fabric “flag”.  I didn’t finish it in Salt Lake, but brought it home to put together in the relative sanity of my studio.  As I looked at the separate pieces, and then started to put them together, I decided I not only liked the card but I loved the color combination.

Isn’t that life?  I try very hard to be open-minded, but I often struggle with snap judgement.  Mr Maui Stamper, on the other hand,  seldom makes quick judgements.  I think that’s why we’re so fabulously compatible.  We’ll come home from an evening out together and have completely different perspectives on who we’ve seen and what we’ve heard.  It’s not as though we were at two different events, but we have different insights.

Marriage is a lot of work, but it’s a wonderful thing.  You can learn to love it, too.

 

An Abundance of Designer Series Paper

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I have always been in love with paper…the texture, the colors, the designs…and finding Stampin’ Up! was a dream come true.  Today Stampin’ Up! has sweetened the deal with a Buy 3, Get One Free deal on DSP:

Buy 3 - Get 1 Free!

  • Download the Flyer for all the details
  • There is no limit to the number of free Designer Series Paper packages you can earn
  • Speciality DSP and Hostess DSP are not part of this promotion
  • DSP ordered as part of your Hostess Free Dollars does not qualify for the promotion.
  • Offer ends August 31, 2011 at 11:50 pm MST.  Do the math for your time zone!  Don’t miss out!!

I am READY for this promotion, because I just did a huge clean-up-day in my studio (the room formerly known as Sara’s bedroom) and I have room for pretty new papers.  In fact, I just placed a big ol’ order myself and can’t wait to get my hands on some new Designer Series Paper.

Check out all the beautiful papers avaliable with this promotion and shop now in my online store. Click Here!

Stampinella

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This summer has been so busy that I haven’t been able to set aside playing around time in my studio for a while.  However, the stars lined up and today was the day.

Mr. Maui Stamper likes to come by and see how “Stampinella” is doing.  It always cracks me up when he calls me that – I’m not sure if it’s because I’m covered in ink, or because my studio looks like the wicked Stepsisters came crashing through, tossing bits of paper everywhere.  What I really need are those cute little mice and birds from Cinderella that come in and finish her dress for her (they would clean up for me, thank you), but what I end up getting is an orange tabby with a shedding problem who wants to spread across my workspace.

Mice, birds, and cats aside, here’s one of the projects I finished today:

Best Friends Forever Crumb Cake

  • Best Friends Forever and Teeny Tiny Wishes stamp sets
  • Crumb Cake, Marina Mist, Naturals White and Soft Suede card stock
  • Crumb Cake, Marina Mist and Soft Suede Classic ink pads
  • Log Cabin Smooch Spritz
  • Antique Brads
  • Stampin’ Sponges
  • Big Shot and Fun Flowers Bigz L dies
  • XL Two Step Bird Punch

I am quickly falling in love with that Best Friends Forever stamp set, one of the sets we received in our convention bags.  I initially thought it would be more of a teen set with that “BFF” image but THOSE LEAVES.  Oh my goodness.  I love those leaves.  I put them on EVERYTHING.   I hope you like them because you are going to see a lot of them.

I wanted a more bronzed Antique brad but this was all that was left.  There are more on the way, but I didn’t feel like waiting.  Maybe I’ll change it out and maybe I won’t.   Sometimes the serendipity of the moment is just the thing, and I’m a big believer in Carpe Diem – Sieze the Day.  If I waited, who knows what those Stepsisters would be up to?  Letting the mice and birds in to torment the cat, that’s what they would do.

And how about that Smooch?  It’s been sitting on the side of my desktop just waiting to be noticed.  Good thing I looked.

 

The Village of Cuteness

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Stampin’ Up! offered us an optional +Fun class on Friday night at convention.  There were 3 different classes to choose from, and I can’t really tell you why I signed up for the Village of Cuteness.  I’ll confess it WASN’T the name – in my book, things like puppies and kittens are cute.  Villages, well, not so much.

Anyway, sleep deprived as we were, we hustled through dinner on Friday night and lined up with a thousand or so of our very best friends to make these:

The Village of Cuteness

Oh yeah, I finished mine in the time allotted and brought them home and set them right up.

NOT!!!

We barely got them painted!!  We decided that was really our plan all along, as trying to bring them home all embellished (more about that later) would be a challenge.

Stampin’ Up! did a great job with these projects.  We had EVERY product we needed and more, clear instructions, even refreshments.  What we were lacking was time (and sleep, which may have had an impact on our ability to make the best of our time.  You be the judge.)   We jumped right in and started painting and distressing with the awesome Distressing Essentials Kit (#118762, $19.95), also known as the Get Your Hands Inkier Than They Have Ever Been In Your Life Kit.

Cheryl and Priscilla with their inky fingers

Cheryl is sitting next to Priscilla, who was the BEST EVER table-mate and fit in with our craziness absolutely perfectly.  Priscilla was much neater at this than I was, as I seemed to have ink AND paint all over my hands.  You have to feed the muse.

Peggy and the cupcake

Speaking of feeding, Stampin’ Up! provided us with dessert – as if we needed more sugar in our systems.  Peggy inspired us all with her cupcake-eating-technique…but some things are meant to be enjoyed in the moment.  You’ll have to trust me when I say it was impressive.

Working on the Villages of Cuteness

This was serious business as we studied our instructions to figure out what we needed to get done in class and what we could do at home.   Notice those looks of concentration!!

Happy Villagers

It seemed like we’d just started when the announcement was made that it was time to pack up.  Priscilla kindly offered to take our picture with our Villages.  I’m not quite sure what Cheryl is doing over Robbie’s head.  We were among the last to leave, and we took a little time to check out some of the displays outside the Make and Take hall before we headed back to our rooms.

Robbie, the Plan Ahead Demonstrator, had brought USPS Flat Rate boxes with her, and the next morning at breakfast she announced to us all that she had already shipped her “Village People” home.  I distinctly remember thinking “Ha, a lot of good that will do”, but I kept that snarky little remark to myself.  Good thing.  Sunday morning we were desperately trying to buy a suitcase for our excess luggage – and when we found one, we crammed that puppy full too.

Once I was home and unpacked, I sat down to finish the Village.  My blocks were already painted and distressed, and my wood sheet doors were stained and attached to the houses.  It was all the other stuff that needed to be done.  I wish I could tell you how much time I spent, but I really didn’t keep track.  I had the tunes going, it was late enough that the Captain was outside chasing mousies, and Mr. Maui Stamper was sound asleep.  I can’t remember the last time I had such a good time with a project!

I’m looking forward to next year’s +Fun class!