E-Mail Class: 28 Christmas Cards

I am offering a Christmas Card Class, that you can do at home, using the I Wish Simply Scrappin Kit. The cards use thick, card-stock weight, pull and stick die cuts. No stamping is required unless you want to add additional stamped elements on your own.

Participants will receive materials to complete 28 Christmas cards, each with a different design. In addition to the kit materials, participants will also receive 28 kraft envelopes and 6 feet of chocolate ribbon. Participants will be e-mailed a picture of each card to use as their design guide.

Cost: $25 (additional $4.75 if you want the materials mailed flat rate priority)

Registration Deadline: Friday, November 7th (in one week)

This is a really lovely kit with a vintage feel to it. I am pleased with how the cards turned out, and I couldn't help but give a big glimpse of the finished product.

Payment must be received with registration. Please contact me soon if you want to take part.

Six Year Anniversary, $100,000 in Sales

This month is my 6-year anniversary as a demonstrator for Stampin' Up! I never thought I'd be doing it this long. It's been a lot of fun, and I've met so many wonderful stamping friends along the way!

This month I also hit the $100,000 mark in career sales! I've never earned the cruise or anything grand like that, but I've kept on slow and steady. I am proud of this accomplishment. I owe a big THANK YOU to everyone who has supported me along the way.

To celebrate these two landmark events, I am offering a special treat to you. For two days only, through October 31st, I will give 20% off all individual orders. Couple this with the 20% off birthday stamps special, and you've got yourself a great deal!!!

Contact me by tomorrow to take advantage of this special offer. Thanks again for all your support!

Artscow Deals

Thanks to my friend Mandy, I looked more closely at the freebies that Artscow is throwing in my account. If you aren't up on Artscow, a new online photo site, you can read about it on my blog here.

Anyways, I AM very pleased with the print quality. And I like being able to get matte finish. So far, all my prints have been free. I print about 50 at a time, and it costs about $5 to ship them. It DOES take awhile to get them as they come from Hong Kong, but I'm a patient person when it comes to free stuff!

It is very funny to read about all the promos. They are plentiful and explained in not so perfect English. Sometimes they appear to be literally begging us to use their services. But so far, my experience has been that it's worth taking advantage of their freebies. I haven't paid for anything from them but shipping. Yay!

So here are my deals so far. I seem to get 50 free 4x6 prints about every month. Not sure why, I think they just like to throw out free stuff. But they do expire at the end of each month. At first I wasn't going to take advantage of this anymore because I have the boys' scrapbooks done for this year and don't really need any pictures right now. However, I decided last night that since I have 50 free prints every month through Feb 2009 so far, I will just print my current pictures and store them away for my next scrapbooking adventures. I have a file box for both boys and will keep them organized in there until I need them.

ALSO, I took advantage of a free 8x8 book from Artscow. I expected it would be a scrapbook type thing, but it ended up being like a hardcover children's book. That was even better! Now Miles loves reading his "brothers book". It was free and cost me $4.95 to ship. Not bad! I think I missed some other credits for more 8x8 books.....remember, they give out free stuff but the credits expire quickly! Darn it! But now I will be paying much better attention. Here are some pics to show you the book I made. Please note, the cover picture isn't centered great, but that's my fault. Still, for a $5 book, I'm happy with the results overall.


Some other free credits that I have in my account are for magnets, ornaments, and a calendar! I hope to utilize those for some Christmas gifts.

If you haven't already signed up at Artscow, it's worth it just to see what free stuff they will throw your way. You can register through this referral link. And if you HAVE registered, run over quickly and see what free stuff is sitting in your account! Most likely, you have several things sitting there that will expire at the end of this month.

UPDATE! Expiring today, Oct 20th, for every $16 you spend (including shipping!), you get credit for one free 30 page 8x8 book!

EXTRA TIP! Artscow accepts Paypal which I like because then I don't have to give my credit card info to Hong Kong.

If you land any great deals over at Artscow, leave a comment and tell us about it!

For Sale: Blue Bayou Package $14

Blue Bayou was a popular SU In-Color that retired. Here is what my package includes:

Ink Pad (opened)
Ink Refill (full)
17 Sheets of 8.5x11 Cardstock
1.5 Sheets of 12x12 Textured Cardstock
5 Sheets of 6x6 Double Sided Designer Papers

There are actually some more scraps of cardstock included but they are just extras that I didn't account for in the pricing. Please contact me if you are interested. US buyers only.

Owl using Big Shot Dies!

This was made by another demonstrator, Laura, at our SU Open House. It uses the small SU cello bags and Big Shot dies (top note and scallops). I know owls are all the craze, but I just haven't jumped on that bandwagon yet. I've seen a lot of "weird" looking owls out there that kind of freak me out. However, I thought THIS owl was so stinking cute! I totally looks like an owl and just has the "friendly owl" look to it. I was so thrilled when Laura let me take one of these home. And I ordered the scallop dies the next day!!!

Open House Card

This card was designed by Robin and/or Claudia for our recent SU Open House. All attendees were able to make this and take it home with them. The red "LIFE" part is a magnetic bookmark!

Stamp Club: September

This was one of our cards for September Stamp Club. I copied from a sample in the catalog. Can you find it? It's in the accessories section, if that helps. :)

Top Note Gift Card Holder

It's mine, it's all mine.....I thought of this my very own self! I don't mean to sound braggy, I just get really excited when I find the time and creativity to actually design something of my own. Usually I'm a big copycat.

I thought the new Big Shot die, Top Note, would be perfect for some kind of gift card holder. I came up with this idea in my head one night in bed. When it actually panned out in real life the next day, I was ecstatic.

If anyone wants directions, let me know and I will post them. :)

Scrapbook For Sale

This is a Making Memories 8x8, 3-Ring CORDUROY scrapbook with 10 top-loading pages. It is still in the packaging. And I also have two packs of 10 additional page protectors....for a total of 30 possible page protectors. I ordered this online for Miles's scrapbook but the green ended up the wrong shade. It is similar to Stampin Up's SAGE SHADOW. SU has a new designer paper in the Holiday Mini Catalog that would be perfect with this scrapbook, if you like to scrapbook in color themes. The paper is called Autumn Vine.

I paid a total of $28.43 for the album and the additional page protectors. If someone would like to take this off my hands for $20, I would be grateful. Remember, everything is still in the packaging. I'm thinking this may be a better deal for a local person who can pick up. Shipping within the US with flat rate priority would run about $10 more.

Scrapbooks For Sale: SOLD

These are 8x8, 2-Ring American Crafts scrapbooks. I am just not getting to the scrapbooking I had intended for these. I bought them online because it is very hard to find 8x8 ringed albums in the local stores. The albums are chipboard with a fabric bind. They can be left plain, or you can have fun covering and/or embellishing the cover. Also, I have many new, unopened packages of the page protectors that fit these albums. I think each album should hold 40 pages easily. That's what I love about ringed albums!

8x8 Album (10 pages included): $7 each
Pack of 10 Page Protectors: $3 each

Let me know if you would like to take these off my hands. I'm thinking this might be a better deal for local people as flat rate shipping could run nearly $10.

Scrapbook of Miles: Year 2

I finally did it. After much procrastination, I spent this weekend starting and completing Miles's 2-year-old album. I used one of Stampin' Up's retired scrapbooking kits to make an ABC album. For each letter, I chose a 2-year-old picture of Miles doing something that coordinated with that letter. I used the same design for each layout, with title and picture on left and journaling on right. The designer papers and the sticker embellishments varied with each page. I am very pleased with how this turned out, and Miles is loving his new book!

Now I won't scrapbook Miles again until near his 4th birthday. I like to have everything together and to scrapbook all at once. I can't handle doing an album page by page all year long. I have issues.

And there was enough left in the kit to make some really cute cards! Check it out....I conjured up 16 cards from the "leftovers". I have been meaning to do this with the leftovers from the baby boy kit that I used for Graham's book. I always think there's not much there to work with but after it's all done, it really is impressive!

Scrap Club: September

We used the Bella Rose theme for September...getting flowers out of our system before holiday time hits. Here is our title page for the month. I had to show a partial of the second page because that flower is so darn cute, and Mandy worked hard stamping 20 of those for club this month. :)

Bella Rose Hippo

I really needed Gracie's 1st birthday card to be blog post worthy, because I knew Mandy would probably show it to the world on her own blog. So I was pleased when I came up with this darling card. The dry emboss dots were done with the Crop-A-Dile.

Promotion for World Cardmaking Day

World Cardmaking Day is Saturday, October 4th. Stampin' Up! is excited to celebrate this holiday with you the week of October 4-11. During this week, they are offering 20 percent off Simply Sent card kits and Simply Sent Card Elements. You can see these items on pages 176-177 of the Fall/Winter Catalog.

Here's a helpful tip...one of the kits is a Christmas one (pictured above). Pull and stick, baby!

Aquapainter Sale

Single Aqua Painter	114617
Discount Price: $7.25
This wonderful tool is versatile and easy to use, and works great with Stampin' Up! Watercolor Pencils, Watercolor Wonder Crayons, Classic Stampin' Pads, and other mediums to pull and blend colors.

Birthday Stamp Sets 20% Off

To celebrate Stampin' Up!'s 20th birthday, they are offering 20% off select birthday stamp sets. How appropriate! This offer runs all through October.

Spend $20 in regular catalog merchandise and qualify to purchase any preselected birthday/celebration stamp sets at 20 perent off.

Item #	Page #	Description	Retail Price	20% Off Price
109439	62	Big Bold Birthday	$27.95	$22.36
112895	62	Cumpleaños genial y divertido (Spanish Big Bold Birthday)*	$27.95	$22.36
111532	63	Party Hearty*	$26.95	$21.56
110994	64	Bitty Birthday	$12.95	$10.36
111618	64	Crazy for Cupcakes*	$23.95	$19.16
111546	65	Simple Birthday Thanks*	$17.95	$14.36
111702	65	Time to Party*	$16.95	$13.56
108559	68	Crab & Company	$27.95	$22.36