Sep 2, 2009 | Big Shot, Chipboard, Designer Series Paper, family, Summer Fun Cookout |
Surprise Tyler!
That was what we yelled Sunday night when we had a surprise party for Tyler. Tyler turned 16 on Saturday and had a most uneventful day. What he didn’t know was that I was planning a surprise party for Sunday! If you only want to see the stamping related stuff go to page 2 of this post.
I have been asking Tyler for about a month if he wanted a party for his 16th birthday – yes, then no, then yes, then finally he said no. So Friday night we went out as a family to dinner, came home, opened presents and ate cake. Below you can see the card and the little gift I made him. Saturday, Greg was gone all day at a tennis/golf tournament, and I was in and out – shopping for the party, taking stuff to my friend, Gina’s house – and by the way – the Best Friend ever – how many people would let a bunch of teenagers that they don’t even know come and have a party at their house. Since it was a surprise I couldn’t have it at my house. So Saturday was a boring day for Tyler – except that he did get his birthday balloon and I made him breakfast in bed!
Sunday I quietly went to Gina’s house to help with final preparation and plan B since it turned out to be a rainy Sunday so all the outside entertainment was a bust. My one concern – was anybody coming to the party….. Just an FYI – not a good idea to put a 17 year old boy in charge of inviting other teenagers to a surprise party – first I didn’t know who ended up getting invited and second teenagers don’t RSVP – maybe they don’t know what that means…..But it all worked out and teenagers did appear at Gina’s door, some on time and some later. We were able to get Tyler up to Gina’s house without any clue and I think Tyler had a fun party and celebration for his 16th birthday. Later that night he told me that he really did want a surprise party – hmmm did I know that somehow ’cause I don’t remember him telling me that…
Here are a few party pictures and on the next page are some stamping projects. (Click on page 2)
kids hiding
some of the kids
gotta have a pinata - and this one was a car!
Aug 17, 2009 | Big Shot, Chipboard, Stampin' Up! Events, SU Ribbon, Techniques |
My roommates and I exchanged gifts at convention. I already posted about the gift I gave them and today I wanted to share the gifts that I received.
Michele made us each a little technique book. She used the Top Note Die to create all the pages and put the book on a ring so that we can add more techniques. The front and back cover are chipboard covered with Designer Series paper. On the individual pages there was a sample of the technique and the instructions on how to do it. The ones included in my book were:
Stained Glass
Versamark Resist or Ghosting
Faux Linen
Serigraph
Faux Tile
Several of these are new techniques for me so I tell you more about them as work with the techniques on later projects.
Diane gave each of us a monogram bookmark made from the Styled Silver HodgePodge Hardware. She used the Polka Dot ribbon and the Filgree brad at the end of the book mark. The letter is from the Lovely Letters Alphabet set. After putting the stamped image inside the hardware piece she used Crystal Effects to fill it in so that it looks like a piece of glass. It is actually two of the hardware pieces together with the card stock sandwiched in between.
Sue gave each of us this cute denim bag. While there is no actual stamping on this bag here is what she did use to create it –
The Big Shot and the Stampin’ Up! Beautiful Butterflies die! Sue used old fabric samples that she had on hand and cut them with her Big Shot and attached them to the front of the bag. The Big Shot will cut fabric and chipboard (and many other things) with the Bigz and Original dies. If you want to see the full list go to my blog side bar where the PAGES are listed and under HELPFUL INFORMATION click on BIG SHOT TIPS.
On the left corner she used the Crop-a-Dile to set two Jumbo Eyelets and then tied a piece of the new Polka Dot ribbon through them.
Everyone loved the bags and since we all carried ours around many people asked to take pictures of it.
I think I’ll have to try my hand at making some of these….
Now on to a little bit of family news – today was Kyle’s first day of college! He is still in his senior year of high school but taking all his classes at Kennesaw State University. So he got up this morning and drove in to campus. He had two classes today and I was surprised to see him home early – almost 2 hours earlier than I was expecting him. Apparently today’s classes let out early as the professors just gave introductions to the class. So it seems he had a pretty easy day the first day and found his way there and back home (he drove it once last week with me navigating the way) with no problems.
I am headed up to the craft room to finish the ribbon share and paper shares and prepare for my PAWS downline meeting tonight.
Have a happy stampin’ day!
Aug 7, 2009 | Big Shot, Chipboard, Designer Series Paper, Stampin' Up! Events |
My Room mates at convention this year are the same as last year:
- Sue is in my downline and lives in Georgia, we are traveling together to and from convention
- Michele is from Iowa. I met her at my first convention when we decided to room together never having met each other.
- Diane is also from Iowa. I met her last year when the four of us decided to room together.
We exchange room mate gifts each year and I always want to think of something unique. It’s not always easy – and I was running out of time….So this year I kind of have a combo room mate gift – something new and something old that they have probably all seen before. But in any case I’m sure they will be pleased.
Since this post is going up while I’m at convention I will have already given the girls their gifts and don’t need to hide them. Both of these projects I have previously posted – one is a bag tag – I made myself and OWL tag – click here for the original post – so that I could be identified as part of the Late Night Stampers group. My tag also won the Late Night Stamper’s Owl contest – I’m not sure I ever posted about that – if you are part of the demo only group my tag is on the main yahoo page for the group. If you see me around convention I hope you will say hi. Michele is also a member of the LNS group so I decided to make her an Owl tag also. Ours have the “LNS” on the front and our names on the back. And then ultimately decided to also make a tag for Diane and Sue – their tags use the chipboard birds. My original tag uses the retired Good Morning Sunshine Designer Series papers so I had to find a different paper to use for the new tags so it would all be current product – I decided on the Tall Tales Designer Series Paper and thought the tags turned out cute! I hope you like them.
The base of the tag is cut from the Long Board chipboard pieces using the Big Shot and the Top Note Die. I also cut the designer paper for the front and the back using the Top Note die. The paper is attached with the Anywhere Glue Stick. The names are die cut using the Billboard Alphabet strip. I colored the chipboard pieces using Sponge Daubers and Craft ink.
Diane's Bag Tag
Michele's Bag Tag
back of tag
The second little gift I am giving the girls is the little game night box that I gave to my leadership conference roommates. I know they have all seen the project already because it was the one that won the stamping challenge in January. So you can see it here at this post.
Sue's Bag Tag
If I’m lucky this year’s convention bag will match my tags. But probably not. Every year we get a bag with all of our stuff inside. So with thousands of demonstrators carrying the same bag – you have to put a tag on it so you can make sure you keep up with your own. I’m excited for us to put these on our bags!
I glued all the pieces on with Crystal Effects so they should not come off.
I’ll let you know how they hold up.
Happy Stampin’!
Jul 25, 2009 | Chipboard, class, Designer Series Paper, Embellishments, Embossing, SU Ribbon, Upsy Daisy |
I made the cutest little desk frame out of two 4×4 coasters the other day. This is one of the projects we made/are making in my class this month. 
The paper is from the Pink Flamingo paper and I used the Summer Sun print with the flowers. Each piece is cut to 4×4 and I used an Anywhere Glue stick to adhere the paper to the coasters. I trimmed the edges with my paper snips. The reason I don’t use my corner rounder punch is because it is not the same corner as the coasters so it is easier to just use paper snips. Then I like to sand the edges with a sanding block. We embossed on the designer paper using the Upsy Daisy stamp set – stamp in VersaMark ink and use white embossing powder. Then heat set the embossing powder. I did one before applying the paper to the coaster and I did another one after applying the paper to the coaster. I felt like the heat tool caused the coaster to warp a little but after lying flat over night it wasn’t noticeable any more so it might not really make a difference. I put the two coaster together and marked and punched the holes using my Crop-A-Dile. Then tied the Bermuda Bay ribbon through to hold the two coaster together. I stamped “always on my mind, forever in my heart” from the Stem Sayings stamp set using the Bermuda Bay ink above my flowers. The Bermuda Bay card stock is corner rounded with the corner punch and stuck on the right side with Stampin’ Dimensionals. My pictures is actually just held on by the little clip from the Clips Assortment. I tied a piece of the Bermuda Bay Polka Dot Ribbon on the clip.
The picture is Greg and I at the beach earlier this month. You might remember me telling you about the infection Greg had in his lymph nodes/neck area. If you look carefully at the picture you can see that on the left side of the picture his neck is swollen and the other side his neck is normal. In this picture he was already getting better (it was worse the week before) and now it is almost completely gone. I think he has one more follow up with the doctor in a couple of weeks.
Don’t forget to join me for the ROYAL BLOG TOUR that starts at midnight!
Have a great day!
Jul 22, 2009 | All in the Family, Chipboard, family, Scrapbook Pages, Stamps |
Yes – we are still happy together after 20 years. Today is our 20th wedding anniversary – can you believe it? I just really don’t feel like I have been married for 20 years – that sounds like such a long time but like they say time flies when you are having fun – and I must be having fun!
This is the card I made Greg for our anniversary.
I used the All in the Family set and the Family Phrases set – stamped on Whisper White with Black ink and colored in with Stampin’ Write Markers.
The ’20’ is chipboard from the On Board Lots of Letters set. I colored them with a sponge dauber and Old Olive craft ink.
“Anniversary” comes from the Fundamental Phrases stamp set and is punched with the Modern Label punch.
The Designer Series Paper is retired it was the Maine Blueberry paper from last year that I really liked. That gave me the colors that I used – Not Quite Navy, Bashful Blue and Old Olive.
Something that I didn’t think about was that 20 years ago we didn’t have digital cameras. I can’t think of when that started really but my digital pictures start in 2002 and we were 
probably a few years behind the trend anyway. I wanted to share a picture of what I looked like on my wedding day 20 years ago. I found a scrapbook page that I made using some of my pictures that were taken at the wedding reception (the non-professional ones). This was an old Simply Scrappin’ Kit that Stampin’ Up! had several years ago.
My dress was what I call a Southern Belle dress with lots of ruffles on it – probably not what anyone would want to wear today. I made my hat – got the plain white hat and added trim and pearls and stuff to it. I even made the hoop that I needed for my dress (I didn’t bustle it but carried it instead). Our reception was in one of the historic homes in Roswell, GA.
So it’s 20 years later and we are still happily married. We went away over the weekend on an anniversary trip – no kids. I found a secluded mountain cabin in North Carolina – it was a really nice place to stay. They had everything you could want or need in that cabin. The only thing I didn’t like was the drive up the mountain to get there – gravel road, very steep and curvy! It was like being on a roller coaster – and I don’t like roller coasters. You had to go fast to get up but if you hadn’t already been up you didn’t know where the turns were. So when we first arrived it took us three tries to get up in our SUV. Now I wish we had the 4-wheel drive. Once we were up I wasn’t sure I wanted to leave until we went home. But Greg said it would be fine and we would get back up so we did end up going out during the day on Friday and Saturday. Aside from the ride up and down the mountain to actually get to the cabin everything else was perfect – an awesome view of the mountains and the sunset.
Saturday we found a little road that took us to the Appalachian Trail (if you aren’t from somewhere east that is the trail that you can hike from Georgia to Maine). We have been on short day hikes here and there. This time we took a 1-1/2 mile hike in (and up) to the top of the mountain where there was an observation tour . We climbed the tower (up 2 flights of stairs to get to the top) and had a 360 degree view of the mountains! It was quite amazing! Our picture is below with the mountains in the background. The view was like that all the way around the tower.
Have a great day!
Jun 12, 2009 | Chipboard, Designer Series Paper, Stamper's Club, SU Ribbon |
Last Friday was my Stamper’s Club meeting. I already shared a few things earlier this week. I had another project to share – this is a desk organizer. This idea came from my upline – Wendy. It was a project she submitted to one of the Stampin’ Up! contests a few month’s ago. If you are a Stampin’ Up! demonstrator you can find instructions for it on the demonstrator website under the Stamping Challenge Ideas – I believe hers was from the Sale-A-Bration challenge.
We used the Good Morning Sunshine Designer Series paper which is retiring this month. The Kiwi Kiss striped ribbon is also retiring this month. This was the chipboard that Bethany was able to color one-handed with the sponge daubers – see the post about her broken arm – it is the So Tweet chipboard.
Here are the views of the two sides which were also decorated. 
I have mine on my craft table when I’m working and it hold all the little things I seem to lose. My bone folders, pens and pencils, my paper snips, my little ruler, my little tweezers, etc.
It is a happy little organizer that makes me want to smile when I see it!
Have a happy day and a great weekend!
