Test Drive Stampin' Up - An Amazing Stampin' Up Opportunity! And a couple of projects too.

Stampin' Up is making an unbelievable offer for the next week, until Oct 21st.  To celebrate Stampin' Up's 25th anniversary, you can try out being a demonstrator for just $25!  If you have EVER considered it, now is the perfect chance!  If you don't like it then you still have over $25 worth of Stamps and if you do like it you have a fun job that will introduce you to some amazing friends.  I love being a demonstrator and I especially enjoy my "wholesale account".  I'd love to have you join my stampin' team, we have a lot of fun! 

Click on the picture above to get more details!

Isn't this owl bag adorable?  There was one sitting on every table at the Holiday Retreat for us to put our garbage in.  Well, being the thrifty person I am, I simply couldn't throw it away with the garbage!  I dumped it out and brought him home with me.  I know Mary Robinson put lots of work into making all of the bags and hope mine wasn't the only one saved from the garbage.

Here is a nice Thanksgiving card I got in the swap at the retreat from a sweet friend, Mychael Allen.  I love the Off The Grid stamp, it is a single stamp, I need it!  There are also some splattery accents with the Gorgeous Grunge stamp set to add some texture to the background. She finished it off with the 2-step leaf stamps from Gently Falling and a sentiment from the Tags For You set with  the coordinating Bracket Punch.  As much as I dread Winter coming and know that Fall is bringing it on faster, I love the colors and harvest symbols of Fall.

This card was also made by the wonderful and talented Mary Robinson.  It shows the versatility of the Gorgeous Grunge stamp set.  The great background was stamped with 4 of the 5 stamps in this set to give an amazing textured card without the bulk.  She also used some fun Washi Tape across the card and placed a sentiment from the Tags For You set. Isn't it a great card!

 

Now, if you want to attend retreats, join in the swaps and get discounts on stamps and other great Stampin' Up merchandise, contact me or sign up on my website here.  I'd love to have you join the fun!

Swap and Holiday Retreat Project

The Stampin' Sister's Holiday Retreat was so much fun!  I sat at the table with some wonderful ladies and we had fun stampin' the day away.  In the morning we did a lot of 3-D type projects and it was very fast paced.  In the afternoon we did cards so we could relax a little but the cards were great.  We also did a swap after lunch so with all these classes and swaps I got lots of ideas for future classes.

I'll share a couple of things with you today, first of all is my swap card.  I had seen a video on Stampin' Connection (an idea share site for Stampin' Up demonstrators) that showed how to make the new thinlit flip cards with an extra flap on the right side so you would have more room to write a message.  I loved the idea and since I had just gotten my Label Thinlit die I got busy and designed a swap card for retreat.  I wanted it to be in Fall colors and decided to make it a Thanksgiving card.  Do you ever send a Thanksgiving card?  I have so many wonderful people in my life that I am thankful for that I believe I need to send out some Thanksgiving cards to them. 

I used Pumpkin Pie card stock for the base of the cards.  I pulled out the tried and true Lovely As A Tree to stamp the card and the new Tags For You Thanksgiving sentiment.  I love that the Tags For You set has a matching punch, the Label Bracket Punch.

Open up the card and see the flap.  I used the Autumn Accents die to cut the acorns.  The Designer Series Paper is from the Quartrefancy pack.  I wouldn't have thought about using that paper on a Fall card but the yellow was perfect for this one!

Open the flap and you have plenty of room to write a message inside.  I thought about putting Whisper White panels inside to write on but the plain Pumpkin Pie is good too.  Besides, I was making 33 of them so that was the first thing to go to save time!

 Here is a fun project we did at the retreat.  What a great idea for the large stamp storage boxes!  We put the DSP cut to size inside the cover of the box and then used Sticky Strip to add a Chevron ribbon handle.  We made cards to put inside the box, what a great gift!  For some reason my computer won't let me add the picture though so maybe I can put it in the next post.  Technology kind of drives me nuts sometimes!

 

Well, I reckon I need to go gather more pears.  They should be all gone by the end of the week.  As much as I will enjoy the "fruits of my labor" all Winter, I'm going to be glad to have those hours spent cutting and canning over for the season.