Stampin' Up Convention 2010

I'm back and still whirling in my mind after all the excitement. I've never seen so many scrapbookers, card makers, rubber stamp users, paper crafting women (and a few men) in one place. It was like being at the biggest CROP in history. I heard there were 2700 women (and a few men) in attendance. I also heard that was down from past years, but for my first experience I think it was the perfect number.

We had classes, workshops, games, parties, swaps (I'll share more about that later), food, snacks, and even a chocolate fountain! I didn't attend all the events, but the ones I did participate in were very informative. I'm rather a laid back sort of woman, so a lot of the hoopla was more than I could enjoy, but for girls who love lots of laughter, music, merry making and girl fun it was perfectly wonderful.

When we arrived we were given THE most adorable purse. It was bright pumpkin pie orange with melon mambo, whisper white and blushing bride pink circles. We were also given three sets of rubber stamps. Through out the four day event I collected all sorts of goodies so my suitcase was really heavy on the trip back to Texas.

The girls in attendance brought boxes full of card fronts and scrapbook pages to swap with each other. They had prearranged to have specific swaps covering specific stamps or subject matter. I was blessed enough to be gifted by a couple gals when they found out I was new and hadn't brought any to exchange.

We had many guest speakers, but I had a couple who turned out to be my favorites. I loved the gal (can't think of her name) who showed us a bunch of ways to use punches. She could sure think "outside the box". Another woman shared business ideas and how to meet the needs of our customers in a load of great ways. I bought her book as I was so impressed with her ideas and her ideals.

Hubby and I came together so instead of spending nights with the gals at the convention we shared quiet time alone and I showed him what I had learned.

There were all sorts of "display" walls set up with card ideas, scrapbook pages, and gift ideas. I am still feeling overwhelmed at all the creative juices that were flowing in that building.

Salt Lake City is a beautiful place. The temperature was right around the low 90s and it even rained a couple times keeping the temps down. We saw all sorts of interesting things after the convention. We had a good time and I was glad I went and that I learned so many new things.

Scrap Til You're Happy

May has been dubbed, "National Scrapbook Month" and with it comes the urge to scrap. Yesterday I had intended to rest all day, but instead I went to my office and worked on cards. I knew I didn't want to get in the middle of a huge project and then have a mess to clean up. I had originally went over to get my phone charger which was plugged into the surge protector next to one of my storage cabinets. I just couldn't resist all those lovely supplies so neatly organized.

Early yesterday I had purchased the April "Complete Cardmaking" (a magazine from the UK). It came with some cute card papers and "decoupages". I had seen that term used before in connection with scrapbooking and card making, but had no idea what it meant. My idea of decoupage is to glue a picture onto wood and then to cover it with some sort of protective medium. As I looked at the freebies that came with the magazine I could quickly see that it meant a picture duplicated several times and then cut out. One then layers pieces of the picture to make it look dimensional. I had fun making four cards and then I decided to use some of the brand new Stampin' UP Specialty papers I just bought in preparation for an upcoming workshop.

I inked the papers and the embossing that comes already put on the paper causes a resist look. I inked with some Rich Razzleberry, Pink Passion and Melon Mambo. These are some of my favorite colors. The hidden pattern on the paper is a lattice background. Once I inked the paper with the three colors it became a neat background for some felt flowers and some glittered leaves. Loverly. I added some buttons, a border with 1/8" ribbon woven through tiny holes that came punched in them. It was a great afternoon. Just a couple hours and my creative juices were filled to the brim. So much fun.

Today I have a workshop. We're making Father's Day cards, Cinco de Mayo cards and then playing with the new specialty papers. I know it will be "muy divertido" (very fun).

I look forward to scrapping all through this month. I have a brand new 6 x 6 Stampin Up album and a new Bigz flower die I love using. I can hardly wait to play.

What are you doing during this month to celebrate "Natl Scrapbooking Month"?

Forget-me-not Keeper Workshops

Hey Gals,

I am holding two workshops that you can sign up for. One will be in January and one in February. In this workshop we build a system to keep all your greeting cards for the upcoming year. The Forgot-me-not Keeper has monthly dividers with spaces for the names of your friends and family. We embellish the box, and each monthly divider. Then we will make two special handmade cards to begin your collection.

This Keeper is the perfect place for those cards that you make or buy that get misplaced when it's time to mail. With this list you can create cards long before the time of their special date. You can even buy "forever" stamps ahead of time, and have the cards addressed and ready for mailing.

I have already begun to make my cards and also to dig out cards I bought before, but never mailed. I will be ready this year.

If you'd like to be ready too, just let me know. You can reach me via email at cerwelt@gmail.com.

If you live in the Permian Basin of West Texas (Odessa and Midland area) you can attend the Saturday January 30th (1-3PM) class or the Sunday February 21st (2-4PM) class.

Registration for the February class must be made by January 20th. The cost of the class is $25.00. I accept checks, debit cards or credit cards.

Contact me as soon as possible as our space is filling up. We have 6 spaces left for January 20th and only 3 left for February 21st.

Cerise

So Fun!

We had such a great time at our PB & J Paper Craft meeting. Our subject was heat embossing and using calendars in Scrapbooks and paper crafts. The meeting went so fast I was amazed when I discovered it was 9:00PM!

The gals had loads of good ideas and Cheryl brought a wonderful door prize bag. Ammie brought yummy peanut butter thumb cookies with Hershey's kisses! We have some great gals in our club.

We moved the meeting to Tuesdays after I took a vote via email. So it looks like for the time being we'll be meeting the second Tuesday of each month.

We're doing a workshop in February to make this "Forget-me-not" keeper. It us a wonderful organizational box for all your greeting cards. It has 12 months with a calendar for each month listing your family and friends' special days. We had eight gals sign up for the workshop, but will hold additional workshops should anyone else want to make one. This is a separate event, but open to whoever asks to be included.

I'm working on February's meeting. Looks like we're doing some sort of Valentine's contest, but I'll let you know more after I develop the plan. I'm also working on finding a great guest host.

I will be posting ideas and techniques we learned on upcoming posts, so be sure to join and follow this blog so you'll know when the good stuff is up online here.

Too much fun.

Cerise Welter
Ambassador
Permian Basin Jewels Paper Crafters

New Stampin' Up! Catalogs

Gals,

January 4th marks the beginning of some tremendous great sales at Stampin' Up! and although I signed up to mail catalogs directly to you, they had some flub up at corporate headquarters. So here I am uploading them to this site and notifying as many of you as possible. They are Adobe Acrobat formatted so all you have to do is download them and see all the great deals. I'd rather they go in paperback form to your front door, but since that may take a while you can at the very least see them on your computer monitors.

There are so many great things in the new catalogs. I love the new mountable stamps. They can be mounted on clear acrylic or glass blocks. They are priced lower than wood mount stamps and I'm happy.

Stampin' Up also has a new type of punch that stores flat, but opens for quick use. I have a couple and love them. Nothing is harder than figuring out how to store bulky punches. I have several of them and they basically get dumped in a large Tupperware container. My "solution" is overflowing with stamps now.

If you have any questions or want to book a party, workshop or start your own club and get great free products. You can reach me at cerwelt@gmail.com. You can order directly from my website at http://cerise.stampinup.net

Cerise Welter
Stampin' Up!
Independent Demonstrator