Spooky Spider Candy Jar

This HUGE candy jar uses a new Decor Elements that will be available sometime later this fall, but was available to all demonstrators who attended Stampin' Up!'s convention in Salt Lake this year.

It's yet to be filled with all that tasty candy that is available for Halloween, but it will be soon! This candy jar (with all it's future contents) will be in the hands of one lucky person who attends my stamp-a-stack on September 27th.

Serene Spring Bunny Tile

Before convention, I had time to play around with the Serene Spring stamp set (a level 2 Hostess set this fall). It's the perfect size stamp to use on the tumbled 4x4 tiles. The image is stamped with Staz-On Jet Black ink, and colored in with the Water Wonder Crayons and a blender pen. It is sealed with Krylon Workable Fixatif found at any craft store. The last step was to adhere a piece of cork to the back.

Here is second tile with the remaining stamp in this set:

Sunset Card

I had a chance this week to play around a little bit with a new stamping technique. You can find it here on Andrea Walford's blog Brayered and Sponged Sunset Background
Andrea has done a wonderful job putting together this tutorial (as well as many others). The Inspired by Nature stamp set seemed perfect for this technique. I think it makes for a very manly card.

Eastern Blooms Card

I finally got some time to play a bit with a few of my new sets. This card uses Eastern Blooms and Refuge & Strength. The colors are Tangerine Tango, Kiwi Kiss and Chocolate Chip. They look less vibrant than in person. The Kiwi Kiss has been inked direct-to-paper with a Kiwi Kiss ink pad. The flowers were stamped in Tangerine Tango (repetively inking off color so each one is lighter than the one before). The leaves are made using the small oval punch, folded in half, then rolled through the crimper at an angle. It's a little different, but I like it.

My convention swap card

This was the card I made for swaps at convention this year. I only had time to make 21 of them. 20 to swap with others to get new ideas, and one to give to SU! I'd never swapped a 3"x6" card front before, so I wasn't sure what the response would be. But, with this size being so popular right now, I wanted to give it a try. It went very well. This stamp us Heard from the Heart, one of the new sets from the catalog that will be out next week! The red and green textured papers are 2 of the new In-Colors for this year: Red Riding Hood Red and Kiwi Kiss. The designer series paper is Bella Rose, and is also from the new catalog.

Convention Buzz continues

Today was another full day. It started with classes, which for Jen and I included another round of make and takes. I'm excited to show some of them with you very soon! The afternoon included our last general session to wrap everything up. There were more wonderful demonstrations with great samples and more give-a-ways. I won a really cute birthday cupcake set and matching stampin' around wheel as well as a roll of the new 1" wide double stitch chocolate chip ribbon. It'll be fun to play with that one very soon.


The now famous game show was today also. This year it was "Stamptionary". Just like pictionary, but with Stampin' Up! terminology. Players were randomly selected from the demonstrator's in attendance.


The first round was East vs. West, with the West winning. The second round was Rookie vs. Veteran. That round ended with the Veteran's winning. The final round was a showdown between the winners, and the West won. It's always fun to watch.


The day ended with UPS donating and delivering a free stamp set to every demonstrator in attendance. It was the new Ronald McDonald House set. As you can see from the picture, it was quite the hoopla!

Convention Buzz

Just checking in from Salt Lake City with an update about Stampin' Up! Convention 2008! The events started on Wednesday with check-in. I got to be one of the first to see the brand-new catalog. Boy are you going to LOVE all the new stamp sets and accessories! It made for a busy day, with a LOT of demonstrators in attendance.


I toured the Riverton distribution center in the afternoon. The bus trip was HOT. Did I say hot, because it was. The air conditioning might have been on, but it didn't feel like it.


Thursday was the first full day of meetings. The time of make & takes was great fun, and I'll have samples to share here when I get back as well. I got to see a few examples of Phase 2 in Decor Elements that will be out early fall. And, I learned some neat ways to display the vinyl onto things other than walls.


The evening was filled with awards and entertainment that was provided by Tonic Sol-fa, an accapella group with a great interesting sound. One of the members of the group sang a song about stamping. It was very funny.

Today was another full day of meetings. The biggest announcement of the day was.........
You'll have to find out about that when I get back! I spent the evening touring Salt Lake: the Temple Square and Capitol building with my down-line Jen. Salt Lake is full of nostalgia and great architecture.