Blog refresh

Hi there blog friends! Just thought I'd pop in real quick to let you know that I have been doing some tinkering on the blog tonight.  If you've stopped by my blog before, you may have noticed that things look a bit different.  I thought it was time for a little blog makeover as it's been awhile since I've made changes to the creative layout of my blog. So, I decided to freshen up my blog with a new header that I created in MDS2.  I'm really liking the crisp spring color palette and I hope you like it too!

I'm still toying with a few details here and there, but I think it's coming along. Part of the change was also making my blog post area a little wider to give some of the images and posts a little more breathing room.

It'll be a work in progress for the next week or so, so please pardon the dust. :)  In the meantime, I'd love to get your feedback!

I'll be back soon. Ciao for now!

Tinkering with my blog using MDS2

I decided it was time to give the bloggie blog an updated look, since it had been neglected for so long on my part!  So tonight, I fired up the MDS2 that I just downloaded and worked on some background ideas.  At first, I tried out one of the DSP patterns, but didn't feel like it was quite the right look for me.  What I finally went with was a background I created myself using the Epic Overlays digital stamps and the Keep this Memory digital embellishments and the finished product is what you see in the background of my blog!  What do you think?  Would love to get your feedback. I started with an 8 1/2" x 11" custom landscape page, and this is what I filled it with:

Once I started, it was fun and easy to put together!  Then I uploaded it as my background in Blogger and viola!  I also created my new header the other day and just made a few tweaks on the sizing and layout.  That was a lot of fun, too :)

My next thing is updating my sidebar labels, so I hope to get those done in the next day or so.  What I found is that MDS2 is definitely a great digital app, not just for scrapbooking - it's an awesome tool for creating blog graphics!

Gonna call it a nite...it's late for me.  Chat with you all soon.

Yay! A simple way to number your comments in your blogger blog!

Hi again bloggie friends!  I just had to share that I finally found a way to easily number comments in my blog!  I know I'm probably late to the game on this, but I've tried before with other instructions...to no avail.  Thanks to the super easy tutorial on thecutestblogontheblock.com, I now have numbered comments - woohoo!  They break it down for you so it's pretty clean and simple to implement.  Now you'll see my comments are numbered like so:

Isn't that cool?  For those of you that do blog candy or any sort of giveaways, this now eliminates the need to count through your comments individually {and double count sometimes, as I do to make sure I counted correctly!}.  Hope you find this helpful!  Have a great day! 

{woot woot!} - celebrating over 200,000 hits!

Hi all!  We made it!  Thanks to each of YOU, dear bloggie friends, my blog has had over 200,000 visits, which is definitely something to celebrate.  How about something crafty to DIE for?!  How does the Framed Tulips Embossing Die sound?

Well, this will be easy peasy for you to play in!

Here are the rules {only enforced by the "Honor System"}:
1. Leave me a comment on this post by midnight Pacific Time, Wed, April 20th.
2. On your comment, please make sure to include a valid email address or a blog URL (where I can leave a comment or have a way of contacting you). For those of you that are uncomfortable with leaving an email in a post, you can write your info like this: yourname at emailaccount dot com.
3. One comment per person please. :)
4. Anyone can play - international visitors welcome!

You can leave me a comment about anything or share the first flower that comes to mind when you think of SPRING!  For me, it's Poppies!!  I am so into those right now.  It could also be because I got my Martha Stewart Living Magazine the other day and there are a bunch of prettty Poppies on the cover!

I'll be announcing the winner on my blog on Friday, April 22nd!  Be sure to come back and visit!  Have a great day :)

blog updates and leadership bound!

Hey there friends!  You may have noticed I've changed a couple of  things up a bit on the bloggie blog.  I was playing with some new My Digital Studio {MDS} downloads from the Occasions Mini and created my new little header graphic and I've also changed my background, trading in the blue and white polka dots with these multi-color ones.  I think it's fun to change it up every once in a while - it's like getting a new outfit! ;)

Anyway, on other news, I'm headed to Nashville today to attend my very first ever Stampin'Up! Leadership conference.  Boy is it going to be chilly there!  But besides the weather, many of you are probably thinking - what?  It took you 10 yrs to go to leadership?  Well, truthfully, the reason I became a demonstrator was because of my instant love for the craft.  I really was hooked on stamping from the very beginning!  Sure, I do the occcasional workshops here and there, and I do enjoy doing them.  {I hope to do them more regularly this year, as a matter of fact.}  Ultimately though, I consider myself a hobby demonstrator at heart and haven't really pushed hard on the selling side.  For me, it's not about that.  I do it because I LOVE to create and show people how cool stamping and papercrafting can be.  My blog is a testament to that piece.  I am thankful to have 2 awesome downline gals{yay Kris and Norma!} who happened to find me online. WooHoo! I'm happy to support them both in their venture as Stampin'Up demos.  No goal is too big or too small - it's really whatever you want to make it!  So, I welcome anyone else that would like to be a  part of my team - know that you'll get support and guidance from me. :)  My philosophy is that I a papercraft enthusiast and I want to promote stamping and papercrafting in any way I can, using whatever vehicles - blogging, workshops, newsletters, etc.  Stampin'Up! has allowed me to do that.  It's contagious!  Inspire.  Create.  Share.  That's what I hope to do with the crafting side of this blog :)

Well, I've clearly rambled on for way too long now!  I look forward to the whole leadership experience and finding out what's in store.  I can't wait to hear about where Stampin'Up! is headed and can't wait to check out all the cool new products and great ideas that will be unveiled.  I'm hoping to post live from Nashville, so stay tuned! I know I got a little soap box-y on this post, so hope you humored me for a sec.  ;) 

Look forward to sharing with you soon!

Happy New Year!

Hi all!! Hope your first day in 2011 is going well! Have you guys made any New Year's resolutions? Well, I just have a few that I personally want to focus on this year:
1. Exercise regularly. My goal is to stick to a regular exercise routine which includes a minimum of exercising 3x/week of some running or other exercise activity for at least 30 minutes each session.
2. Be better organized. That means my craft room as well as my work and personal time management.
3. Craft and blog regularly. ;) You guys can help with this accountability for sure - my goal is to blog on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, at a minimum. And do one weekend day. Probably a lofty goal for me, but I will try my best to stick to this! As far as crafting goes, it's part of my relaxation therapy, so my goal is to carve out regular time for this creative release!!

How about you all? Would love to to hear what your resolutions are, if you're willing to share, of course! Maybe we can keep each other accountable!!

Thanks for popping in! Would love for you to visit me regularly in 2011! ;) Bye for now!

Hello there!

Hi blog friends!!  Hope you guys had a very Merry Christmas!  I know I've been quiet for a few days on the bloggo here, but as I'm sure you all know, time is precious during the holidays so I haven't had many opportunities to post.  I do have a couple of fun announcements to share with you guys:

Year End Blow Out - Guest Designer!!

* Some of you may have noticed on my right side bar that I'll be a guest designer for Dawn Rapsas UStamp With Dawn and FriendsYear End Blowout!!!  Woot Woot!! It's truly an honor!  I have to say that I am blown away by all the creative talent of the entire Design Team Crew from all around the world.  I'm excited to be a part of this amazing event which starts on December 31st and goes through January 19th.  You'll need to sign up on  site link above.  This event will be showcasing Stampin'Up! projects created using 12x12 paper.  The cool thing too is that the color combos showcase every SU color, so not only do you get project ideas, but you'll also get a taste of a variety of color palettes to get your creative juices flowing!!  Just AWESOME. And you'll have the ability to download pdfs of each of the projects for your own personal use.  You don't want to miss this!!!

Paper Crafters Sampler Design Team!

* I'm excited to announce that I've been asked to be part of Melanie Schulenberg's Paper Crafters Sampler Design Team !! Woohoo!  This is a monthly online publication of Stampin'Up! Projects and is such a great resource for your paper crafting ideas.  You can subscribe for each month's edition and download each of the projects and instructions, too.  I've seen the awesome projects the DTs have created in past editions and it's definitely worth the while.  You can check out the site and trial sampler to see what it's all about. Then, if you decide to sign up, you can use referral code PCSRD. :) 

Wowzers!  I have to say I am so excited to be a part of both teams and I am looking forward to pushing my creativity to the limit and make projects that I hope you all will enjoy.  So, my dear friends, there's a lot in store for 2011!  Thanks so much for continuing to pop in for a visit!  I've got a bunch of new ideas I want to try out on the blog here, too, so stay tuned for sure!  By for now.  Have a fantastic day!!

thankful for the {cherry on top} award!

How fun that I got this sweet award from Amanda Perth from Australia!  Thank you so much for the kind gesture, Amanda! Hugs to you! :)

For this award, I need to share 3 things about myself and then pass it on to 5 blogs.

Here are 3 tidbits about me:

1.  I LOVE purses and shoes - outside of stamping and papercrafting, they are vices that I enjoy indulging in :)

2.  My favorite ice cream flavor is Jamoca Almond Fudge - YUM!

3.  My favorite book of all time is Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. I have a fascination with the Lizzy/Darcy thing, I guess. :)

Now here are the 5 fabbie blogs I'm passing this award to...these ladies are sooo creative and inspirational!

Angela
Chat
Jinny
Selene
Steph

Have a fantastic rest of your weekend, dear blog friends!

are you a fan? I've got a badge for you!

Hi again.  I think I've gotten addicted to creating badges on MDS.  Soo much fun!  So, for those of you, dear blog readers who come visit my blog, this badge is for you!  I would love for you to post it in your sidebars if you like :)  You can post the graphic below or check out the smaller graphic in my sidebar.  Feel free to email me or leave me a comment if you have any questions!

The owl image is too stinkin' cute, I couldn't resist making something out of him.  I hope you like it.  I created the digital graphic using the owl punch, the scallop oval punch, and the bird punch in the MDS tool. It was such a piece of cake to make!  I highly recommend MDS {aka My Digital Studio} to any of you that don't have a digital application yet and are looking to purchase one.  Not only is it super intuitive to use, but it's loaded up with super cute Stampin'Up! images and punches, so you'll be able to make all kinds of things in a snap - from digital graphics, cards, scrapbook pages, albums, and calendars just to name a few.

Anyway, I'm getting carried away!  The main point of this post was to share a badge with you guys - it would truly be an honor for me to have you post on your blogs :) 

Have a fabbie day!

new blog look

Hi blog peeps!  It had been a while since I've tinkered with my blog header and layout, so I thought I'd change it up a bit and go with a whole new color scheme.  What do you think?  Since it's almost fall time, I decided to go with a more subdued and muted look.  I had fun making my new header in MDS and now that I've looked at the header a bit, I think I do like the black background with the Vanilla/Baja Breeze/Wild Wasabi color accents.  I also changed my sidebar graphics in MDS - I made the Modern Label "labels" that say "Links", "About", and "Follow."  I'll have to look at my page again tomorrow and see if I like the new change.  Would love to get your feedback!

In the meantime, I'm going to call it a night.  It's getting late!  See you tomorrow.

Blog update - new My Stampin' Specials page!

Hi there blog peeps!  Just got a quick post for you.  I'm still a little bit jet lagged, but already went back to work today!  Anyway, my update is that I have a new My Stampin' Specials page where I'll be offering monthly specials. I've combined July and August and you can check out that special here.

These specials are only available for my US customers (sorry, international readers!)

That's all for now...gotta get to bed!  G'night!

woot woot wootie woot!

Come on - say that with me!  How fun is that phrase!! I have Amy Tsuruta to thank for that little ditty {BTW - how fun and creative is SHE!!} - She left a fun and sweet comment on my post that made me chuckle and smile...needless to say, the phrase got stuck in my head and I've been saying it all day...seriously!  I still am oozing with excitement about being on the 2S4Y team!!!  I just added this blinkie to my blog.  I intended to post a card today, but alas, it was one of those days where time escaped me...it was a tad bit busy for me at my day job!  I hope to post something tomorrow though.  For now, I appreciate you humoring me and sharing in my excitement!  Yay! {Can you tell I'm smiling from ear to ear as I type this post?} Thanks again to Laura and Kazan, the Fab Ladies at at the heart of 2S4Y :)

More to come soon!! Ciao for now!

Tinkering with the blog

Hi all! Hope you're having a better weekend than I am. I'm a little under the weather, so I haven't been very productive. I'm finding that being sick, achey and coughing is no fun at all! So, I've basically been lackadaisical at best and confined to the house {mainly on the couch}. Although, if you've visited my blog at various points this weekend, you'll have noticed that I've had some spurts of energy and have been tinkering with the background and changing my blog header. I think I like the one I've just created now with the little Cheep Talk bird. I've been playing with MDS and my new Sweet Pea download, which has the cute paper and felt flower images. They're super cute! But, I was drawn back to the bird from the Cheep Talk stamp set, as I wanted to simplify my header and make it smaller. Here's the other header I had on my blog yesterday, in case you missed it: What do you think? There are a lot of fun elements, but I think it turned out bigger than what I had wanted. So, my latest blog header is a little less "chunky" so you can see more of the page when you come and visit :) For those of you that have blogs and are curious as to what size my header is, I export the MDS image to a JPG and resize it in my Adobe Photoshop. I have a fixed width of 880 pixels across (since I have a 3 column blog), and I just keep the the length and width ratio aspect, so the length ends up being whatever that ratio maintains it to be. Hope that makes sense. If you guys have questions, feel free to leave me a comment and I'll answer back in the comments as well.

I hope to have another post later today, but I still gotta finish up the project, so we'll see. Hopefully, I'll get another spurt of energy! Thanks for visiting :)

Tweaking my blog layout

Just wanted to make a quick post to let you guys know that if you've come and visited on Sunday night, you may have experienced some random layout formats...that's cuz I've been doing some changes on the back end to make my blog a 3 column format. After a couple of tries, I finally got it! For those of you on Blogger that have a 2 column and want to convert to 3 column, I found some great instructions here from The Cutest Blog On The Block website. They've got some great tips and tricks for bloggers! Just thought I'd share :)

The reason why I wanted to switch to a 3 column is because my 2 column blog was getting a little too right-side heavy, if you know what I mean. My actual posts in the middle column would end, but the right column would just keep going, and going...etc. You get the gist. So, hopefully this layout will work out a little better. Now, I may need to adjust my header so it fits better in it's wider space. In the meantime, I hope you keep visiting...just pardon the dust ;) Have a good night!

Blog Makeover

Hi peeps! Happy Sunday! Not sure if you noticed, but my blog has a new look today. I thought it was time to change my background to a new color scheme, but then, after I changed it, the photo in my header didn't really "go" with it anymore, know what I mean? So, I thought I'd play with some ideas using MDS {My Digital Studio} and created this new blog header banner you see now. What do you think? I really had fun coming up with this!! Now that I know how easy it is to use all the different elements, like the stamps, embellishments, punches and colors, I think I'll be customizing my header to match my background more often!

The My Digital Studio program is now available for customers to order now, so you too, can have fun creating graphics and digital scrapbook pages and cards! There's a special this month where you can purchase My Digital Studio at 50% off when you host a workshop of $400 or more. The retail price: $79.95; promotional price: $39.97, when you use your free hostess dollars! Contact me for details!

I also wanted to let you know there's a clearance sale going on my Demonstrator Website right now! These are items that have been discontinued from prior catalogs and now they are available at super deep discounts. Shop now and take advantage of the savings! (Only US customers can order from my website...sorry, international friends!).

Thanks for stopping by! Have a great day!

Hot off the Press - Convention Registration and My New Playlist!

Woohoo - I'm excited to share that I registered for the Stampin'Up! convention today. It's taking place this August and I really do look forward to going every year. I've made some great friends there over the years and I always am blown away by all the new things Stampin'Up! comes up with. Believe it or not, it will be my 9th year this year. I am really looking forward to this one because I would love to meet some of you virtual friends out there that I've met through my blog and visiting other blogs, in person! So, if any of you, dear readers, are planning on going to convention, leave me a comment or email me and let's try and meet in Salt Lake this August! Nothing formal or anything, but I would love the opportunity to make some name and face associations.

Another thing I'm excited about is the playlist I added to my blog just this evening! I think it's gonna be a work in progress, but so far, I'm happy with the songs I picked. I hope you guys like it too - if not, you can always turn the volume down or mute your computer ;)

Well, that's all I got tonight. I've been busy getting things ready for my friend's baby shower this coming weekend. I'll definitely share some pics after! I'll be posting a project tomorrow. I just sorta ran out of time tonight...too preoccupied with my playlist (heehee!).

Hope to see you guys tomorrow. Thanks for visiting!

Exciting Non-stamping news

For those of you who've been following my blog, you may know that I got laid off from my day job this past fall. Well, I am excited to report that I'm gonna be starting a new job TOMORROW! WooHoo!!! While it is a contract job, I have to say that it feels great to know that I'm back to work. I'm excited about it and looking forward to a new challenge! That said, I do want to also say that I intend to keep up with my blog, but just wanted to let you know that if I miss some posts, it might be due to me adjusting to a new schedule. I've enjoyed blogging, stamping and crafting these last few months while I've been looking for work that I really want to make sure that I keep a work life balance! We'll have to see how I do in the coming days and weeks....in the meantime, read on to check out the cute scallop bag and box in my next post...

Thanks for visiting :)

Yay - our new computer is here!

How excited am I right now?! Our new computer arrived this afternoon and is now up and running. Well, there are still a few things that I need to install on it, like the Adobe Photoshop elements that I'm still waiting on from Amazon and I still need to get Microsoft Office. But the computer itself is functional...all I need to do is get a little familiar with Vista. Hopefully, I'll be able to edit and add watermarks to my pictures again in a few days and then I'll be all set! Well, I just wanted to report that...I know, I am such a techie nerd! Off to explore what my new computer can do. Have a great night!

Technical difficulties...

Good morning all! Well, I am sad to report that my computer is having hardware issues...meaning it won't even turn on! I took it to get repaired yesterday. So I am blogging today via my cell. It looks like it'll be a few days until I have access to my computer (if it's fixable) or we'll need to get a new one. It is amazing how we've become so dependent on technology. I am already going though computer withdrawal. Silly, huh? In the meantime, I'll try and make do with the mobile blogging and try to figure out how to post some pictures. I'll keep you all posted. Have a great Wednesday!