Halloween

Well now that I seem to be back up and running, I thought I'd get at least one picture posted of our recent Municipal Alliance event. Every year the Frelinghuysen Municipal Alliance sponsors the "open house" at our town hall. We do a drug and alcohol free events and Halloween is one of our biggest events. We prepare hot dogs, punch, hot drinks along with lots of candy! We had 150 hot dogs and had to borrow some that were left there. Even though the weather was iffy, we had a great turnout! Here's a picture of our crew and som of our place decked out! Everyone seemed to have a great time!

Computer

Well I think I finally have everything running ok. Had some major problems and still working on getting everything back to what it was. Had to send in my laptop to have one key fixed. Well they couldn't just fix the one, they had to replace the whole thing! Well I bought a new 16GB flashdrive to back up everything. That went fine. Used it a couple of times and then couldn't get it to read on any computer! Oh, how crushed I am! I'm missing pictures from June through October along with numerous files which will takes months to replace. Looking into having a data recovery company try and retrieve the files. Let you know how that goes! So when I got my laptop back, I had to put all my software back on. Thought that was no big deal! Spent the week doing that, a little at a time. Then it started "not responding" to everything, whether I was just trying to open a file or surfing the web! I spent the entire last Friday fixing that! I was having a real meltdown! I was planning on spending the day preparing for the craft show I was doing the next day at the local Blairstown Presbyterian Church. Welll that didn't happen. I have things working again, brought it into the office and had Brandon do his magic so I could work at the office as well. I'm still putting all my favorites back into my favorites file AGAIN! There is that love/hate relationship you have with your computer. I hope all that kind of stuff is behind me. I think I'm going to look into an external hard drive I can use to back up everything from time to time. This is not worth all the frustration and time!

Stamp swap

Well I sent in my laptop in the shop to get the one "key" that popped off. I've been dredding doing this, but needs to be done. Now I have to use my husband's computer which is so as malasses! So here is a quick post of some of the projects we did at my upline Tina meeting the other night. This first one, is the one I did. My sideline Ginger Gould did a similar one with us in a fall theme. The instructions were posted on our SU site and had wanted to make one for the longest time. It's such a cute little book. Would go perfect in your bag to show off your family!

This one was designed by Colleen Benedetto. Such a cute little wagon. We kept on saying all the wonderful things we could put in it as well as make it for different holidays.

This ornament to the right was designed by Louise Del Velvecchio, this was so easy yet so elegant!

The snowman ornament was designed by Tracy Bakunas, this was another quicky but again so cute.

The next one was this Top Note box. Love the holiday paper in the catalog, was going to get, but forgot, got to make sure I pick up this pack! This box was designed by Kathryn Roberts. Beautiful!

These last two were also fun, and just as charming! The left one was using our matchbox die cut and the new sizzlet folder die for the tags, the sizzlet die for the trees, snowflake & bird and the embossing folder. Debbie Modrowsky designed these. The far right was designed by none other then our fabulous upline Tina Rosenkraus. This was using the boxes in the holiday mini as well and a piece from one of the extended Bigz die cuts. You could put a photo there and use it as an ornament or just a decoration during the holidays. Loved all these projects and now have some great ideas for classes!

Enjoy! Cyndy

Octoberfest

Well I finally uploaded my pictures from Octoberfest and Eileen sent me a couple so I can share our group photo. I had a great time and came home exhausted! My Elizabeth girls (as I call them, but they are not all from Elizabeth!) stopped at Newton for dinner and then on to Shoprite to pick up their last essentials for the weekend and got lost getting to camp. My local friend Debbie and I reserved our sleeping spot and then hung out in the dinning hall for the rest of everyone.

Saturday, the weather was beautiful and the first half was rather relaxing. After breakfast I treated myself to a massage and then went to my basketry class. The class was taught by my friend Debbie Zvanut. She told me some time ago that my sister Pam was the one that taught her how to weave! Well Debbie does a beautiful job on her baskets and I always enjoy taking her classes. My friends from Elizabeth and I decided were going to go out to her place, outside of Allentown, and make a basket some weekend. Well I didn't get my basket done during the class. I never do, but did finish later that night (that was around 2am!). We had a lunch break, which was great as usual (so was breakfast). They always have so much food. Here are pictures of me finishing my basket with my instuctor and my finished basket!

The afternoon, I taught two stamping classes. One was a stationery box with a card, gift card & tag to put into it. My other friend Debbie helped me to prepare for these classes along with helping me teach them as well. This class was a bit difficult and took a bit longer, but we got it done! The second class was much easier. They made an explosion box. Here is a picture of my sample, along with what the inside looked like. I found several different variations on the internet. The one we made was just one sheet of 12x12 cardstock for the base and an 8 1/8" square of DSP for the lid. Everyone was able to use more of their creativity on this one. Wish I had taken some pictures while they were working on them, but at this point I was pretty tired! Everyone who wasn't done used the free time we had before dinner to finish up.

After dinner we had a white elephant sale. In case you don't know what that is, everyone brings stuff they don't want anymore, they sell raffle tickets and you take a chance at winning what you put your tickets to. Camp earned enough money to buy a new funyak! Way to go!

Saturday evening after dinner, they had a fire in the dinning hall (not to worry, it was in the fireplace) and sang girl scout songs. I was a bit tired and wanted to finish my basket, so I along with the rest of our group went back to our cabin to hang out. Some did some scrapbooking, some just read and others finished their projects as well. My friend Diane wasn't able to take my explosion box class, so she stopped in to make one herself (sort of!) My friend Diane is not a crafter and always lets me know, but I think secrectly she enjoys it! So this time as she made her box, I got her to be more involved. Here is a picture of her making her box.

Finally here is a picture of our group! My Elizabeth girls are planning another adult weekend in Febuary, can't wait!That's all for now! Will have to be out in that nasty weather later today. It's the Marching Band "Music Under the Stars" fund raiser. The band is doing quite well so far this year, they have come in first place at each competition. They are a very focused group of kids and really put their all into their performance. I hope they move things indoors, but will be prepared to be outside if necessary!

Last Wish

Going through my email this evening I received this information today from my pastor and thought, why not post this on my blog and I could really get the information out. This boy, Ethan Theilmann, from Franklin, NJ who is seriously ill and is hospitalized at Newton Hospital.
He has a final wish to receive a thousand birthday cards to celebrate his upcoming birthday on Monday, October 19th.
If you are able to send him a card, his family would be much appreciative.
The mailing address is: Ethan Theilmann, 19 Auche Drive, Franklin, NJ 07416.
Let's try and grant his wish, I know we can do this!

Fall Fest

Now for Fall Fest. We had such a great time. Besides all the great displays, speakers and make n takes. It's also so nice to see other demonstrators that I haven't seen in a long time and get a chance to catch up on how they're doing. My upline Tina asked some of her downline to do a demo during our event. So I offered and did one the new Shimmering Paint that we carry. I had a lot of fun doing it. Here is one of the cards I did. I used the champagne to heat emboss the image and then colored it in with the frost white.

I'm now going to try and post a picture or two of a swap I got from Michelle Zindorf! It was a pity swap too! I feel so privileged! I now have to send her a card. Isn't this a beautiful swap! I did get a few other swaps, which I'm going to be sending them a swap in return. Well that's all for now. I'll try and post again soon with more pictures from Fall Fest and my Kids Stamp Camp. Got to work on my album I'm creating with our new "My Digital Studio". As a demonstrator I was able to pre purchase it. In just a few days, customers will be able to purchase. It is such a great paper crafting tool! More later.

Technique Class

Well I wanted to post much sooner then this, but it has been a very busy month so far! I seemed to go from one project to another with no down time. Now that Fall Fest is over I have a bit of a breather before the next event. First here is a picture of a card we did at my belated Technique Tuesday class. This was really fun to do and looks really elegant in person. We used alcohol inks to do this, but I'm sure I could have used the SU Classic inks in a cotton ball with rubbing alcohol like doing polished stone without the metallic ink.

Supplies:

card stock

aluminum foil

alcohol inks & applicator

blending solution

Xyron

Black Stazon

embossing folder

Big Shot

So here is how to do: Take a piece of cardstock (doesn't matter the color). As far as size goes, it depends on what you're going to use it for, here I used 3 3/4" x 5". Place you're card stock through a xyron or cover one side with double sided adhesive and place on a piece of aluminum foil (sticky side to foil) slightly larger then your cardstock. Fold over the extra foil to back. Now load up your cotton ball/piece of felt or whatever with about 2-3 drops each of 2 different ink colors. Dark colors work better on this project. After you have the in on your cotton ball add alcohol unless you're already using alcohol ink you then add the blending solution. Now pounch your cotton ball/piece of felt all over the piece of foil covered card stock. Do this until you're satisfied with how it looks. Place your piece into an embossing folder with the foil towards the negative side and run it through your BIG SHOT. Take out and with a juicy Stazon pad (black) swipe it over the raised part (embossed). Add to card and embellish as desired.