Congratulations to ME - and that means a chance to WIN for you!!! :D

Hi, y'all! :) If you're not local, you probably thought I dropped off the face of the earth. Sorry. Health, time, and yadda yadda. :D

So! Since I last posted, I celebrated my 15th anniversary with Stampin' Up! Yea, me!

But that's not what the congratulations is all about - last month, I passed a milestone with Stampin' Up! - one that has some benefit with it: I have lifetime sales of over $100,000.

Yes, a lot of it has come out of my own pocket - I keep buying new toys, even if I'm not inspired at the moment. :D But I also really love our products, and I love bundling products to save money. So I get them, and I look at them, and I share them, and tine I finally try them out. :D

ANYWAY. I'm sure that's not why you are reading this post. I'm SURE you want to know where the winning part comes in... :)

I didn't reach that sales goal by myself. YOU have helped me reach it. And I am SO blessed - if you've ever stamped with me, attempted to stamp with me :D, or purchase from me to stamp on your own - to have you in my life. Even if only virtually.

SO. Here's the winning part:

I AM GIVING AWAY TWO (2) $25 GIFT CERTIFICATES and a grand prize $50 GIFT CERTIFICATE!!!!!!!!!!!!

Here are the rules:
1. You enter by leaving a comment on THIS post. It has to make sense.
2. You may enter DAILY from now until MIDNIGHT CST on 10/25/2016. Each comment MUST be different.
3. You may place an order through my business site (CLICK HERE to go!) for an extra FIVE entries for every $50 in merchandise you purchase.
4. You may schedule a party/place a party order (Sorry, November hostess, you don't get this benefit) between now and MIDNIGHT CST on 10/25/2016 for an extra 20 entries.
5. I will use a random generator online to choose our three winners.
6. I will also be giving my dedicated customers and hostesses bonus entries without their having to do anything, as long as they've ordered/hosted in the past year. THIS IS AT MY DISCRETION!!!!

So! Anyone is welcome to order; share if you wish! I hope to have a new card or something to share soon - but we're about to go on a trip. :) That's why you get TWO weeks to enter!

Thank you for being faithful, and for sticking around! :)

Have a WONDERFUL day! Make sure to mate the time to stamp SOMEthing!

MDS Monday - Seventeen Years

Welcome to Monday! :) Here's a quick and easy page, done using MY DIGITAL STUDIO!

Yup. Seventeen years. :) We still irk each other, we still growl. But each day we learn, we love, and we share the grace God's given us. God's good, and Kenn's a good man. :) I am blessed.

Now, go download your free 30-day trial of MDS! :D

Have a wonderful day! Stamp something, if you're not gonna go try it. :D

Welcome! card

Happy Friday! And tomorrow's my 17th anniversary - Happy Anniversary, Kenn! :D

Sorry about the photo quality sometimes - we're down a camera until it's fixed and back to us, so I'm borrowing my dad's camera sometimes. I'm grateful he has one! :D

I really, really like this card. It's simple but elegant, in my very humble opinion. :D The card stock colors are Very Vanilla, Early Espresso, and Burnt Brown Sugar. (It's not my old fave, Creamy Caramel, but it's not a bad color at all!) I used Versamark, and embossed the leaves from Gently Falling with gold and the saying with Early Espresso. The saying is from Occasions Alphabet.

There. You see? Simple and elegant. :)

Have a wonderful weekend! Be sure and make the time to stamp something!!!!

An Old Technique, but a FAVE! :D

Welcome to Wednesday! :) Are you having a good week? Have you stamped anything yet? :D

Well, for today's card, I went back to one of my favorite techniques - it's an old one, but such fun to see what you come up with! :)

This is one of the stamps from the BEST OF... release from January - the BEST OF BIRTHDAYS. :) It IS our 25th anniversary, after all! They're wonderful stamp sets, and I think they're at a great price, too! :) When I saw it, I decided I wanted to do something with a fun background for it. :D

I used Versamark and black embossing powder to stamp the stamp on Whisper White, then colored it in with Pumpkin Pie, Real Red, and Daffodil Delight Stampin' Write Markers. Those are the same colors of reinkers and card stock I used - those links will take you directly to the categories, not the specific colors. :)

Marbling is easy. I have one of the larger stamp storage boxes with five marbles in it. I store it that way, so it's always together when I want to use it. :) I should have gone a LITTLE lighter with the Pumpkin Pie reinker, but I'm happy overall with the background.

This card was MEANT to be super easy and quick. Otherwise, I probably would have done some Dazzling Diamonds on the flames, maybe some Crystal Effects on the candles or plate, brads or eyelets or something in the corner of the card front. :D

OK, I'm outta here!!We leave in FOUR DAYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! EEK!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :D Have a wonderful day, and be SURE to MAKE the time to stamp something!!!

SURPRISE! :D

SURPSISE! I'm here on THURSDAY!!!! :D Why, you ask? Well, I know most of you don't pay any attention to the MDS pages I post, and I thought MAYBE I could at LEAST get you to look if I did it as an EXTRA post! :D

Did you know that you can try MY DIGITAL STUDIO for FREE for 30 days? It's fully-functional; you can download the trial, and play with it to your heart's content - and I can almost guarantee you'll be impressed and want it! :D Just click here -----MY DIGITAL STUDIO FREE TRIAL!!!----- and go to town! (There's LOADS of helpful information at My Digital Studio Online if you want to see videos, ask other users questions, get pricing, etc., etc!!!)

ANYWAY. If you click on the photo above, you can see the pages at the size I downloaded them at. This was a sketch layout challenge, and I absolutely love doing them. It forces me out of my personal box, and helps me get some scrapping done at the same time! :) As you can see, this is a layout of our 15th anniversary - if you've been following my blog for a while, you may remember this post about it. If not, you can always go read it.... :D

So! HAPPY THURSDAY, Happy Last Day of January, and just be BLESSED! :D TTFN!

Sixteen YEARS!

 Good Monday Morning!

Well, we made it. Kenn and I, that is. :) Made it to celebrating SIXTEEN YEARS together. In some ways, it seems like just yesterday that we were saying, "I do." In others, not so much. :D

ANYWAY. Because of everything going on around here (I'm in Missouri when you read this!), I decided to use MY DIGITAL STUDIO to make my card.

Seriously. You need to try this program out. You can do so for FREE for 30 days; check out the button on the sidebar there! It's SO easy to manipulate things, to design whatever YOU want. The words on the front are from various digital greeting sets I've purchased; I just mixed and matched and moved until I got what *I* wanted.

Oh, and in case you didn't know, our wedding colors were black, white, and red. :D (VERY me!!! :D)

For the inside, I used two stamps in MDS, then typed my message. It really couldn't be any easier! I printed off both the front and the inside, and matted them - I did use the retired ticket corner punch above, but YOU know it's one of my favorite tools of all time!

I used the  Perfect Polka Dots embossing folder on the very front of the card, to give it just a bit of texture.

So, now you've seen my anniversary card for Kenn. :D And know that we're working on year #17. And my wedding colors. If you've been around for a while, you might even know me better than I know myself... :D

Have a WONDERFUL day! Be sure and take the time to stamp something!

Happy Anniversary, Kenn Stilger!

Today is our fifteenth anniversary. In some ways, it's been a LONG fifteen years; we've been through a LOT together. But this anniversary finds us counting our blessings more than ever - including each other. We still have our areas where we struggle with each other, just like anyone else, but they become a little less each year. :D This is the cover of an 8x8 hardcover memory book I'm making him - made MUCH more difficult by my hard drive crash. My backup only saved half of my photos. AUGH! :D

Anyway. :D I won't be available today; I'm getting a massage and we're going out to a very special dinner. Have a wonderful day, be sure to tell the people you love that you love them, and take the time to STAMP something. (I may not be stamping today, but I can almost guarantee that a thought or two will sneak into my mind.... :D)

I keep forgetting to show this off to you!

Yes, that says ten. As in ten years totally completed! Stampin' Up! doesn't consider you to have been with the company the same way we count birthdays. :D I joined in June 2000! And yes, those are diamond chips. :)

It's been a lot of fun, and I've met some incredible people along the way. I've used a lot of card stock and adhesive, and may have ended up wearing just about as much ink as I've put on paper.... :D

Thank you for being a part of my journey. I love hearing from you! Every time you leave me a comment, it's truly "blog love". :D (Hint, hint.... :D )

OK. Today is staff and student orientation at the school in which we're going to be teaching. :D I need to go wash off some of this ink.... :D

Have a wonderful day! Be sure and take the time to STAMP something!

I'm off!

I know I haven't posted much this week. But you'll just have to forgive me. :) I'm off to spend a weekend with my husband; Monday was our 13th anniversary. Eight years ago today, we were in San Francisco celebrating our 5th anniversary with the "honeymoon" we never had. Nor will we ever forget that anniversary trip.

Anyway. :) I'll be back next week; I've been creating up a storm, and will hopefully be able to show you something! :D

Have a wonderful weekend - and take the time to STAMP something!!!!!!!! :)

Fun Times Last Night! :)

Last night was my Let's Get Punchy! class. This is one of the five designs we did; isn't it adorable (if I do say so myself??)? :D The wings are large oval punches from Cerise Designer Series Paper, The head and "behind" are 3/4" circle punches. The embossed tiny dots on the Real Red card stock are done with the Crop-A-Dile, as well as the holes punched for the eyelets - and those set, as well. As for the ribbon - well, I just LOVE our gingham ribbon. It FEELS so nice!! :D And it added just that special something, don't you think?

Today is my and Ken's eleventh anniversary. Ken's been really sweet this week, and I'm waiting for him to bring me breakfast now. :D He had a meeting with someone this morning, so he's bringing me a breakfast burrito from Sonic - and a diet cherry limeade. I had my first one last night - wow! It's really great! Try one if you get a chance! It definitely has a "diet aftertaste", so if you CAN drink all that sugar, you might want to get a REAL one. :D Ooooh, he just called - he's done with his meeting, and is picking up my breakfast. :D YEA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OK, I'd better wrap this up. LOL!

Have a wonderful day, dear friends - and those of you who haven't become my friends yet. :) May your day be filled with laughter and love - and take time to STAMP something!!! :)