WCMD - Part II

So, as promised - here are the lovely ladies who joined me for my shoebox swap and their adorable cards.

Diane B

Karen O

Kathy B

Kathy W

Lyn M

Paula B

What a fun day - good company - great cards.  Gonna have to do it again - soon!! ~Maureen

Shoebox Swap Cards - Part 2

The final four of our cards from last Saturday's Shoebox Swap, these are the ones I made of each of their designs -Enjoy!

Lyn's card

Maureen's Card

Paula's Card

last but not least - Virginia's Card

Thank you to everyone who came for the great cards, great food and great fun!  We'll do it again - soon!!  ~Maureen

A Great Shoebox Swap

Last Saturday we had such a fun time of stamping.  I hosted a Shoebox Swap at my home for members of my downline.  Here are the tables getting set up for the event.

Some cute little Valentine decorations - those candle holders have sweet hearts in the bottom.

Place settings with a little Valentine thank you with chocolates!

Virginia, Kathy W. and Paula -

Lyn, Diane and Kathy B -

Stop back tomorrow to see some of the fun cards we made!  ~Maureen

Secret Sister Gift

Some of you remember that at our Secret Sister reveal in December some of my ladies could not make it due to some family stuff going on.  So Julie brought Lyn's gift to this year's first meeting.  Here is what she made her - this amazing coin purse made with SU's Spice Cake fabric.  Man I wished I knew how to sew.  Isn't this great?!?!  She did say it was a lot of work and that she was never going to make another - so I guess Lyn has a one of a kind :)

 She also decoupaged this "L" for Lyn, and the elastic around it with the butterfly, flower and ribbon, can be removed and used as a book mark - so clever!

Finally - she made her this adorable lanyard that she can use for her work swipe card.  It is very similar to the ones Julie made us last year for our convention gifts.  What a great set of gifts - and Lyn was thrilled to get them.

Hope you enjoyed - my downline is so amazingly creative!  ~Maureen

September Secret Sister Gifts - Part III

Today I'm sharing Lyn's lovely (and yummy) gift from her Secret sister. I didn't get a picture of the packaging :( But inside was this cone filled with goodies, and the beautifully wrapped candy bars. Lyn LOVES mint, and I know some (if not all) of this candy was mint flavored and she was in heaven. Here's a close-up view of the candy cone -

More Downline Meeting Shares

Yesterday I promised to share the neat bow that Lyn made using her origami flower and "ribbon" made from Stampin' Ups! Lace Ribbon Border Punch. Look how great this package looks. Here's a better close-up of the bow - it's two of the origami flowers from yesterday's post and look at how she curled the 'ribbon' - that's just our Basic Black cardstock. I can't wait to try this.Secondly - each downline meeting we have a challenge - we are currently following the challenges in Stampin' Success (our exclusive demonstrator only monthly magazine from Stampin' Up!) The challenge was to make projects from the new Holiday mini - we only had one entry again - but it was a winner! The entry was from Annette, and she made this adorable card with the new stocking punch - looks like their hanging from the fireplace. You can see but the stocking are textured with our textured plates and look great. Nice job Annette! Finally I want to share what Julie brought to the meeting. We have a share table where people can share up coming Stamping events they are having; and projects they have recently made. Julie made this great fall ornament using our Spice Cake fabric, big buttons and striped ribbon. The picture does not do it justice. It's a unique and great way to showcase these new fall products - thanks so much for sharing this Julie!

Origami Flower Project -

At our last downline meeting Lyn led our group through making a beautiful origami flower. Here she is with part of the group as the concentrate on putting their petals together. It all starts our with 10 triangles - they do not have to be different but Lyn made them two different types so that we could tell easier which to put on the center and which to put as the outer petals. These were all made out of Whisper White cardstock. Half are colored with pad to paper direct to get the more solid coverage and the rest were stamped with Fifth Avenue Flower. After curling all three corners of each with a dowel - according to Lyn's instructions - I came up with this loose version of the flower - But Lyn was kind enough to leave her finished one, so that you can see how beautiful the flower can be when you do it right. I'll be practicing this one till I perfect it!Check back tomorrow to see how Lyn created an amazing Halloween bow using this flower.

One more Birthday goodie!!!

Wow - this birthday never ends - and I LOVE IT!!! Yesterday, my friend Lyn brought me this beautiful card and decorated bag and inside a this lovely blue bottle of a German Reisling! So sweet of her and we had it with Salmon for dinner and it was YUMMY!!! Here's a close up of the beautiful card - thanks so much for thinking of me Lyn!

June Secret Sister - Part IV

And the gifts go on and on and on - what a great group of secret sisters we have. just look at this lovely gift Lyn got - these four beautiful cards - and if that was not enough - They came in this lovely little wood crate!

And then Karen's gift came in this beautiful box - with that big bow on top -

and inside she got a ton of great cards for every occasion - she's set!!

Still more to come - check back tomorrow!!

April Club Challenge Cards -

Each month our club does a challenge using last month's technique. Last month we did the Baby Wipe technique - http://crazystampinglady.blogspot.com/2011/03/club-baby-wipe-technique.html So we had three entries this month - this first very Eastery card by Karen used not only our baby wipe technique but also the embedded embossing technique from the month before - she also used the technique several ways - on the background - the stamped words - and on the flower. This card just shouts "Spring is here" to me - The second card was mine - I used Night of Navy and Old Olive for this richly colored Flowers Awash card - the flowers were stamped using the baby wipe technique and there is also a background layer that I loved - but most of it ended up getting covered up :( I still like the way it turned out though.

The third entry was from Lyn and was our winner. She used the baby wipe also by swiping the background and then also on the layer behind the words and the lovely flowers (which have our glitter brads in the center). If you look closely you can see she also embossed the flowers before punching them out. The picture is a little dark as I was having trouble with my flash putting a glare on the card - sorry Lyn. Thanks ladies for entering our challenge -

My Clubs are currently reorganizing for our next round - you can check out full details here http://crazystampinglady.blogspot.com/p/stampers-10-stampers-clubs.html and let me know if you'd like to join us!!

Final SSS gifts for this month -

Okay so here is the last round of our Secret Sister gifts for this month. NOTE: I reserve the right to show one more - Virginia will get hers from Lyn late as Lyn was out of town for the meeting - so watch for that to come :) Here is Karen's gift from her Secret Sister Heidi - Heidi etched a clover in the side of the beer mug, then filled the mug with "green" bliss candy. This is so cute. You can see more of Heidi's work at - http://stampinking.blogspot.com/ Next is my amazing gift from my Secret Sister Theresa - She made me this lovely box with my initial on it in my favorite color - YELLOW!! And as if that weren't enough, so filled it with tons of matching notecards - which I always, always need. Julie - thank you so much!! You are amazing! For more of her work go here - http://simistamper.blogspot.com/
And here is my gift to Lyn -

I used the embossed inlay technique to add this shamrock to the top of a little green tin - Then filled it with her own pot of gold - actually chocolate, caramel candy - but we can pretend. Hope she liked.

See you all soon!!

February Downline Meeting

This morning was our monthly downline meeting - and it was such a great time. It was a small group due to several commitments in the group - but it was a fun group! Lyn provided a wonderful "Weight Watchers" friendly snack - and wonderful it was!! Thanks so much Lyn!Here are Heidi w/Zavian and Maria -

Lyn, Karen and Kathy - and Julie, Lyn and Karen. What a great group - check back and I'll be posting our card challenge and winner; my demonstration; and our share items. See you all soon!!

More Secret Sister Gifts

So Lyn is next and her Secret Sister Maria made her this beautiful Christmas tree - this picture doesn't do the tree (or Lyn - sorry about the closed eyes) justice - it was amazing. The next gift was from Julie's Secret Sister - ME! Remember how I said I've been sick - well that's my excuse for making this gift of a collage frame with great potential - just passable. But Julie was wonderful, and gracious and made me feel not so rotten about not make it up the standard I had planned. I didn't even get a chance to make a card :(

There's still more to come - so check back!

Nov Club Card Challenge Cards

Last month we did the Shaving Cream technique at our club, so this month the ladies were challenged to make their best card using that technique. Here is our winning card from Lyn - she actually ran the shaving cream sheets through the big shot embossing a design on them that looked great! Congratulations Lyn!Here's Karen's entry - look at those amazing swirls of color. Karen used the faux linen technique on her background layer.

Here is Jackie's entry - unfortunately my picture doesn't show the depth of her swirls. Jackie only had one re-inker but built of up the colors on the shaving cream by using and reinking - it actually looks like she used several greens. Finally - here is my entry. it's for a friend who just lost a beloved pet. I wish we had had this set sooner, as I have so many friends and family I would have loved to send a card like this to. It's so hard to know what to say during the heartache following the loss of a pet. I really love the way the colors swirled together on this layer. Thanks ladies for playing along - can't wait to see what you come up with next time!