The Retirement list is out!

 

The stampin' Up! Retirement product list has been released.

Many of the current catalogue items are discounted by 25% and some by 40%.

That includes stamp sets, accessories and tools that will not continue in the new catalogue.

These products will be on sale from 31 May to1 July or until stock runs out. From previous years experience I know the heavily discounted items will disappear very quickly.

Retiring stamp sets include: 

French Foliage 40% off $20.96, Aviary, Kindness matters $12.71, Star tree $10.71, Topsy Turvy $14.97, Forever young $35.95, Established elegance $38.95, Elements of style $38.95, too many to list.

http://su-media.s3.amazonaws.com/media/lastChance/2013%20AU%20retired%20List/Stamp_Availability-AU.pdf

The retiring accessories include punches, patterned papers, fabrics, ring binders and out going colours in ink, cardstock and ribbons. Take a look here at this link to see the entire list of tools and accessories that are going. Some are already showing as out of stock.

http://su-media.s3.amazonaws.com/media/lastChance/2013%20AU%20retired%20List/Accessories_Availability-AU.pdf

To order any of the retiring products you can simply send me an email to nerida_carter@hotmail.com 

with what you want (need!!) and I will order it ASAP to ensure we do not miss out.

Thinking you'd like to have a retirement party to celebrate the passing of some of our favourite products? Give me a call and we can organise either day or evening. 

Nerida m.0468 877 125

Brisbane Convention part 4

At Convention, everyday was a new and exciting whirlwind of ideas and new products to see. These projects were demonstrated up on stage by Donna Griffith.

You can see a few new colours and products sneak peeking here.

After lunch on day 2, we found time to mingle with friends and start on our make and takes ... I have yet to finish mine. So I have taken a few pics of the finished projects on the display boards.
"Hello Lovely" Card and envelope: (nice new buttons and washi tape).

Gorgeous new acetate boxes with cardstock feathers, ribbon and new stamps. Big enough I think to hold about 8 (or maybe more) Ferero Rochers... I am thinking.

" You make me Happy" Chevron printed paper bags containing note cards.

And of course these are just some of Shelli's projects on display:

 Woudn't this post card make a great gift ... or launch project ... hmmm!

 Getting all arty on watercolour paper with a new framelit set -

 Shelli's Life is Good Smash book for 2013 -

 Some gold embossing and dictionary page background stamping and a new flower punch -

 A decorated jar to hold chocolate bullets in -

Another gorgeous background stamp with stamped butterflies and squashed flower -

oh my, I think the retirement list comes out today ... come back and see some more convention photos and Stampin' Up! news tomorrow.

Brisbane Convention part 3

So glad you came back to day to see some more cards and photos...
My blog as you have probably guessed is about sharing my ideas, stories and creativity. Perhaps you will be inspired to make some cards with me and share them with others.
Back to Brisbane then,

 Bonnie Thurber (one of my favourite presenters) made us laugh and wow at her 5 stamped projects that make a difference. I definitely liked her "match book scrap book" for her friend who makes a difference in her life 365 days of the year.

 Amy Schwartz talked about the colour refresh we are expecting with the new catalogue.
How Stampin' Up! stays up to date with the current colour trends and how they have promised not to let our colours become as outdated as they have in the past. The changes are determined by our sales of the current colours and forecast colour trends. Did you know what the Pantone colour of the year was in 2012?

New colour refresh families and in-colours for 2013

 Tangerine Tango!!!
and we were missing a mid colour purple so that's why Wisteria Wonder is coming back (so happy with that).
What next? Aaron Scott talked about our Australian successes over the past 12 months.
Asked us to guess what our Best selling tool was in 2012 - drum rolll ...
the Label collection framelits, holiday framelits and Blossom punch.
Best selling stamp set?  Reason to Smile, Ornamental keepsakes and Mixed Bunch.
Best selling embellishment? you guessed it ... stitched satin ribbon in Gumball green, Raspberry Ripple and Midnight Muse. Oh and that's when we received our
25th anniversary gift of silver glimmer paper, silver glitter, silver paperclips and sparkly rhinestones.
We were so so spoilt!

 Shelli walked us through the new Annual catalogue and demonstrated her beautiful crafting style on stage.
Many of her projects featured "washi" tape and her own "life is good" 2013 This and That smash book.

Our small group sessions were lots of fun and we learned to make a digital card using My Digital Studio.

And check out the things you can do with My digital studio.

When you have a party to organise, you can

Design your invites, menu, place cards, gift wrapping and Thank you cards in MDS and have them professionally printed as many as you want.

Weddings, Birthdays, Baby showers, Parties ...

Brisbane Convention part 2

Day 2 in our apartment at 7am! did I mention we were in the Penthouse suite?
Here is a fun shot of me at my desk in the Riverview suite... ready to go.

 During day 2 ... we visited the Demonstrator Resource centre. Where you could wander around and try new products like the magnetic framelits on the Big shot, or the new rotary blade on the Stampin' Up! cutter, or My Digital Studio on a computer, or how to make your own moulded clay buttons and flowers.
 What's that huge crowd doing over there in the corner?

 I can see a very talented demo pulling a huge crowd- they're like putty in her hands... who is that?

It's the very busy Denielle B. from our Inksomniac team making clay flowers.

This year they mixed it up a little bit, well a lot actually. Instead of having all the awards on the Friday night we were treated to some stage walks throughout the general sessions.

Here is Linda Higgins doing her stage walk for selling 40K in 12 months. (She's terribly skilled at this) even so much, as to let her have her own demo segment on the main stage!

A very proud moment for all her team to see her march (skip) across like that.

I should call this segment: My brushes with famous demos

Denielle crossed for $30K and Ellen marched for $20K!

So glad to be in a team of amazing business women.

This is a very long post, I hope you are enjoying the photos and living precariously through my exciting craft journey. I do my best to please - more random photos.

This year Memento mall was fulll of exciting products for us to buy to help us in our business. There were pens and bags, keychains, biscuit cutters and stamps, card trees and notepads, post it notes and watches, tape measures and hammers? It was an eclectic mix you might say... only problem is on the first day you could only buy one of each item.

And then by the time I came back all the good things were sold out!!! So I threw myself in front of a demonstrator with 4 bags who was putting some back (as she had too many) and managed to fill my basket with a few more. 

Linda Higgins - Workshop Wow!

Brisbane Convention 2013

 This year's Stampin' Up! Convention was in Brisbane. Our accomodation was in South Brisbane with a spectacular view of the River. There was a slight mix up with our room numbers, and we were upgraded to the Penthouse suite. . . can't argue with that.

We felt very special having such a lovely place to relax and take in the views.
Next Morning we were up early and cabbed it down to the Convention Centre to be welcomed by the gorgeous SU staff.

 We met up with other demonstrators that we haven't seen in real life since the last SU event but talk to so frequently online. Here I am with my room mates: Anne, Ellen and Michelle.You can just see I'm wearing my new Conference Back pack, my Elite Stampers pin (from Angela Sergeant) and ESAD purple butterfly.

 The doors to the general session opened at 9am !!! The party began with Shelli celebrating 25 years of Stampin' Up! and telling us her story of how Stampin' Up! started in the living room of their home and the lessons they have learned. She focussed a lot on how SU makes a difference in peoples lives.

 Shelli then invited Ronald Mcdonald on stage to announce that Stampin' Up are now supporting partners with RM house in Australia and NewZealand. SU will be donating time, handmade cards for the families to use, volunteers and financial support from sales of a new stampset.

Our first giveaway was a new stampset called "Tag it" ... perfect for making cards to donate, and $3 from every stampset sold goes to support the RMH charities. Later we had the opportunity to make some cards with our new stampset as a service project to kick the project off and running.
 Are you still with me?
I can't show you the stampset, but I can show you the cards we made with it.

Fresh made cards - the ink only just dry on the page.
Come back tomorrow for the next instalment of the Great Brisbane adventure....

Raspberry Ripple Book marks

 Jess and I had a lovely time on the weekend making cards and playing with the Big shot.
While I busily made some swap cards for Convention (next week) Jess enjoyed herself with any supplies she could find on my table.
These are her book marks for her reading books.
Her favourite colour is Raspberry Ripple and Pretty in Pink goes so well with it.

 The stampset is Hearts a flutter and its matching heart shaped framelits to cut them out makes them a fun set to make bookmarks, cards, anything with.
We added Raspberry Ribbon and Pretty in Pink stitiched ribbons to them.

A Fine Feathered birthday

Such a simple card I made two.

They are almost the same. How did I position them exactly the same?

Easy, I used my clear rubber stamps on the same block and stamped it twice. Makes it very easy to stamp a stack of cards in one go.

The colouring is slightly different as I used the thumping technique with markers to get the rainbow of colours on each feather. Ahhh, and I tied the ribbons differently!

Two extremely easy cards today.

Cardstock: Naturals white

Ink: stampin' write markers - island Indigo, Gumball green, Elegant Eggplant.

Stamps: Fine Feathers, Beautiful Birthday.

Ribbon: Elegant eggplant spotted grosgrain.

Baby card - Cherish the moments 2

What colour do you choose when you don't know what the baby will be?

Lemon yellow, mint green, purple?

I have chosen Pool Party a very in-colour minty green. The hand prints are Heat embossed using pool party coloured embossing powder. Cherish the moments is from the same stamp set "Baby Prints".

 

Perhaps it needs a white ribbon to offset that lacy doily. What are your thoughts?

Crafters anonymous pocket card

On Monday night at crafters anonymous we made this gorgeous pocket card.

The tutorial for this card is by Dee Sturgeon and so fabulously easy I can see myself making a few of these for different occasions.

This one is a Thank you card.

I have made four tags to put my "Feel Goods" quotes on.

My favourite of these has to be: "She believed she could so she did".

This picture shows all the tags and you can see the curved pockets on the front of the card. I have used Not Quite Navy card stock which has been textured with the square embossing folder and wiped around the edges with white ink. I think it looks a little bit like denim.

And I added a piece of Certainly celery cardstock, wrapped with pool party ribbon and added my Thank you sentiment from "Itty Bitty Banners". The heart is from hearts collection Framelits.

Cherish the Moments -Baby Prints

I was asked recently for baby cards. This is what I made for a new grandma -

For a baby girl. I indulged myself in the pinker side:

Pretty in Pink, Melon Mambo and a touch of Rich Razzleberry ink.

I painted over the foot prints and tree with some champagne shimmer paint direct from the jar on a brush tip. The girl on the swing is from Forever Young and the background Clockworks.

I think this might have to do.