Trade Show Jitters

It's just a few short days until the big CHA show in Anaheim and there is so much to see already. If you have not been there yet, check out www.cosmocricket.blogspot.com where they have pictures of all four of their new lines. Absolute genius.

The newest accessory for your pages, and sure to be a scrapping staple, is the new Luxe designs. They have some basic papers in basic colors that are going to be fabulous as compliments to many of your other patterned papers. Making Memories is posting a preview of their new stuff every Friday but you should take a look at their blog. They are showing a new line that will be out this week called 5th Avenue. Very cute stuff and shown on their blog.

My class samples for February are 1 1/4 away from being complete. The Two Scoops purse/album for Scrapbook Island needs a closure and the tropical travel acrylic, also for Scrapbook Island needs about another hour.

Been raining here a lot. These are not the days that put the "sun" in "sunny california" but we do what we can...

Hope you are all having a great week. More soon and thanks for reading all the way to the bottom.

Spring Trade Show Previews

You probably already know this, but February brings the biggest scrapbooking trade show of the year. It's the show when most manufacturers show off and offer for sale their new product. So part of the excitement leading up to the show are the previews that some manufacturers do on their web sites or blogs. I am highly recommending the following two (with more to follow in the next few weeks)

See the Cosmo Cricket blog for the ongoing story of Jon the Warehouse Guys trying to get us all a sneak peek. Also, Luxe Designs started their preview process today with daily updates including layouts and other great things.

I'll send you others as I find them, but these two are a great place to start. I'll be publishing my February teaching schedule this week. February includes acrylic travel albums, album in an afternoon, page layout classes and a purse album with the new Basic Grey.

Have a great week and thanks for reading all the way to the bottom.

Life is moving quickly

So, do you have any Maya Road mini albums lying around the house? Maya Road has put out a call for albums to display in their booth at the Craft and Hobby Show next month. They want four pictures and your contact information. If you have never submitted anything you have done, this could be an easy way to get into the submission habit. These are the pictures that I submitted. See the details at http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs047/1101294029850/archive/1101938673878.html

Things are going well for me as I hope they are for all of you. Two students created the Cosmo Cricket Hey Sugar album with me last week at Scrapbook Territory. We had a late night finishing, but lots of fun in the process. The class is being offered again and the full sample is in the store.

We are heading off to the big craft and hobby show at the beginning of February, so if there is something you would like us to be on the look for, let me know and I will keep it in mind as we look around.

Family is in town this week. Pictures to follow. Got a manicure today. I wonder how alcohol inks will look on my new acrylic nails?

Take care and enjoy the beautiful California weather this week.

How are those resolutions coming?

Why is dieting so hard? It was easy to eat my way to this place, why is it so hard to eat my way out?

Anyway, I got to hang out with four very talented ladies on Sunday afternoon. They made acrylic albums. One dog book, one cat book and two toddler boy books. They really came out well. We had robots, fish, bones and all kids of embellishments all over the table. Best of all, we had fun doing it.

If you are shopping for Valentine's Day paper, I highly recommend the Cosmo Cricket (of course). But if that isn't your style, you will want to look at the SEI Valentine line or the Valentine line by Making Memories. For a while now, I have been unimpressed by what has been distributed by these two companies until now. The SEI paper has got foil and velvet paper and is so nicely done. The Making Memories stuff is like the Noteworthy line and has very cute embellishments. Also, not to be outdone, is the Basic Grey Valentine Collection http://www.basicgrey.com/catalog/index.php?cPath=79 All very cute. I tried to find pictures online of the SEI and Making Memories and couldn't do it.

Hope that all of you in the Bay Area survived the rains and wind over the weekend without major incident and that my Chicago buddies are bundling up and keeping warm.

February classes: Album in an afternoon at Scrapbook Depot along with a layout class featuring layouts for Valentines Day and Birthdays. Travel album at Scrapbook Territory featuring an acrylic tabbed album combined with paper pages. I'll keep you all updated as the dates are available.

Thanks for reading all the way to the bottom and have a great week.

Sue

Scrapbook Depot Classes - Preliminary Pics

I'm posting some pics of the almost (you know me, title last) completed classes at the Depot. Comments?

Resolution One - Blog

So, let's see if this resolution lasts longer than the diet.....

Happy New Year to everyone. Last year was such a life changing year for us that our only possible response was to stay at home, be asleep by 11 after some fabulous hamburgers for dinner. Ah, la vida loca.

I am publishing this address to all who have taken classes from me in the bay area and I thought I would take a minute to tell you what I plan to do so that when it doesn't happen you can call me on it.

I intend to write about new things that I see that you may all be interested in. This is not a commercial for product or for a store, this is stuff that I see that is new and fresh and fun.

I intend to write about techniques that I come across. This may be in the form of me putting up pictures or, more likely, a link to another site that showed me something that I didn't know or forgot about. Sometimes some of the best techniques are those that we knew once and forgot.

I intend to tell you all where I will be and what I will be doing. There is a Where's Sue section on the page that has all of my schedule that I know of listed. If you have questions, write. If you need pictures, I will generally rely on the store site that I will be teaching at to give you the description and pictures. After a class has been offered, I will let you know if the store will be selling kits. Kits will be sold at the class price and anything that was unique to the class environment (stamps, tools, etc.) will be done for you in the kit and pictures of the finished pages will be provided in the kit.

I intend to ask you what you want to make. See the poll at the right and vote for any that you are interested in. I am currently working on class subjects for February, so speak up now. If there are things that you want that are not listed, send them to me and I will add them to the poll.

I think that's enough for now. The page layout class at Scrapbook Depot is very very cute. I will let you know when the pictures are available. There is also a Valentine Acrylic album class there. We are using the acrylic books from Pageframe Designs which allow you to use a cropadile on the pages so some different embellishments for that one. Is very cute. I made the LOVE album with the BoBunny product (see prior posts) with a student the other day, and it came out really well. The thing I like about both projects at Scrapbook Territory is that they can stand up on a table. Very cute.

Wishing you all the best of everything in the new year. Looking back on 2007, the happiness of teaching all of you will stand out as one of the highlights of the year for me.