November's Stamp Set of the Month

Sorry cruisers, but I have a little bit of business to take care of before my next installment of my cruise diary.

For all my Stampin' Up! customers, the SSTM for November is Teeny Tiny Wishes, Item #115370 on page 145 of our big, beautiful 2009-2010 Idea Book & Catalog (if you don't have a copy, you can go to my website & view it online). It's a set of 24 very useful stamps that regularly sells for $36.95, but this month, I'll give you 15% off. That's a savings of $5.54! Pretty cool. If you order directly through me (email me), your savings are instant, but if you order it online, you will be charged full price, but I can give you credit of $5.54 towards your next order. Remember, you've only got until November 30th to take advantage of this great offer.

I'm so honored!

I'd like to thank my new good friend, Eileen Bellomo, for awarding me with this honor. I met many, many new friends, but Eileen is one of my favorites from the Cruise to Mexico with Tim Holtz & Wendy Vecchi.

With this honor comes a couple of little jobs. First, I have to pass this award onto 5 other deserving blogs, so after much thought this morning, here are my choices:

Studio 490 by Wendy Vecchi. I discovered Wendy's blog a couple of months before we set sail, and I was immediately hooked. She's not only very creative & talented, but her posts really make me laugh.

Thinkin' 'Bout Inkin' by Lori Hassler. Lori is another funny & creative new friend I met on the cruise. We were all so busy during the cruise that I'm sorry I didn't get to spend more time with her. I love her blog--just the name shows you how creative she is--and sometimes I laugh out loud.

Craftin' With TLC by Traci Camardella. Traci is one of my very best Stampin' Up! sistas. I love spending time with her while we create because she always makes me laugh.

Karen Barber Stamps by, of course, Karen Barber. Karen is one of my uplines in my SU family. She's actually my uplines' upline, so in otherwords, she's my grandmother. Not only is she such a creative inspiration, but she is one of the funniest ladies I know, which in itself is quite funny. You see, Karen is quiet and on the shy side, but when she tells a story, stop what you're doing and listen cause she'll crack you up!

And, finally, Tina Stamps by Tina Rosenkrans. Tina is my leader, my guru. She is Karen's upline, so Tina's like my great-grandmother. She's very talented and a great upline to a huge number of us, and she treats us all like family. She's a very loving, giving person, but best of all she's is FUNN-EEE! It's a pleasure to know her personally and to be her friend.

Now, for the 2nd little job of this award: I have to tell you five facts about myself that you probably don't know, so here I go ...

1. My parents died by the time I was 10, and I'm the youngest of five. I believe that I inherited my creativity & crafting skills from my parents. My father used to work with leather making beautiful purses for my mom, belts, and more. My mother was even more of an inspiration ... she used to sew Barbie doll clothes and sell them. She taught me embroidery, basket weaving, painting on fabric and much more.

2. I never took an art class in high school. I used to think the ability to draw was a requirement, and I've always regretted that.

3. I never went to college. Another thing I've always regretted, and sometimes a little embarrassed about.

4. I used to deliver auto parts. Being the youngest of five, nobody wanted to let me drive their cars. One of my sisters had the job first, and when I found out that they paid her to drive, I was in! The years I worked at that auto supply store were some of the best of my life! I had so much fun at that job.

5. I'm a typesetter by trade. I spent 15 years in the graphic arts field before starting my family. I've worked on everything from military newspapers when I lived in Southern California to the Village Voice, STAR Magazine, New York Magazine, and even National Lampoon when I returned home to my native New Jersey.

Once again, I'd like to thank Eileen for giving me this honor, and I hope I chose 5 worthy recipients who will pass on the honor as well.

The fun begins ...

After we set sail the group got-together before dinner to meet Tim, Wendy, Jim, Mario, Wendy's hubby Rick, Keychain (Karen) & Michelle, and Jaci & Jan from ScrapMap. We received our tote bags and our name tags.

Inside the name tag pouch was our little booklet with our schedule of events:

After our little "meet & greet", we went for our first dinner at 6pm in the Rhapsody in Blue dining room at Table 300. We met some wonderful ladies at our table: Eileen from NYC, Barb 1, Margaret, Barb 2 (I was going to put their last initials, but they're both W's! LOL), Mary Ann, Sandra, Wendy, Sue, myself & Andrea. We also met our wonderful waiter, Robert, who we referred to all week as "Charlie", because he called us his angels, and our Assistant Waiter, Jude. We all introduced ourselves and became fast friends.

Margaret mentioned that she had signed up for the bottle of wine each day, thinking she'd be able to sit on her balcony each night and enjoy some nice wine. Unfortunately, she was informed that she could only have the bottle during dinner, so she was very generous and shared her bottle with us.

Dinner lasted a full 2 hours, and we were exhausted and ready to go to our cabin. We were so excited to see our first towel animal ... a turtle!

Our cabin steward, Alester, put Andrea's sunglasses on him, and he was just adorable!

The next day we woke up early because we were told the market place would open at 8am. We arrived just before 8, and were not too surprised to see a line already waiting to get in! We were in Group D, so our first class was with Wendy at 11am, which gave us plenty of time to shop and bring our goodies to the room.

Well, let me just say that the market place on this cruise had at least twice the amount of stuff (maybe 3x) than the Alaska cruise, and I spent a pretty penny on that one, so I knew I was in big trouble! LOL Mario gave us raffle tickets for every $20 we spent, and I'm trying to black out how much I spent. I tried to get all my shopping done in one trip. Yeah, right.

I was so excited about Wendy's class. I had never heard of her before the chatter of this cruise, so when I checked out her blog, she had an instant fan. Her art has the cool distressed, grunge look like Tim, but with a feminine flair.

We received these pre-stamped aprons, grunge paper with some pre-stamped flowers, and lots of other supplies. Wendy taught us how to make her awesome flowers and we decorated our aprons. Although grunge paper is safe to go through the wash, she gave us pins to attach our flowers to our aprons to save on the wear & tear. This is a photo of Wendy's apron ... I never attached my flowers because I was having trouble with the metal pieces & the glue.

After Wendy's class, we had a break before our class with Tim at 4pm. And, Tim didn't disappoint either. We made these awesome 7-day journals to record our adventures. We used sticky back canvas to decorate the covers (Tim's crew pre-printed the maps for us which we colored with Distress Inks.). We also got these cool paper bags that are only about half-an-inch thick. Perfect to slip in a tag. At this point, Tim turns on his iPod to the tune of the Mexican Hat Dance ... and Keychain, Tim & Michelle passed out these awesome stamps so we could stamp the tags and fill in the details later. In this 1-1/2 hour class, he must've played that song 5-6 times, each time handing out great stuff, with our cheers getting louder & louder each time! What fun!

After class, Wendy popped in, and I had the perfect chance to get a photo with both of my favorite designers! This is turning out to be another fabulous cruise!

Let the journey begin!

I found it very challenging packing for this particular trip because it had 3 legs: a visit to see my son at college in Rochester, NY; the cruise; and 2 days in LA. Since there were no laundry rooms on the ship, I had to pack for 9 days. I also wanted to pack my portable photo printer and half a case of water & snacks for the ship. That alone took up one suitcase along with toiletries! Seems the older I get, the more I need. LOL

I kept the NY items in a tote bag, loaded 9 days of clothes in my big duffle bag, and hoped I wouldn't be getting too much stuff from Tim (I should've known better after the Alaska cruise!) I convinced myself that I'd be OK cause the water would be consumed, the snacks would be eaten, and I'd have less toiletries.

We left Friday morning after dropping my daughter off at school (she's a HS senior), and I started off my 5-hour drive to his college already forgetting my fleece. Bummer. We got up there, and you guessed it, it was cold. Rick wanted to buy me yet another R.I.T. (Brendan's college) fleece, but I just borrowed one of my son's.

This was our first visit to see him since he started. I only had the one day with him, so after his classes were over we went out to dinner and then we caught Jim Gaffigan's show at the campus. Funny guy! I had to say my good-byes to Brendan after the show because my flight left early Sat. morning.


I didn't realize I hadn't taken any pictures of our visit with him, so this is a photo from when we dropped him off at school at the end of August.

The next morning, Rick took me to the Rochester airport, and I had the best seat on the plane! It was a single seat (#1) as soon as you come on the plane, right next to the flight attendant's station, and the lavatories were right next to that. Perfect. I did have to change planes in Chicago, and that went off without a hitch.

When I arrived in LA, there was a little mix-up with the shuttle, but after texting Andrea, who was already in the hotel, we straightened it out and I was on my way. I met a lovely couple from England and another couple from Texas in my shuttle who'd also be on the cruise. I ended up seeing both couples throughout the week, especially Bob & Dorothy from Texas. I saw them so much you would've thought they were in our group!

I settled into the room, and Andrea & I went down to the lounge to meet the other cruisers. What fun! I ordered a margarita to get me in the vacation mode (I don't drink, but I make up for it when I vacation alone ... when the cat's away ...), and it went straight to my head! I only drank half and decided we needed to eat. We grabbed a bunch of girls (and Jon-Luc ... hope I spelled that right) and found a great Mexican restaurant by the water.

The next morning, we had breakfast and got in line early for the shuttle to the ship. So glad we listened to Gloria and got there early.

We had a very creative porter when we got to the ship. He got everything on one cart (there were 7 or 8 of us!). I tried videotaping him, but was told I wasn't allowed to take any pictures of the port. Guess I shouldn't be posting this!

We had about an hour wait in the port, but it was nice. We got to spend time with fellow cruisers, either re-acquainting ourselves, or getting to know new friends.

We finally got on the ship (Royal Caribbean's Mariner of the Seas), and it was H-U-G-E! This balcony overlooked several decks and the promenade of shops. You'd never know you were on a ship looking at it. Above the shops were windows to some of the inside cabins. I commented about how I'd hate one of those cabins cause you'd always have to leave the curtains closed for privacy. With that, an older woman opened her curtains and was checking out her view. We caught her attention, and I motioned for her to lift her shirt, and to my surprise, she did! We were all histerically laughing, and some of my group flashed her back! She went and brought an even older woman to the window, and I flashed her. She got this very surprised look on her face, and then flashed me back!

By now, a crowd had gathered since we were making so much noise, and that's when we met Bjorn. He caught me flashing the lady, and I thought he was gonna throw me off the ship. Instead, he pretty much said "glad you're having a good time."

We strolled around and stopped by Guest Services to pick up the ship's daily news to see what events were going on while we waiting to get into our cabins. Lots of stores & ship's services had tables set up in the promenade of shops. One booth had a girl who did airbrush tattoos, and you could get a free star tattoo. Andrea & I stood on this line so long that we decided to make it worth our while and purchase one.

While waiting on this forever tattoo line, we were missing the 'scavenger' hunt that was going on around us. Turns out that all the tables that were set up had answers to questions for a contest to win prizes from all the ships services like massages, souvenirs and more. We only had about 20 minutes to get all the answers. We got them and put our ballots in the big clear cube of entries with 10 minutes to spare. We saw Bjorn who was at the Bingo table, and Andrea had to have the T-shirt, so we bought the 4 lottery tickets so she could get one. I won $5 on one of mine. When we went back to the clear cube of entries, we saw people around it looking in the cube and copying the answers, so Andrea & I quickly copied answers and put in a 2nd entry each. Well, we won! First, I won, you'll never guess ... a free tattoo! And then Andrea won right after me ... get this ... a Bingo T-shirt! Too funny.

We finally were allowed to go to our cabins, and Andrea always has to take 'before' pictures when she gets a room.

She even takes pictures of the bathroom! We were told that they'd separate the beds for us and put the nightstands in the middle, but we decided to keep the beds together to save room. Figured if I could sleep with Rick, I could sleep with anybody! LOL

We had a balcony cabin, and we enjoyed the view as we left port. Our voyage begins!

My First Digital Cards!

Last night I watched my 2nd webinar from Stampin' Up! where we were shown how to make greeting cards using My Digital Software. To reinforce what I watched, I recreated the card that Mark Jessen made following all the shortcuts he showed us. The card is actually 7x5, not square, but the photo is below. And, this blog photo really doesn't do it justice, so I ordered it from the print service so I can show you in person. When it arrives, I'll take a photo and repost it here.

After I created Mark's card, I decided to challenge myself and try creating my own from scratch. Here's what I came up with ... remember, the quality of this blog photo is very bad. This card is a 5x5 tho, so it's pretty much how it's going to look. I'll repost a photo of the original when I receive it.

I thought it was going to take me hours to figure it all out, but I actually whipped this card up in about 20 minutes!

I had originally intended to create a 5x5 scrapbook, have it printed by SU, and then I'd have a sample to show everyone. As it turns out, we currently only offer printing of full books, so until I get around to finishing a complete book, creating & printing greeting cards is the way to go.

Next up ... a calendar!

My Digital Studio Comes Today!

For the first time ever, I'm glad I have no sign-ups for my scrapbooking class tonight. Why? This afternoon, I'm expecting a very special package. I'm getting My Digital Scrapbooking software! Since I have no class tonight, I can play all night! Ya know what the best part is? I'm getting it free, and a new stamp set too! Woo Hoo! Last month two of my favorite students became two of my newest recruits, and with that came a promotion for me, and a $100 bonus! Couldn't have come at a better time, cause I really wanted to play with this software, but I just couldn't justify the added expense right now. Been spending waaaay too much lately, and I have to reign myself in. Turned out it wasn't in check form, but in SU credit, so I had to spend the money on somethin', right?!

Stampin' Up! is also offering lots of webinars so we can learn all about the software. I already took the first one last week, and since then I've been just itchin' to get my hands on it. They're also offering a certification program, and I just signed up.

I think tonight I'll work on a 6x6 book and have it printed so I have a sample to show all of you. I'm also thinking of adding a special My Digital Scrapbooking class to my schedule as well. Maybe even a My Digital Scrapbooking crop night? Oooh, my mind's a buzzin'!

Getting ready for Fall Fest

What is Fall Fest? My wonderful upline, Tina, who is actually 3 levels above me, holds two big day-long events a year: Spring Fling & Fall Fest. At these events, every demonstrator in her downline is welcome to come, and we learn new techniques, business tips & advice, swap samples with each other, win great prizes, and best of all, make fabulous projects! Usually I volunteer to work the registration table, cause I love to match up the names with the faces. But this time, I was honored when Tina asked me to be one of the demonstrators for the group! I'll be demoing the Big Shot, and my mind's just buzzin' with great ideas! I'm going to start working on my projects today, starting with a 12x12 scrapbook layout of my son teaching his girlfriend to snowboard. I'll be offering this spread in my next scrapbooking class, which happens to be this Wednesday, September 16th. I'll be using the Big Shot to create the title which I'll be making using our Window Sheets.