TIM HOLTZ DIES & FOLDERS

What a beautiful day in the Ozarks! Fall is my favorite time of year, and although we are not officially there, you can tell the weather is changing. I was pretty sure yesterday I was going to have to take Maki (my Seal Point Himi) to the vet in a Kayak. Nothing worse than rain so hard you can't see 100 feet in front of you, rush hour traffic (yes, we sorta have that here) and you're driving with a yowling cat that is UNHAPPY to be in a carrier, in the car, with a painful swollen eye! She was trying to dig her way out of the carrier, and that was somewhat distracting while driving. Almost as distracting as watching a really dark sky with a large wall cloud coming toward you, just before the sky opens up and dumps on you. I was happy it was just rain and not a twister or golf-ball sized hail. Just the same, she saw Dr. Bacon (through her one good eye), was much better with him dropping stuff in her eye than with me, and she yowled again all the way home, but the pain med he gave her, plus her bad eye being numb, seemed to disinterest her from trying to dig out of the carrier coming home. It did remind me of the "Pig that goes Wee, Wee, Wee all the way home" commercial. At least the sun was shining again by then. That's what they say about Missouri weather, if you don't like it, wait five minutes.

I've had a few inquiries as to what Tim Holtz Alterations Dies and Texture-fade folders I have in stock, so I am going to make a list at the end of this entry. I also just found out this afternoon that my TH stamps are FINALLY shipping, so those of you with pre-orders should be happy inkers next week. Idea-ology is also on it's way, and Ranger product should be shipping next week too. We're fully stocked with Maya Road, Ten Seconds Studio and expecting some more Kaisercraft product to ship! Lots of projects planned for the holidays, we'll get some samples up soon (probably coated in Maki hair, I think she sheds on demand).

Here's a sneak peek of the Kaisercraft Beyond the Page Advent Calendar done with Graphic 45 Christmas Past paper, Tim Holtz Hitch Fasteners as drawer knobs, and a few Kaisercraft Latte Pearls. The shadowbox portion will be dimensional with lots of other embellishments, and I still have some inking to do, among other things. This was taken with my iPhone, what a great tool for a quick informal pic!



Here's the list of Tim's Alterations that I currently have in stock. If I catch a moment this evening, I'll take a pic of the Tim "Wall of Wonder" as my friends call it, and a pic of the classroom/crafting area. Don't forget that we have Candy Colwell's "The Witching Hour" book class coming up on October 2. If you haven't signed up, hop over to her blog for information on how to sign up.

TIM HOLTZ ALTERATIONS
Caged Bird
Hardware Findings
Gadget Gears
Elegant Flourish
Heart Wings
Fanciful Flight
Ornate On-the-Edge
File Tabs On-the-Edge
Scallops On-the-Edge
Bracket On-the-Edge
Plaque & Postage On-the-Edge
Dot Matrix/Gridlock Texture Fade
Burlap/Swirls Texture Fade
Sizzix Cutting Pads for On-The-Edge dies
Movers & Shakers Key Hole Punches
Movers & Shakers Hole Punches

CRAFT-N-CROP SEPTEMBER 18TH

We had so much fun the first time, we're going to do it again! OK, so we're going to do it every month up through Christmas. Our next wild and crazy Craft-N-Crop is September 18th at the Conquest Keepsakes Paper Studio, from 10a to 6p. Please note, that is a time change from the first one. I'm not much of a morning person (unless you want to say I'm a REALLY EARLY morning person since I don't seem to get to bed much before 3a), so this time is probably more realistic if you want my brain engaged in productive activity. :-) Please call to reserve your spot at the tables, we can easily seat 12 attendees and if we have less, it means more room for you to spread out. Not that any of us would do that..., eh Katrina? :-) Kidding aside, we are all for the spread if there is room. Cutters and other tools are on other work surfaces, so you can have more supplies on your table. Plus there will always be a store special for those who want to pop by as well as those of us, er, crafting or whatever it is we do! Cliff will be standing by with the big cart, so you can load up your gear in one trip around to the lower level. Cost for the crop is a measly $5 and that covers your drinks, some snacks and free use of all the tools you can find, and there are a lot tools, I LIKE TOOLS! If it plugs in or runs on batteries, makes loud noises or can burn you, I probably have it, so ask if you are not sure.

One new items you will be able to see is the full range of Hanah Silk! I have seven boards of all the samples of the silk ribbons they offer, and we can special order any color you want, by the yard or by the spool. These are some of the most beautiful hand-dyed ribbons you will ever see, in either silk or satin.

Future Craft-N-Crop dates are October 23, November 6 and December 4th, although our December day may change due to potential scheduling conflicts. That's always such a busy time of year, but we want to get in one more day of Christmas crafting before the big day hits!

Neighborhood Pizza is just up the street from us if you want to grab a quick bite to eat, they have it all! Small personal pizzas, regular pizzas, sandwiches, casseroles, nachos, salads, wraps, I couldn't begin to name it all, and it is the best food in Springfield! You can even find them on Facebook! If you get the urge for your own bag of treats, there's a Dollar Store right next to it. Milk Dud central. Yeah baby!

Again, I will try to pull a demo out of my Tim Holtz Hoodie and see what we come up with. We're still waiting on Tim's Fall line of stamps and products, which should be shipping soon. They tell us "September" but that can mean it leaves their dock on September 30th at 11:59pm, so I'll keep breathing for now. :-) We will have the new Spellbinder dies in to demo along with some new Kaisercraft creeping in the back door.

Call to reserve or get directions, we are easy to find, just north of I-44 on North Glenstone and a bit east on Valley Watermill Road (or about a mile west of Hwy 65 off the County Road 102 exit which is also Valley Watermill Road, past the Springfield Country Club, The Greens and the Valley Watermill Reservoir). The street address is 3726 N. Mill Ridge Avenue if you have GPS (one of the top ten technologies according to Modern Marvels on the History Channel—consider yourself educated!).

JUST A QUICK HOBBY LOBBY CLASS NOTE

The next class dates are scheduled for Tuesday, Sept. 21, Thursday Sept 23 and Friday, September 24. The class for that week is the Monogrammed Notebook. You will need to bring a Chipboard letter with the monogram of your choice, and all the items listed in the sidebar for the Basic Crafting Kit. The Paper Studio Large Chipboard Letters are excellent for this project, although other chipboard letters will work as well, depending on size. Please bring a large glue stick for this project. This book will be using fall themed papers and ribbon and include instructions so you can make additional books on your own. The cost for this class is $15.



Please be sure to read the sidebar regarding Hobby Lobby Classes, and the Basic Craftng Kit. It gives you all the information you need to sign up for the class and what items to bring. Class sign-ups need to be made according to the schedule listed under Hobby Lobby Classes. These deadlines are necessary in order for me to have enough time to prepare kits for the classes. Sorry, no exceptions. If you don't have the supplies that you need, please come in at least 30 minutes before the class and I will help you find what you need at the store so you can purchase those items before class starts. :-) Our classes start promptly, so don't be late!

SCRAP & CRAFT AT CONQUEST KEEPSAKES!

Don't forget to Scrap & Craft with Conquest Keepsakes tomorrow from 9a to 5p! If you need directions, email me and I'll get them out to you. It's going to be a beautiful day!

If you come by the crop, take a look at Candy Colwell's The Witching Hour book and a couple of her amazing Heritage blocks on display! Sign up for the Witching Hour book class (only a few seats left), and see what we are offering this fall. Lots of great Christmas Gift ideas that you can personalize with your own unique crafting style! Here are a few pics of Candy's ingenious The Witching Hour book:
































































In this class you will learn some unique ways of putting together a 3-dimensional book that is very interactive and can be displayed during the holidays. Every time you look through it, you see something new! Candy is a master craftsman of interactive crafting experiences. We'll be using many products you might not have had the opportunity to use, so come and learn something new with Candy! The class will be October 2 here at the Conquest Keepsakes Paper Studio.

If you like to craft/crop, we have space for 12 (quite comfortably), so bring something to work on and come play with us tomorrow! Door prizes, make-n-takes, demos and more! Of course we have chocolate (what self-respecting crafter wouldn't?) and lemonade, tea and more. We have the garden cart waiting to bring your scrappy/crafty items around in one easy trip!

We'll continue to carry a unique array of vintage items and can special order what we don't have in stock. While you crop/craft tomorrow, watch our slide show of favorite CHA Winter and Summer pics, you will see some of the great projects we saw at the show and share a few laughs too.

Check out our Vintage, Metal and Soldering Class/Kit Clubs that we will be debuting this fall or sign up and join us on our monthly Scrap & Craft nights. We look forward to seeing you in our comfortable, relaxing surroundings and becoming a part of the Conquest Keepsake family!

It's a WHOLE NEW WORLD!

This is has been a summer of a lot of changes, crafting, hanging with my crafty friends, Mom having cancer surgery, me battling my own health issues, but most of all, totally revamping my training and retail area here at the Conquest Keepsakes Paper Studio HQ (aka, the other 1500 sq. ft. in our walkout not occupied by mowers and bathrooms). Most of my friends/family/business associates know I have had a travel store for the last three years, Conquest Keepsakes (so original, I know) and I sell primarily vintage/multimedia art and paper products and teach paper crafting classes. I also have been teaching basic papercrafting at both Hobby Lobby stores here in Springfield. But some changes were in order...

Sometimes you just have to make a choice to do one thing well instead of a lot of things OK. Thus my decision to focus on vintage mutlimedia projects, mini-albums, and vintage jewelry making, and expanding the training area. To that end we have added Ten Seconds Studio products so we can create metal works of art that fit with our vintage projects and jewelry. We are also working on adding a couple of more product lines to deepen what we have to offer in this niche. If you like SteamPunk, this could be for you! Such a hot product area right now, I saw quite a bit of it at CHA this summer.

Speaking about things made from metal, I'll be going down to Texas in October to take the TSS certification course, which I am sure will be a hoot as Cheryl and Megan are very entertaining and quite versatile in what they do. I KNOW I will come back enlightened! At least about metal...

As I've said, this summer I've decided to get REALLY serious about making some changes in my training/retail space here at HQ. I have the technology and the background, so why not use it? So for the past couple of months I have worked on totally clearing the finished walkout basement area (bye bye mancave, or at least relocated), rearranged the tables, spanked out the Sharp projector, set up the video camera and lit up the screen with artsy projects (instead of SciFi and Photoshop). Delightful! So now I can teach 12 to 14 victims, er, clients, at a time, utilizing the video cam to show everyone the techniques we are using and demo products. Now we've gone from 6 to 12, effectively doubling our training/crafting/cropping space. With this setup, I can even monitor my wireless IP Surveillance camera. :-) A girl's gotta know when FedEx and UPS hits the door! I could even do some Death by PowerPoint if I were so inclined (and believe me, I'm NOT).

It really does feel good to go back to my roots in technology, instructional design, graphic arts and marketing and using more of that to promote my crafting/artsy business. I taught graphic arts software for 20 years, so it has been nice to put all those art classes in college to work and teach something that doesn't involve the computer. Using your hands to create art and tell a story is so gratifying to me! I still love my Mac and graphic apps, but I am really excited about expanding more in this vintage direction by enlarging the training area, branching out into metal art and offering products that are out of the mainstream and harder to find! My love has always been teaching hands-on, and with all the wonderful products on the market now, there is plenty of room for everyone to be involved. It is my goal to teach techniques and products that are not currently offered by the big box stores, or even the local scrapbook stores. Like I said earlier, everyone can't do everything, so I have directed my efforts to fill in the gap between crafting and art, using found objects and items out of the mainstream. The full store is set up when I am not traveling, so it's a one stop learn and shop! You don't know what it is? We will show you! Then you can become addicted as I am. :-)

Along those lines, Conquest Keepsakes is holding an open house Crop & Craft August the 28th from 9a till the cows come home (your guess is as good as mine!), but we're shooting for 5-6p. We will be doing demos, make-n-takes, door prizes and other fun things to introduce the newly expanded and high-tech advanced classroom area, along with our expanded store offerings. We will have a new schedule up shortly now that summer is coming to an end; for local classes, road classes, club crops, and events (including Hobby Lobby classes too) for Fall and Winter. If you like Tim Holtz, Ranger, Ten Seconds Studio, Maya Road, Graphic 45, 7 Gypsies, Suze Weinberg, and everything else distressed and vintage, this is for you! We have a class schedule that will keep you hopping, so check back often! We've expanded into jewelry making and soldering, so we are sure to have something to interest most of you beyond scrapbooking!

We'll be posting pics of the new space within the next few days. There are still a few things that require assembly. I just LOVE directions that consist of pictures of what's in the box, and... nothing else. NOT!

We have some other "new" things coming, so don't be surprised when... or I could show you some sneak peaks of.. well, I'll tell you about it later!

Keep the faith! ~Vicki

RAINY DAYS AND MONDAYS...

Well, it's not Monday, but it is rainy! As the rain sheets down outside here in parts of southern Missouri (snow in other areas), I am here in front of my warm fireplace and MacBookPro, sitting on the knitted throw that my Mom made me for Christmas and reflecting upon another cozy afternoon spent with my artsy friends in Ozark. Although it was cold and wet outside, inside we all sat around the tables and visited and shared our latest artful projects. Shirley was working on a beautiful crazy quilt mini-ablum, Pat on a snow layout and Joyce let me peak at the mini book she just finished for her nephew, who bears a striking resemblance to my nephew! In another corner Misty is showing Lois how to use her Design Studio with her JukeBox on her Cricut. We all sang happy birthday to my husband, who graciously spent his day helping me move product in and out, setting up tables and ringing up the goodies the girls wanted to use on their projects. Rebecca and I shared a smile as we're both the same age; she just had her birthday and mine is coming up in a few weeks. Let's just say we're older than we wish we were! It's always amazing how our lives intertwine with consistent themes of family and friends, fellowship and laughter, and sometimes a tear or two as we think of relationships that have changed or moved on due to circumstances beyond our control or the natural cycle of life.

I am truly thankful for the family and dear friends that I have. They are a constant blessing to me. They inspire me to do better tomorrow than I did today, they spark my creative curiosity as we all exchange our thoughts about the day's events and how we want to capture those feelings and emotions, as well as the details in what we're working on during the day.

As the rain turns to drizzle and ice (and heavens, probably some snow!) I'm going to sit here and plan a few new classes and projects. There is something about the change in weather during this time of year, even when we seem to be going backwards and not "springing" forward, that always makes me yearn for something new and different. New product arrives daily and it almost seems like sensory overload trying to narrow all the ideas down to a few well-planned projects that will excite others to work with them as much as it excites me to plan them! As I grow older this month I am still excited about getting to play with my new toys! Stay tuned, you may be finding yourself drawn into the excitement of a new project too!

Keep the faith!
Vicki

SOMETIMES THINGS JUST DON'T PAN OUT LIKE THEY SHOULD...

I haven't posted in a while, been busy with other stuff, and not so fun other stuff at that. This is a hard post for me to write. I've put it off forever but now I finally have to say something.

You know how the old adage goes that says, "No good deed goes unpunished"? Or the one that says. "Never lend money to a friend"? Well, I've received a good dose of that this year. I wouldn't normally talk about this type of thing on a blog, but I guess my bucket is full to overflowing. It's time for righteous indignation! I feel a need to say something, because I think this situation happens way more often than it should and I am sick and tired of people acting badly and getting away with it, because no one will stand up to the person and tell them, "Hey, that is NOT how you treat friends/people!"

Since when is it OK to lie to or mistreat your spouse, your friends, your family, and even your constituents if you're a politician? How come we as a people, we as family, we as friends, and even we as voters, can turn a blind eye to things that are just flat, plain wrong? Do we not have any sense of personal responsibility anymore? When did our word being our bond cease to be? Has it now become "do anything we can get away with?" Do not actions have repercussions/consequences? Can we lie with impunity?

What happened to treating people with compassion and understanding? Extending help even when we are not asked? Hoping others will "pass it on?" Is the good deed dead or does it only work in movies? Has Ty Pennington used up all the good will in America and the common person thinks watching it on TV is as good as doing it? Do people now have the option of making promises they have no intention of keeping and freely cop an attitude about it? Is that the new "cool?" Can we take other people's money that they were generous enough to lend and just pitch responsibility out the window and say, "Screw you, you can't touch me, I'm not paying you back a dime?" What EXACTLY has this nation come to? I hear a lot of people calling themselves Christians, but acting in a VERY un-Christ-like manner. Jesus is shaking his head and the founding fathers of this nation are spinning in their graves.

As a Christian myself, it sickens me. It SADDENS me. It makes me lose hope. Hope in America and it's people. A nation that was founded on Christ-like principles and now it's people are acting like a group of miscreants, thugs, liars, cheaters, etc. Do we blame this on a new generation? If so, it is people my age that have failed our children. We've not taught personal responsibility and accountability to them. Why should they feel responsible if we don't show responsibility to them? The golden rule has tarnished. A nation that was founded on the Bible now doesn't let you post the Ten Commandments in a public place.

All of this and more has hit home to me this week. I was generous with a friend and this person repaid my kindness and generosity with a lie and an attitude. They've told the lie so many times that they now think it's the truth. (Almost sounds like Congress.) I'm to a point that I can't believe anything that they say. It's a sad day when you have to document every little word someone says just in case they chose to lie about it in the future. What a sad and pathetic way to live your life. I feel truly sorry for a person like that. I would much rather have joy, truth, friendship, generosity, kindness, understanding, compassion, gentleness, love and hope in my life.

So my word for this year is BETTER. I want to be better at being a Wife, Aunt, Sister, Daughter, listening ear, encourager, sustainer, prayer warrior, Christian, artist and friend. I'd also like to be better at posting. :-) While I'm at it, I'd like to be better at picking better friends. Thankfully, I am already blessed with many wonderful, compassionate, gifted friends. I just need to get rid of some chaff and pass on a little lesson regarding actions have consequences, whether those consequences are experienced in the short term or the long term. Ultimately, we all know God is the final adjudicator and He sees all. I can live with that.

Keep the faith (I'm certainly trying),
Vicki

ROW ROW ROW YOUR BOAT...

I'd say I was sitting here in sunny California, but it's definitely not sunny and I forgot to pack my oars so I could paddle on down to the convention center tomorrow. Oops. Hopefully it will be sunny and a little bit warmer tomorrow, or I think I might have to call this western, western Missouri. :-) Our condo does have a great view of Disneyland and we'll be able to see the fireworks from our unit. If we're looking out the window and not at our computer screens!

I did get my one clumsy move for 2010 out of the way today. Last year, my groove involved missing a step going downstairs at my house and doing a face plant at the bottom of the stairs, a week after getting my cast off my arm. At least I didn't have an audience for that performance (outside of the furry four-footed kind). This year, I waited until I arrived here in California and made my move in front of Bubba Gumps. Evidently I am not even coordinated enough to walk down the sidewalk without falling down. In the rain. Hard. Busted. Embarrassed. Sigh.

Well, it's getting late. I'm trying to keep up with photos and such on FaceBook and Twitter. Once the show (CHA) starts, I'll post pics here too. Theoretically. If I don't bust my camera by falling on it.

Keep the faith (and medical insurance if you're coming near me)!
Vicki

A WONDERFUL GIFT

One of the wonderful benefits of the Tim Holtz cruise this fall was having the opportunity to make new friends and spend time with other creative women. This cruise was also the first time I've been a part of an ATC swap. For those of you who don't know what an ATC card is, it stands for Artist Trading Card and it is based on a very simple concept. An ATC card is the size of a card from a deck of playing cards (think Hearts, Spades, Poker, Black Jack, etc.) and past that it really has no rules. It can be anything you want, using whatever types of media you feel comfortable using. The only real rule it has, is that it has to be given, not sold. So imagine 150 creative women making cards to trade with each other and with Tim, Mario, and Wendy! Not all of us made cards, but those who did were very generous and very creative. Since I signed up for the cruise about 4 weeks before departure, I didn't have time to make any cards, although I decided that I would try to make some after the cruise to share with several of my fellow cruisers. Watching everyone swap cards and show their collection of cards was a lot of fun, and one of my new friends, Kathy E., made a vest of ATC cards that she wore on the ship. Amazing! My other favorite was Mario's card... a copy of the shipping labels for all the boxes they had to send with supplies. Hysterical! It still makes me smile.

This week I received an ATC from Karen (aka KeyChain) that she made using some pretty cool techniques, and some interesting products. Rather than try to describe it, I thought I would post a picture of it so I could share it with all of you. What the picture doesn't show as well is that the right side of the card with the likeness of Mona Lisa is very textural, so I asked her what she did to create it and here is what she said:

"I spread a thin layer of Gesso on the card, made an impression using a clean stamp. Added a thin wash of paint after it had dried."

I thought it was a really nice look and worked really well with the other products she used on the card. I'm kind of an earth-tone girl, so the whole card really appealed to me. Hope you all enjoy it as much as I did. :-) She also helped me increase my ATC collection (now that I have more than four, I can call it a collection, can't I?). Thanks Karen! Can't wait to see you at the show and you can tell me what else you used on this card... [wink]

Until tomorrow everyone, keep the faith!
~Vicki

Quit laughing...

So I have to be the world's worse blogger, nothing new there! Facebook and Twitter were clamoring for attention but now it is back to basics!

Since there is no way to catch up, I'm going to use a good old church euphemism that goes like this, "Come as you are." So, other than late to the party, here I am! You can also find me on Facebook and Twitter (@conquestkpsks).

Here's a quick run down of the last couple of months, and probably the reason I am slow to post, is THE CRUISE! Yes, the cruise to Mexico with Tim Holtz and Wendy Vecchi in October and arranged by ScrapMap happens to be one of the most incredible things I have ever done! Bar NONE! All the rest of the girls have blogged their trips, so now I'll endeavor to blog my perspective, along with current news such as the impending trip to Winter CHA in LA. I do have a few more days before I leave on Thursday, so I hope I'll be able to catch up while itching with anticipation for the show!

If you ever have the opportunity to do a scrapping/stamping cruise, working with ScrapMap and Jim West was a delight, considering I signed up six weeks before the cruise! Jaci Hague hustled around and got me everything I needed on time so I owe her special thanks. You ROCK Jaci! They had every detail planned and it was such a wonderful time. We did have some rough seas the first couple of days, but we all managed to deal with it as it came along. The Royal Caribbean Mariner of the Seas was a spectacular ship, our stewards and wait staff at dinner were impeccable, I don't know how else they could have spoiled us with everything they did. Just flat amazing! Because of the rough seas, we had to change our itinerary some, but Tim and his crew just rolled with it and we had an awesome time! Of course I picked up a few new slang versions about cruising, like "The Floating Raisin Ranch" or "Newly Wed or Nearly Dead" much to my amusement! They've already announced the next Tim Cruise, it will be in the fall, Sept. 30th through Oct. 9th, New England and Canada. I do have some pics posted in an album on my FaceBook page, but there are more to come (I took TWO cameras and some video).

After the cruise I threw myself into getting stuff together for our Forever Memories crop we do once a month, and OF COURSE we are all Tim peeps. It's a small group of very talented ladies and we all love vintage, distress and mutli-media projects. They really had to twist my arm to get me going to that! [grin] Now I feel like a pimp handing out Tim fixes once a month (if not more often).

As far as upcoming events and classes, we have two events this Spring. One is the Pleasant Hope Crop on March 6th that my friend Lori McCroskey puts together every year benefiting the school, and the other is the Children's Miracle Network crop April 9, which is always a big crop for a really good cause. For more information on these crops, you can contact Lori at Clear Dollar Stamps for info on how to register for that event, and for the CMN crop, you can contact The Scrapbooking Momeez for more information and registration. This year Krista Pickle, from Scrapbooks Forever in Branson will be hosting an excellent store for this event, you don't want to miss that! Mark your calendars now. I will also have a booth and teach a class and some make-n-takes, all emphasizing vintage/distress looks. I'll be carrying everything Tim in my booth, along with Zutter, 7 Gypsies, Graphic 45, Maya Road, Making Memories, and Jenni Bowlin, just to name a few. If it's vintage or distressed and available, I'll have it. Obviously we will be showcasing Tim's new products being intro'd next week at CHA, his inks, stamps, Idea-ology, and his new Sizzix dies. I'll be giving away a couple of really great products and you'll have the chance to examine and play with his new product lines.

In between those crops, we still have classes going at Hobby Lobby, our Forever Memories monthly crops and some other special events for a few local groups. If you're as excited as I am about all the new things coming out, you may need to stop reading here and go to the restroom. I'll still be here when you get back!

One of my new fascinations is Ten Seconds Studio and working with metal. I can't wait to see what those crazy ladies show us this year at the show. Seriously, you need to catch their Taco Tuesday videos. Look for links for all these on the sidebar.

Until later!

Vicki

NOVEMBER CLASS OPPORTUNITIES

As I sort through the 435 pictures I took on the cruise to start blogging about it, I thought I would post an update for November classes. We have several classes to choose from, so I'll list them with all pertinent info for those of you watching for the schedule.

This Saturday is open craft day here at the Conquest Paper Studio. I have kits for the Advent Calendar, another grunge wall hanging project, a grunge birthday book (Days to Celebrate) and a couple SpellBinder projects. There are also some monogrammed gift card tins too. It starts at 10a and runs until the last person leaves. We'll have access to my many tools and horde of products, those of you who know me well, know my stash is legendary. As usual, you'll receive discounts on products you order during the open craft days--deals so good, you can't afford to miss them! I will probably do another Open Craft day Thanksgiving weekend, so if you are interested in any of the classes, let me know, you can email or call [350-4569]. I've still got a few Tim tricks up my sleeves for several of these projects. These are all great gift projets. There are still Hobby Lobby classes, but I need to have at least 4 or 5 signed up to have the classes at the stores. Classes here at the Paper Studio go on no matter the number of people present. I'll post some more details tomorrow. Bring a friend and have some fun with us! Bring your basic class kit (wet and dry adhesive, sissors, sand paper, trimmer, ruler, pencil, black and white gel pens, dimensional foam (pop dots), brown or black ink to age with, and any Tim Holtz products you might have (like Distress Inks, ink blending tool, pads,

Keep the faith! What a wonderful time of year to be reminded about what that means!
Vicki

GOOD GOLLY WAS THAT A BLAST!?

OK, I'm kind of lame. Look down at the ground and kick the rocks lame. A pictureless posting shamer. That's me!

HOWEVER, I'm gonna work on it. Who goes on a Mexican Riviera Cruise WITH TIM HOLTZ and doesn't write or post anything? Well, that's about to be over. I was kind of waiting to let all the other Timites get there stuff up before I put up mine. It's a concerted effort to wait, but we're trying to stretch out the joy as long as we can! We're a merciless lot! Suffice it to say, THAT CRUISE WAS ALL THAT AND A BAG OF CHIPS! I met some new, wonderful friends, got my picture taken with Whoopie Goldberg and it doesn't stop there! Even high seas and a tropical depression didn't stop us! The projects were bumbalicious and Tim, Mario, Wendy, Rick and the whole gang at ScrapMap made this trip a cherished memory! Table 302 was the best IMO but Club 300 had it going on too! So many details and I'll try to get to everything. I even shot some video! Ooo-la-la what a trip! Tomorrow I will start at the beginning, and try to get it all in. However, I do have a few other things on my plate at the moment. Like visiting inlaws, class prep, CHA show prep among other tings...

Cliff's parents are in this week from Canada for a ten day stay. We love to have them here because who couldn't sit and listen to a British accent and not feel well traveled? All of my husbands family has it's roots in the UK, but also have folks scattered about. We're having some beautiful weather, at least for the next several days, a goood Indian Summer. So on that note, I'm going to vacate my post (ha ha) and get all kinds of busy. Classes are coming up and I've been keeping Tim Holtz products stocked and there's so much to get done.

Before I stop for the night, I definitely have to get a shout out to my husband. I am SO BLESSED that Cliff is a part of my life. When I got home from the cruise, he had flowers, a box of Milkduds and clean house to meet me. He even rearranged the furniture in the bedroom, something I've been wanting to do for a long time, and he even wrapped some fall leave garlands around the four posters on the bed. WOW. What a guy! Honey, I love you with all my heart!With that,

Keep the faith!
Vicki