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Posts Tagged ‘Convention’
Convention 2011: So many ideas, need to get stamping!
By the third day of the Stampin’ Up! Convention, it sounds like everyone is starting to get itchy fingers that need to pick up a stamp and start creating based on all the fabulous ideas we’ve seen! Every time we look up at a screen or sit down in a class, there’s another project that we “need” to make for ourselves.
The new It’s A Wrap Occasions stamp set (see it online) made the top of my new Wish List… good thing it was waiting for me already at home, having just been ordered the week before Convention!
We also saw this super-clever Thanksgiving Turkey by Stampin’ Up!’s own Carrie Cudney. The body is created from the Heart Sweet Treat Cups (see them online) and the rest of the turkey feathers and features were done with the Build a Blossom stamp set (see it online) and the Blossom Petals Punch (see it online).
And here’s another of her clever ideas using Sweet Treat Cups for a Christmas favor.
As part of the Main Stage session, there were several more groups honored with a chance to walk across the stage. The awards on Day 3 were the Milestone Awards — the ones that you earn no matter how long it takes you (for sales milestones) or how active you are as a demonstrator (for years milestones). Here’s a picture of 8 of our Green Hat Girls marching across the stage for their 5 Year Milestone. I don’t have a picture, but I also marched for crossing my $300,000 in Career Sales milestone this year!
After that, SANTA visited us demonstrators, and brought with him a new stamp set from the upcoming Holiday Mini Catalog, plus a disk of My Digital Studio downloads — yay for Santa!
And the stamp set Santa brought is the new Hostess Set from the Holiday Mini Catalog… you’re going to love it! I can’t show it to you yet, but check back on September 1st for the unveiling. Or if you want the true Sneak Peek, you can always take advantage of the $99 Demonstrator Starter Kit and join my Stampin’ Up! family. As a demonstrator, you can even SHOP from the Holiday Mini Catalog on August 1st–hardly any waiting at all!
After Santa we all said goodbye–to head back to our hotel for our Annual Post-Convention Pizza and chance to see all the swap cards everyone had received. Have you ever seen a pizza this big? I swear they were 3 feet across! Okay, maybe not quite 3 feet, but not too much smaller!
So many swaps… I’d guess there were close to 10,000 card fronts to look through. We were all joking about how many cards a demonstrator can look at in one evening before her eyes begin to glaze over. But the pizza was great, the swaps were gorgeous and the friendships and time spent together are the best.
Here’s our whole group (minus a couple of ladies who had to leave early) of Green Hat Girls at Convention this year! (that’s me in the checkered dress at the bottom right)
If you’ve enjoyed reading about the Stampin’ Up! Convention this week, you’ll want to start picturing yourself enjoying it with us NEXT year! The dates are July 18-21, 2012, and the chance to attend Convention is only one fabulous perk of being a Stampin’ Up! Demonstrator. I’d love to have you join our Stampin’ family!
Don’t forget about the special $99 Starter Kit available only til the end of July (valued at $185+), plus you’ll receive the Christmas Keepsake Box Kit: stamps, ink, embellishments and directions–ready to stamp! ($40+ value). You can drop me a note with any questions, or if you’re ready to sign up, you can use this link and click “join now” on the right side of the screen. You can even watch a little video clip about Stampin’ Up!.
Thanks for touring the Stampin’ Up! Convention with me this year!
Happy Stamping!
To Order Stampin’ Up! Products On-Line 24/7, CLICK HERE!
Subscribe to the comments for this postConvention 2011: Day 2, stamping, stamping and more stamping ideas!
Want to guess how many pictures I took at Convention this year? 300? 500? 1000? Keep going: I took about 1200. And I know demonstrators who took TWICE as many! There were so many ideas shared, and Day 2 of the Stampin’ Up! Convention started out with classes and ideas.
Here’s a great idea using the Milk Carton Die for the Big Shot to make a 6-sided box. Donna Griffith showed this one, created by cutting two Milk Carton pieces and trimming one panel from each.
Here’s another idea, using the corner of the Decorative Label Punch to create an ornate corner for layering.
There were several more stage walks, to celebrate demonstrators for their achievements in sales, recruiting and helping the demonstrators in your group to promote, and I was excited to be honored in each category. Here’s a shot of me walking across the stage with my stamping friend Lynsay Mahon. Stampin’ Up! has been a great way to make some fabulous friends!
We also spend time visiting display boards and touring the displays set up by Stampin’ Up!, highlighting each of the new Product Suites in the new Stampin’ Up! Catalog (debuted July 1st). The detail and creativity astounded us!
The evening wrapped up with a “+Fun” class. The one I selected was the My Digital Studio Hybrid Class. We made a terrific calendar–watch for my Class & “To Go” Kit later this fall. Drop me an email if you’d like the details when they’re ready!
One last chance to hang out until way past bedtime. We gathered in the room of several fellow demonstrators to talk about the Holiday Mini Catalog (yay!) and all the creative ideas we could come up with for the new products!
Convention 2011: Can this really be Day 1?
For sure, how is it possible that this day was packed with so much, and it was only the first day! Okay, here goes my fast photo tour of the Stampin’ Up! Convention, Day 1… (which was yesterday, if you’re losing track of the days like me!)
Here’s the Main Stage display–Stampin Up does a fabulous job of putting their stamp on everything (ha, bad pun intended), including the stage background.
One of the highlights of the morning was a chance to walk across the stage and be recognized for all the demonstrators who shared Stampin Up with a friend this year. Each of these Green Hat Girls had at least one person sign up to be a demonstrator with them. Way to go!! Just think, you could be one of us next year, if you wanted to take advantage of the $99 special before the end of July!
We also saw several fabulous projects created with the supplies from the Christmas Keepsake Box Kit that comes as a bonus with the July Demo Starter Kit special.
Next surprise? New Holiday Mini Catalog! We saw more of the incredible product suites from the upcoming Mini Catalog (customers begin ordering Sept 1, but demonstrators get to preorder Aug 1!). Then we got our very own copy of the new Mini!! See everyone with their heads in the mini? Those are looks of concentration!!
Then at lunch we had a Sneak Peek of one of the products coming up later this fall… (got a guess?) yum!
After lunch we worked on our own Make N Take projects, this stamping thing sure is fun! Hee hee… We didn’t quite finish the beautiful projects, so you’ll have to hold off for pictures of those. But here is a shot of my mom and Theresa working out the details of one of the projects.
The Annual Awards were held in the evening, announcing and honoring the demonstrators who earned the Incentive Trip to Disneyworld next spring. We also learned the locations for next year’s trips. Drumroll please… Hilton Head Island for the Getaway Trip and FIJI for the Grand Vacation!!
Interested?! Let me know if you have any questions about how Stampin Up can send you and a guest to Hilton Head Island or….FIJI! (can you tell I’m still excited about that one?)
Lastly, the Demonstrator of the Year awards were announced. I was thrilled to be recognized this year as the #35 demonstrator out of roughly 45,000 in the US. Very exciting, plus wonderful to be surrounded by my demo family!
Whee… Can’t wait to see all that is in store for us the rest of the week. I just need to figure out how to stay awake for it!
Happy stamping!
Meg
Convention 2011: Registration and Shopping!
We’re here! It’s here! Convention officially opened today, and if you remember my posts from Conventions past, you might recall that my demonstrator group usually wears some kind of fun green hat, so that we can find each other easily among the 3000+ demonstrators at Convention. Well this year is no different, so here we are, getting our green hats for this year! I think Kim did a great job finding these hats–they’re actually pretty cute!
To head from our hotel over to the Convention center, we have a short walk. But in Salt Lake City they have these fun traffic flags! You pick one up on one side of the street, then carry it with you across to the far side. I haven’t quite decided if the flags are really just a joke to mark us tourists or not, but until we figure it out, we have fun impersonating elementary school crossing guards!
My first stop of the day was Momento Mall, and who doesn’t love to shop for cute things created with Stampin’ Up! exclusive artwork and the Stampin’ Up! logo? Each year the Momento Mall is filled with all the things I “need”. And the displays this year really top all past years. Here is the wave of umbrellas, sculpted on a wall:
Did you seen the rain boots, too? They were filled with paper flowers in Stampin’ Up! colors!
On Registration Day we also get to visit the Awards Booth to pick up the free stamp sets and pins we’ve earned for the year. Most excitingly, I received a Founder’s Circle pin and exclusive purse this year again, which means that I’ll be in the top 100 for the Demonstrator of the Year Award. Wow! Very exciting, and you can probably see how happy we are — my friend Missy and I, posing here with our purses.
Finally, after a busy day and a fabulous Garden Party with Stampin’ Up! to cap off the official events of Convention Registration Day, we ended up at a nice dinner with our group.
I’d like to say that I headed straight home to the hotel and then directly to bed, but of course I had to write up some photos of the day for you all! What a fun way to kick off Convention 2011. But now I really do need to head to sleep so I’ll be bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for the *actual* beginning of Convention tomorrow.
Happy Stamping!
To Order Stampin’ Up! Products On-Line 24/7, CLICK HERE!
Convention 2011: why wait for SLC?
When I talk about the card swaps I’ve been working on for Convention, the idea is to take them to the Convention with me and trade them with other demonstrators.
But if I meet demonstrators in the middle of o’Hare airport in Chicago, doesn’t it make sense to start swapping now??! Okay, it confuses our fellow passengers, but you never know when you might inspire a new stamper!
Or it just might be a new demonstrator friend like dawn!
Convention 2011: early start
My Convention travel day started out early when our phone rang not once but four times at 4:45. No, my flight’s not til much later, but a demonstrator friend (who shall remain unnamed 
was up and her phone accidentally dialed us.
Hmmmm, or maybe she just wanted to share her excitement with me over being up early to head to Salt Lake City!!
In any case, it was probably good because it wiped out my “I overslept” excuse for not exercising this morning.
Now I’m taking the chance to work on my swaps on a big table–much more comfortable than the tray table on the plane!
Convention is Coming! Wish You Were Here!
I’m off to Salt Lake City! Yesterday I mentioned making some new Faster Fleece Flowers as swaps for the Stampin’ Up! Convention. Today I’m showing a few of the fun things I have planned for the LovenStampfuls Demonstrators attending Convention with me!
I didn’t want to show these too early, since I didn’t want to ruin the surprise for our demonstrator group. But since nearly everyone will be traveling today, I didn’t think they’d be cruising my blog and I think the coast is clear!
For the Flower Power Party tomorrow evening, I’m going to give each demonstrator a Swap Bag that matches the theme… Peace, Hope, Love… along with a matching Bag Tag.
At Convention each year we get a fabulous bag from Stampin’ Up! (can’t wait to see this year’s–we get it at Registration on Wednesday!). But since all several thousand of us have the same bag, it’s nice to have something different as a tag.
For the tag this year I started with a piece of cardboard, then covered with Designer Series Paper (the Island Oasis paper from the Summer Mini Catalog) using the Tombow Multiadhesive (love that stuff!). Then I put the tagboard and paper through my Big Shot Die Cut Machine with the Top Note Die.
The Extra Large Scallop Circle has an image from the Homemade single stamp in Pacific Point ink (did you see my Rock N Roll Tip for the Homemade stamp last week?). And the letters are stamped in my NEW Broadsheet Alphabet stamp set — LOVE that baby, especially with the clear mount format!
Tie off with a Pewter Jumbo Eyelet and a piece of Old Olive Grosgrain Ribbon, and you’re all set!
I also made a photo frame gift for my LovenStampfuls group — using these little flat glass frames from a Swedish discount store (get it?).
The Tempting Turquoise card stock inside the frame was stamped in Pacific Point ink with the Baroque Motifs stamp set (one of my all-time favorites).
And did you know that you can get blank Decor Elements sheets? You CAN!! So I used my Beautiful Butterflies Big Shot Die to cut a small butterfly from the White Decor Element Sheet. I stamped a little bit on the corner with Baroque Motifs and a Tempting Turquoise Craft Pad. The Craft Ink sticks great to the vinyl sheet. And of course I needed that ‘one more thing,’ so I added a Jewels Basic Rhinestone to the corner.
Looking forward to seeing many of my demonstrator friends at Convention this year!
To Order Stampin’ Up! Products On-Line 24/7, CLICK HERE!
Fleece Flowers: Faster and Fresher with Scallop Circles
This week is the Stampin’ Up! Convention in Salt Lake City — that’s 4 full days of thousands of crazy stampers all in one place.
One of my favorite parts of Convention is trading ideas with other Demonstrators. We like to call it “swapping” and we swap everything from cards to scrapbook pages to 3-D items.
Stampin’ Up! has a fun evening event planned for us with a Flower Power theme, so of course I had to come up with a fun “flower power” type item to swap! The Fleece Flowers I’ve shared recently are great (check out that Video Tutorial) but I wanted to come up with something a little quicker.
Hence the “Faster & Fresher Fleece Flower” was born! These little flowers are created using the Scallop Circle Die. The steps are simple:
- Cut a Scallop Circle from polar fleece fabric using the Big Shot Die Cut Machine
- Cut the Scallop Circle into a spiral, about 5/8″ wide all the way to the center
- Use hot glue to attach a 2″ fleece circle to the back of the spiral (cut with the Big Shot Circles #2 Die)
- Use hot glue to attach leaves cut from the Big Shot Island Floral Die
But I can do one better than just directions and photos. Here’s a Video Tutorial that I created to teach you how to make these simple flowers using fabric and your Big Shot Die Cut Machine.
Want to see other Video Tutorials? I have more! (click here to check them out)
And be sure to check back this week for more posts about the Stampin’ Up! Convention!
To Order Stampin’ Up! Products On-Line 24/7, CLICK HERE!
Accessories: Big Shot Die Cut Machine (113439), Scallop Circle Die (113468), Circles #2 Die (114526), Island Floral Die (118871)
Convention: Salt Lake City or Bust (with gifts)
Okay, honestly, I never understood that statement… “destination here or bust” What the heck does that mean, anyway? I suppose I should look it up in Wikipedia… if anyone knows, feel free to leave a comment
ANYWAY, back to your regularly scheduled programming…
Today’s the day! I’m really really looking forward to a fun day of finishing up swaps during my flights, chatting with my fellow demonstrators, and a really nice dinner at my favorite Salt Lake City restaurant, Cucina Toscana. MMMmmm… I can already taste the fabulous food!
Wow, am I distracted this morning, or what? I wanted to share these little Convention Albums that I made for the demonstrators in my LovenStampfuls group. I always like to have a little book for pictures RIGHT when I get home from Convention, so I thought I’d help them out with one ready-to-use.
I used the Cottage Wall Designer Series Paper, and the Big Shot Scallop Square Die to cut out the covers from the Chipboard Longboard sheets in the catalog. The numbers are cut using the new Stampin’ Up! Simple Numbers dies, which I’m finding super-handy. I love having large-format numbers available to use on my art and scrapbooking projects.
You might also notice that these little gift albums look suspiciously familiar… yes, everyone in my Stamps in the Mail Club will be making a similar project when they get their August Stamps in the Mail Club kits! Actually, if you’ve paid for your SITM August kit already, then your kit went in the mail yesterday. Here’s a picture of them sitting on the work table in my Studio over the weekend. I still think my favorite card in this month’s kit is the Kaleidoscope Tri-Fold Shutter Card!
To Order Stampin’ Up! Products On-Line 24/7, CLICK HERE!
Stamps: Jumble Alphabet
Inks: Rich Razzleberry, Old Olive Craft Ink (on numbers)
Papers: Cottage Wall, Certainly Celery, Pale Plum
Accessories: Big Shot, Beautiful Butterflies Bigz XL die, Stampin’ Up! Simple Numbers Dies, Scallop Circle #2 Die, Scallop Square Die, Chipboard Longboard, Tombow Multiadhesive, Crop-A-Dile, Rich Razzleberry Polka Dot Grosgrain Ribbon,
