Every June, the Great American Scrapbook Convention comes to Chantilly, VA, a 15 minute drive from my house. For the past few years, I have been fortunate enough to have had my daughter Jess with me. But now she is an Ensign in the Coast Guard and they are out sailing the high seas so I was flying solo today (and still managed to drop way too much money).

I checked out the classes going on and there are a LOT! I have never taken one there but noticed a few that looked tempting. Down the first aisle, I saw a Sizzix Outlet store called Scrapperz Outlet that had a great assortment of dies at amazing prices, even the new pop-up ones by Karen Burniston, so if you are going, definitely stop by there. I dropped in the Melissa Frances booth to say hi but Melissa was teaching class. I chatted with her daughters for a bit, who are lovely and look just like their mom! Bought a very cool (and only $4!) 4″ x 6″ album made from MDF? Her display with the tiny crystal chandeliers, as always, was beautiful.I also spent a good bit of time in Accent Scrapbooking which carries some very interesting products, including a lot of acrylic albums and shapes. This product offers a lot of possibilities…

I noticed there were quite a few more booths selling deeply discounted merchandise. A sad comment on the state of our economy… but I’ll admit I did my best to help them out. Just doing my part. There were also 2 wire grid racks for paper which each hold 30 stacks which I purchased because up till now I have been using milk crates. They hold a lot of paper but are heavy and you have to look through the entire bin to find the one piece you are looking for. Part of the problem is they started out in color order but, over time, have become unruly. Now to find room for them- they do stack on top of each other which is good.

And when I got home, I received a preview of my product which will be coming out at the summer CHA show- it’s so exciting! What a fun day. I am so blessed to be able to work doing what I love. Thanks Hayward 🙂

It’s a sickness… I often try to figure out why I have this obsession with boxes. Is it that the boxes are a symbol for my deep seated yet unfulfilled desire for organization? Or is it just because they are so darn cute? I prefer to think it is the latter.

Tonight I went to the mall with Mary because she wanted to get some sneakers. I needed to price a new washer. So we separated and agreed to meet at the shoe store. After hanging out out the shoe store for a while, I remembered she said she was going to Dick’s first. So I wandered down to see if I could find her there. As I was going down the escalator, I saw her on the other side. For some reason, I turned around and attempted to run up three (moving) escalator steps in my flip-flops. Something went terribly wrong and I found myself with a cut toe, bruised other foot and a hole in my favorite black capris sitting on a step going down. Oh and also, I was humiliated. I had dropped my bag and an off duty Dick’s employee who was 5 steps behind me handed it to me in disbelief. I wanted to say, “What? You have never done something totally ridiculous and idiotic in your life? Just wait honey…”

To give Maryanne credit, she did acknowledge me (OK, she was laughing her head off) and we sailed out of Dick’s. By then I was laughing too. The blood coming out of my toe and all over my flip-flops was another matter. So we stopped in a Bath & Body Works where she suggested I buy some hand sanitizer and wipe off the cut. That’s when I saw these adorable little bottles. I’m going to a lunch tomorrow with some friends and thought, “Everyone should have one of these with them at all times just in case…” and purchased one for each friend (and myself!).

As we all know, presentation is everything! So I took some scrap matboard, a couple of stamps and ink, ribbon and plastic rubber bands and fashioned some tiny gift boxes for them. I measured the bottle and calculated how big I wanted the box. Then I stamped the matboard, scored the sides, and trimmed off the edges. I punched holes on both sides of the box and threaded ribbon through and knotted it inside for the handle. And that’s it! I didn’t even glue these as I usually would (it’s now 3:30 AM for heaven’s sake!) but instead used the plastic bands to hold all the sides together.

Now I need a trip to the mall for black capris…

I was honored to be asked to create a piece of art for our choir to give as a gift to a visiting muscian who is doing a workshop for us. I love this uplifting quote from Psalm 100. I had an idea of how I wanted to lay it out and of course waited till the last minute (there were other last minute things with more imminent deadlines before this! And do admit I am a procrastinator but sometimes people actually do wait till the last second to order something… and I can’t even get mad at them because I do the same thing…) ANYway, I was happy because the artwork came together pretty well and I was breezing along- matting went well- I liked the colors, they matched OK, went to frame it and the problems began. I wanted to use this cool antique frame- have been doing that a lot lately- save them for the “special jobs”. I started cleaning this glass and found two scratches! And of course it’s a weird non-standard size frame and I have no idea where my glass cutter is to do a new one. However, when when I went back to my frame room area and poked around- lo and behold- I found another frame within 1/4″ of the other one! With a little shimming, we were back in business!

The lesson is…everything takes longer than you think it will… so don’t wait till the last minute! I am saying this for myself mainly. And any of my children who happen to see this. 🙂 And for those who do things ahead of time (and you know who you are) I hate you. I mean, congrats on planning ahead…. but I’m sure my life is much more exciting than yours.

I am so sad. We made the exchange last night and I cried for about half the trip home. Thought I was doing OK till I saw the front porch with her little rocker sitting next to mine… But I did have an excellent night’s sleep. Life returns to reality and work…

In other news, I have 3 projects appearing in the August issue of Crafts ‘n Things! So that was pretty exciting to see. Now I am finishing off orders for the Coast Guard Academy Parents’ Club and the Army Officer’s Wives’ Club of the Greater Washington Area, assorted matted graduation announcements and wedding presents.

Pam came over yesterday and we did a project together- it came out really cute and she was so excited about giving this to her friend. Will post tomorrow.

I have been adding some features and fiddling around with this blog but it’s slow going. Had some excellent suggestions from my friend Patty’s daughter Caitlin who married an English guy and lives and works in England. She writes such a fun blog- check it out. Thanks Cait! You are so kind…

Time is flying by… this is our last week with Trinity and it has been so much fun to have her here with us. I never really understood what people meant when they said “It’s so much more fun to be a grandparent” but now I can see why. When mine were little (and there were four fairly close in age), it seemed most of the time was spent with maintenance- feeding, changing, baths, school, driving, sports and activities- that there didn’t seem to be time to just ENJOY them. But this has been a month full of enjoyment. She really is a delight, not that I am biased in any way…

So, at night, after I kiss her angelic little cheek, I come down here to my really messy, fun studio and see what trouble I can get into. I had sent proposals for what I KNOW is a really cool idea for a book in to two different publishers and was rejected by both (nicely, but still…). I’m not giving up yet… Also put myself out there with an idea for a regular feature in a craft magazine, so who knows… All they can say is no 🙂 The good news is the new product is coming along beautifully and can’t wait to be able to tell you all about it!

Today I planted. $168 worth of flowers from Lowes have been sitting in the back yard for a week and a half but it has been either raining or buggy or humid. Today was cloudy, about 74 and perfect. Trinity and I suited up- on went the gloves, bug stuff, comfy clothes and ponytails- and went out for a few hours to put them in. And now I think why did I wait. It was really fun. Of course I need a lot more…

In front of Giant every year, there’s a lady who sets up a flower stand and I usually visit her a couple of times. Now I have waited so long it’s buy one, get one free! So tomorrow Trinity and I will hit her stand and see what’s left. I think my favorite flower is the tuberous begonia- they flower continually and require minimal maintenance- what’s not to love? The photo above is something I saw on the way down the driveway to get the mail- have no idea what it is but love all the wacky strands popping out everywhere…

Is Trinity not the cutest child you have ever seen? My friend invited her over today and here she is proudly walking up the path to show me the cupcakes they made. Lorine is following with a box of dolls and clothes that Trinity is borrowing. Tomorrow we are headed out to Purcellville to check out a new fabric store. The fun continues 🙂

I am working away- this has turned out to be one of my busiest months ever! Today I mailed out an emergency gift order to my friend Charlene at Ft. Bragg, the last batch of wedding invitations have been finished, did three sets of graduation announcements, and am more than halfway done with an order for 600 magnets. Tonight I am finishing up some single orders. I am framing our NY house neighbors’ 50th wedding invitation as a surprise. As we were driving up to check on our rental property in upstate NY last weekend, we stopped at 11:30 PM for gas. Much to our dismay, the RV would not start. So we spent the night in front of the gas pumps listening to announcements telling us to turn off our vehicles while pumping gas, while we slept in our bed! We rented a car to get the rest of the way and our neighbors welcomed us into their home, since we had no RV to sleep in the next night. I also found some beautiful faux lemons in the thrift store- that’s Toni’s latest favorite thing to collect and think she will love them.

So life is good.