Founder’s Circle Day 2 continued….pm

What a relaxing day!  After the make and takes (see last post) and lunch,  everybody I knew went shopping at the outlet malls.  Me?  I went to my room, put on my jammies and “rented” a movie!  I even got under the covers, ate more jelly beans (they keep filling those candy jars like we really need more) and thoroughly enjoyed the afternoon!

Georgia called my room to invite me to dinner with a group and we all walked to Outback.  I tell you, this altitude and the hills really kicked my you know what.  I was having trouble talking and by the end of the hike, I sounded like I had sucked the helium out of 10 balloons!

After dinner, everyone (and by the way, the only ones here at this hotel are with Stampin’ Up) changed into their pjs and we went to the gathering place.  Yes, even Shelli had her adorable pjs on.  I didn’t get a pic because she was still trying to finish her swaps!

We lined up for our Holiday card swap and it took about 30 minutes to make it through 120 people!  We did a line swap, so it was organized and I can’t wait to look through them all!

As we finished, this was waiting for us:

The pen and matching notebook were for our Business Share time.  Demonstrators got up to the microphone and shared their favorite business tip in one – two minutes.  Lots of great tips and we all submitted them prior to coming so SU gave us the printed versions, too!

Stampin’ Up had root beer floats!  I haven’t had one of those in a long time and even the glasses were chilled!

ok, great pic of Mary Polcin but terrible one of me.  I’ll blame it on my post root beer float sugar crash.


PILLOW GIFT!

I got back to my room and found this on my pillow!  It matches the purse they gave us.

Off to bed now – have to get some rest for our Kanab tour tomorrow!  We leave at 8 am and not sure how long the bus ride is to get there.  It is going to be fun to tour the new Stampin’ Up manufacturing facility and see how they do all they do.  I think we eat lunch there also.

I can’t believe we still have 2 more days!

Linda

Founder’s Circle Day 2

Hi!  I’m still getting adjusted to the time change.  I think I woke up at 4:30 (6:30 my time”, saw the darkness outside the window and went back to sleep.   Woke up an hour later, still dark and played a Scrabble game on my phone and fell back asleep.  Finally got up and went to the breakfast buffet!

After breakfast, we headed to the Gathering place and they had added more chairs and these amazingly soft bean bags!

Jan helped me finish assembling my swaps for tonight!  135 done and ready to go!  These are gift card holders using the Spotlight on Christmas set, silver cardstock and embossed in silver.

all images copyright Stampin’ Up!

MAKE AND TAKES!!

Using our new stamp set “simple Friendship” (which will be coming out in the big Spring/Summer catalog in January) we made 3 projects:

all images copyright Stampin’ Up!

This is the front of the album we made.  The butterfly was stamped twice with Bordering Blue ink on vanilla cardstock – once on the cover and once on a scrap piece and cut out the body.

This is the inside that folds out:

all images copyright Stampin’ Up!

Jan and I showing our accomplishments!

all images copyright Stampin’ Up!

LOVED this little guy!  It is a Tri-fold with a window, punched with our new big circle punch. Bordering Blue cardstock.

Here is the inside: (the designer paper is Pink Pirouette but I’m a stamper not a photographer so it is tough to tell!

all images copyright Stampin’ Up!

all images copyright Stampin’ Up!

How adorable is this?!  It is a small cello bag with a piece of designer paper inside.  Then 3 little notecards are inside for a gift.  The top is punched with the Word Window punch (cello and all) and tied with our stitched chocolate ribbon!

Off to lunch!

Linda Heller

Founder’s Circle Day 1

Hi Stampers!   I arrived in St. George, Utah after a long travel day from Orlando.  After a few nights of less than 3 hours sleep, I managed to get here sleepy but excited all at the same time.   Matt got me up at 4 am to be at the airport by 5:30  only to sit for over an hour (on a hot plane, crying and kicking children behind me) because they needed to change the tires.  (funny, even I look at my tires before getting in the car – you’d think they might have noticed before we ALL got on!)  Anyway, I tried to finish my card swaps (had to make 135 holiday cards for Founder’s) and gave up since I was still getting a kick from the seat behind me just when I was trying to put my brads in and I’d drop them, never to be seen again.    So I landed in  Las Vegas where Stampin’ Up picked me up for a 2 hour drive to St. George.  There was only 2 of us who arrived  that early, so Joey (one of the Rising Stars this year) and I had a great chat as we drove through the gorgeous scenery.

Once we arrived at this beautiful hotel, look what was on my door:

Isn’t that sweet?  They always go the extra mile to make us feel special.  There are 122 of us here and we all have one on our door.

My first stop was to visit the hospitality room, where I picked up my name tag and a  Get To Know You game.  I was given a bow stamp from a stamp set (which name escapes me – it’s in the Holiday mini and has word images in the shape of a stocking, ornament, etc….Ah yes, Deck the Halls)  Anyway, I was to find the 4 other people who had the stamps that go in that set.  Once we found each other, we went back up and they gave us that stamp set! (wrapped in our new wide striped  Riding Hood Red holiday ribbon)  So I now have Deck the Halls and have to find something fun to do with it!

(all images copyright Stampin’ Up!)

The Hospitality Room was So Shelli, in pinks and cream.  The pillows on the sofa matched the lining in our purse, which is one of our designer papers.   Below you see one of the 2 tables with candy in glass jars!

If you look closely, there are little silver pails with pink ribbon to fill with candy!

Stampin’ Up also gave everyone a yearbook, with all of our pictures in it.  So the room was buzzing with “sign my yearbook!”

I’ll fast forward to dinner, since the hours in between were snoozing and a bath, both were wonderful.  I met up with Jan Burnett and we headed in to the Welcome Dinner.  Look at the beautiful table!

And at each place setting, a note from Shelli:

The dinner was wonderful and dessert, too!

And just when you thought dessert was the best and last thing, I went back to my room to find this hanging on my shower!  (gee, now I wish I wouldn’t have left things a mess on the vanity if I would have know they’d be in my room!)

AND inside (it is AWESOME!)

Isn’t it fabulous?!   I don’t know when it will be available – maybe in the next mini catalog or next catalog but wow!   This is probably what we will be using for our make-n-take session.

Oh, and these were in the top part of the bag:

Linda

p.s.  I forgot to tell you:  After dinner there was a pow wow with this year’s Rising Stars (demonstrators who were the top achiever’s in their first year of being a demonstrator) .   Anyone could join in and some of the past rising stars were there, too.   It was so amazing and refreshing to me to hear how they achieved cruise and Founder’s Circle their first year.   So many of them said they had no idea how they did it;  they just had fun stamping with their friends!   It just reinforces why I started this 10 years ago – to have fun sharing what I love…Stamping!

Linda