I've missed two weeks!

Oops - it's been almost 2 weeks since I posted!  Sorry about that.  I have been quite sick.

I hope you all enjoyed your Valentine's Day!  I know I said I was going to have Blog Candy last week but I just didn't get to it.  So, we'll have a bit of GIFT GIVING this week!

I'm placing an order on Sunday, February 24 at 6:00 p.m..  If you get your order to me by that time, here are some extra deals JUST FOR YOU, FROM ME:

- Anyone who places an order of at least $50 will receive a free item from me worth under $6.00!!
(glue dots - 5.95, dimensionals - 5.25, paper piercer - 4.95, button sizzlits - 5.95, baker's twine - 3.95, ink refills - 3.75, etc.)
Go through the accessories section of the catalogue and add any item under $6.00 to your order and I will buy it for you!!

- Anyone who places an order of at least $100, will receive a full pack of card stock (assorted or single colour 8 1/2 x 11 packs only, ALONG with the FREE item under $6.00!)

Remember, if you spend at least $60, you get a FREE Sale-a-Bration item also (scroll back through my website to see the free choices in an easy-to-see format).  If you spend $120, you can get TWO FREE Sale-a-Bration items, along with BOTH of MY gifts!

I hope that helps you with your shopping list!  Be sure to check your wish list and your stock and please contact me by Sunday at 6:00 if you want to place an order.

Have a great day!
Andra

ps - tomorrow I will post reminders about all the current specials that are available from Stampin' Up!

Home again (and Prize Patrol!)

Hi everyone,

Whew!  I made it home!

Convention was amazing this year.  I'm so glad I went!

The end of Convention ended on a high note...I won a PRIZE PATROL GIFT!!!  What is that, you ask?  Well, when you go to convention you receive a coloured wrist band in your bag.  I had a pink one with white flowers this year - so did Gisele, Lesley and Sara, who were all in our "group".  After a demonstration, each presenter gives away a set of items they used in the projects.  They flash a picture of the matching wrist band on the big screen and then you jump up and down and scream if you win!!!  Well, we WON!  I was thrilled to receive 3 items I had not purchased yet and am thrilled to have won!  We'll definitely be using them in upcoming classes!

I think it was even more fun to win WITH friends - we were very giddy about it!!  Here's a picture to prove it!

Lesley, Gisele and I (Sara is not pictured).  We were VERY excited!! 

(I still am, actually!!!)

Also, I think you should check out this link, just for fun!!!  I was so pleased to meet Linda Heller and chat with her.  She's lovely!  It's a great picture too!  Thanks for letting me know about that so quickly, Bev!

A final reminder to get your entry in for the Blog Candy by tonight at midnight (please enter IN the Blog Candy post (several posts ago...).

Also, if you get me an order of at least $50 by noon tomorrow, you'll get a special gift I bought for you at Convention!!

I have so much more to post but I'm exhausted.  I'll work on it tomorrow!

Night, night,

Andra

Second Day at Convention

Hi,

Friday at Convention was a wonderful day.

Our day started with Main Stage presentations and also some "walks".  You get to celebrate your achievements at different times during Convention.  In the morning they did the Annual Sales walks.

I was nervous going up onto the stage, but it was pretty neat to look out at 3500+ people!

I crossed the stage with Kari.  She is from Kingston and also earned the 20K award this year.  She is part of our "group" and is so much fun to spend time with!  We were so glad (excited!!) that we could go across the stage together!

During Main Stage, we heard about the MDS2 program that is due out in August.  They have made about 75 changes/additions to the program and it sounds amazing!  I'm going to start using it, so watch out!!!  We also had great stamping demonstrations from Shannon West and Bonnie Thurber.  I love them both!  (I secretly want to be related to them...!) 

Shannon gave us a quick peek at this amazing project.  I'll tell you more about it in an upcoming post!!

After Main Stage was over, I went and worked on my "Make & Takes" with my new Convention Stamp sets.  I didn't get ANY of my Make & Takes done this year - I guess I was too tired!!!  I'll have some work to do in the next few weeks to get them done!

I attended two great classes after that.  The first class was called "I Am Having Fun".  Shannon West lead the class and it was fabulous!  Adele and I sat together and had great fun dancing along to Barry White during the class.  :)

The class was all about remembering that stamping and Stamping Events should be fun for everyone.  All the senses should be "happy" during an event.  It should look good, sound good, smell good, taste good and feel good!  That makes "sense" to me!  Hee hee!

My next class was called "I Am A Leader" with Brian Pilling.  I got a kick out of the fact that he really wanted to call it "I am a Bad Leader" and tell us what NOT to do.  Instead, he did a great job keeping it positive and was able to teach us what he wanted by using the well-known fairy tale, "Goldilocks and the Three Bears".  

I liked how he got us to write real goals for ourselves with timelines.  One of my goals is to have more of a schedule for my Stampin' Up! stuff.  I want to be a bit more organized in my approach instead of just fitting things in here and there.  

After that class we went back to Main Stage.  Shelli did a neat stamping presentation and I laughed out loud (as did everyone else) when she showed us a new product and said "If you don't order this, something is WRONG with you!!"  

During this Main Stage session, I got to cross the stage for earning a 100K award this year.  Adele was able to snap a quick picture of me while I was up there:

We ate a fabulous supper at P.F. Chang's that night and then zipped back to the hotel to do our "Shoebox Swap".  I'll post pictures of that in another blog entry.  

Hope you're enjoying the pictures and all my babble!  

Andra

Convention First Day Fun and Blog Candy!

Hi everyone,

* I have edited this post to add more pictures and information.

Well, today was the first official day of Convention.  It was a fabulous day!

Here we are waiting to get in to the Main Stage area.  There were over 3500 Demonstrators in attendance this year.  It was LOUD and EXCITING!!!

The Theme of Convention 2012 is "I am...".  This was the main stage.  Loved it!

Here "I am" in front of the stage...

The Main Stage opened with this fabulous video playing on the big screens.  The end of this video actually happened - the dancers came out on the stage to finish the song.  It's a fun and catchy song - I'm sure you'll love it too!!  It was filmed at the Riverton Home Office with the Stampin' Up! employees doing the "lip dub". 

Shelli Gardner (co-founder and CEO of Stampin' Up!) then greeted us this and we had a wonderful Main Stage presentation.  After that, I attended two fabulous classes.  

The first class was called "I Am Savvy" and we learned fabulous new techniques and tricks for using Ribbon (presented by Dawn Griffith), Fabric (presented by Laura Milligan) and Simply Sent Kits and Simply Scrappin' Kits (presented by Megan Wheeler).  I especially LOVED Laura Milligan's fabric ideas.  I am absolutely going to plan some class projects featuring fabric and the Big Shot!!!

After that we went to a class called "I Am Open for Business".  It was a class to work on how to meet new people to share Stampin' Up! with.  I have some fun, new ideas to try.  I really enjoyed Carrie Cudney's information and ideas.  I thought it was great how she brought everything back to the idea of "going fishing".

Here "I am" again later in the photo area!

It was awards night tonight and I was so proud to see Catherine (who is my upline) awarded for being one of the top 20 Demonstrators in Canada.  As a result, she was awarded the Founder's Circle Award and will attend a special event this fall.  (They give this award annually to the top 100 US and top 20 Canadian Demonstrators.) Wow!!!  She got a beautiful bag as a gift for receiving Founder's Circle.  

Now on to the fun...I know many of you are probably here to enter the Draw for my special CONVENTION BLOG CANDY!

In order to enter the draw, you need to leave a comment on this post, by Sunday at midnight, telling me something you want to learn how to do with stamping and/or Stampin' Up! products.  It could be a technique you want to try, a product you want to learn about or projects you want to work on.  Please put your name on the post.  I'll do a draw for the number of the post that will win on Monday morning!!!  :)

What will you win?  A stamp set from the new Catalogue called "Lovely & Lacy" (I already bought it and I got a second set here at convention so YOU can have it!)  I will also put an exclusive Convention Memento Mall item with the stamp set.  It's a great prize so make sure you enter the draw!

(This fabulous card uses the Lovely & Lacy stamp set!)

I bought all the sweet little gifts you will receive if you place an order of at least $50 by Monday, July 23 at noon.  You won't want to miss out on the free, fun stuff!  Scroll down to past entries if you want to read more about this.

Night, night!
Andra

ps - if you're on Facebook, you can find me: Andra McLeod Donbrook, and be my "friend" and see some pics of me from Convention.  Just a few so far, but there will be more!

Check-in day at Convention...

Hi everyone,

* Please note that I have edited this post and added pictures and details.  My first post did not have many pictures.

On Wednesday morning, we lined up bright and early to get our Convention bags and SHOP at Memento Mall!  What fun!

After that, we took the bus to go tour the Riverton Home Office.  They have these fabulous big rocks in front of the office building and they are perfect props for taking pictures.

Inside the Home Office, there are many things to see.  I have hundreds of pictures, but here are some I thought I would share:

This is me inside the Riverton Home Office.  They have a large display area with beautiful projects, called the Legacy Room, designed to inspire everyone who enters.  I'll put a few of the pictures that I liked the best below.  

Large flower display.

Loopy wall decor.

Covered books and cards.

I thought this room was fabulous!  They "blew up" the flower in "Betsy's Blossom" and then cut out card stock to make the flower.  Gorgeous!!

After touring the Legacy Room, we went on to visit the Distribution Center.  It is HUGE.  Probably at least as big as a football stadium and  there are boxes and conveyor belts everywhere.  Here are some pictures of it:

This is what you see on the right hand side of the Distribution Center.  This is where the computers generate the shipping labels and the workers make the boxes that will be filled.  From there, the boxes travel on the conveyor belts and once they get near the rows of products, every few feet the shipping label is scanned by a machine and if the box needs products in that area, the box is re-routed.  It's really incredible!

This is what you see directly in front of you when you are on the balcony (you can't even see the back wall of the warehouse!!) 

This is what you stand on the 2nd floor balcony and look to the left.  At this point, the boxes have travelled all the way through the warehouse and are coming back up this conveyor belt.

This is a picture that Catherine took of Adele, Gisele, Dayna and I from the Balcony of the Distribution Center.  We were on the floor checking everything out.  Great picture!  I think ALL pictures should be taken from above!  :)

After touring the Distribution Center, we went into the Atrium and took some pictures as a large group.  Stampin' Up! has made this facility absolutely beautiful for the employees.  It has a large waterfall and pond in the middle and everything looks and feels welcoming.  What a beautiful place to work!  

After our tour, we went to the Olive Garden for a fabulous supper (WAY too full after that) and then went back to the Convention Center for our first Class.  My class was called "I Am a Pattern-Mixing Pro" and we worked on creating a beautiful canvas with paper flowers.  The class was lead by Carrie Cudney.  She is so much fun!

I did not finish my project but will...someday!!! 

It was a great first day!  

Andra