Scrap Camp Recovery Day Two

These are my new friends called the Cuttin Up Crew! Tammy had T-shirts made this time which was fun to have! The other scrapbook group there was jealous of our matching shirts! We had 29 ladies attend and they are such a fun group of ladies! This was the spring gathering and they have one in the fall as well. Here is the scrapbook page that I created in my head at 4am while trying to get to sleep the last night. I even had to get up to sketch it down by the light of my cell phone. I made it once I got back down to the room at 9am. Everyone loved it, so many cased the page for their own group picture. That was so special and I was honored! I used Pretty in Pink, Regal Rose and Chocolate Chip. The pink layout is 8 x 8 and eyelet edge punched on the bottom. The white is 5 x 7 so the picture had to be cut to 4.5 x 6.5. I used brown dotted ribbon from Betsy's bag of ribbon! :) The butterflies are from the Sizzix Big Shot die cut and word window punch for the center body part. The scissors are made from small and large oval punches with the word window punch for the blades. They are attached with a brad and popped off the page with a dimensional dot. The letters and numbers are done with my new favorite tool that I HAVE to get! The Cricut! I used the Tear Drop font and sized them to 1.25". Then I attached them with my next new favorite tool the Xyron! It makes any things 1.5" or less a sticker! Thank you Taylor for teaching me how to use them! I bought one at Walmart while I was there on Saturday. Love it! Now I need to have that yard sale so I can get the Cricut and the Disney Mickey Font to finish my Disney scrapbooks! Have a magical day! Cindy

Scrap Camp Recovery Day One

I got back from my great weekend at Scrap Camp Spring 2009 on Sunday! What an amazing time I had! I got three and a half scrapbooks finished(which I will show this week), learned about some new stuff like the Cricut and Xyron, and made alot of new friends! I did not get much sleep and usually was one of the last ones up past 3am. OY! So I am paying for it today while I finish my month end for work. I will try to post later a group shot and the scrapbook page I designed for it. Have a magical day! Cindy

Festive Friday

Festive Birthday that is! Here is the card I made for my Dad's birthday. He loves gray/silver and black and I added the red to contrast it. Reminds me of the time when he asked me what to paint the strip on our race car and I said RED! So he did to please me and then a few months later, he painted it silver! Humbug! (love ya Dad!)

Colors - Black, Basic Gray and Riding Hood Red, Whisper White, Craft ink white

Stamps - Upsy Daisy, Pocket Silhouettes, Itty Bitty Backgrounds

Paper - retired Ghostly Gatherings striped

Punch - 1 3/4" circle

Ribbon - Riding Hood Red 5/8"Striped Grosgrain

Have a magical day!

Cindy

Disney Tip Thursday

why DVC? continued....

Another link http://allears.net/acc/dvc.htm is to another explanation of the DVC program. It covers the same basics as the other link but not as funny. Love the "need the Excedrin yet?" at the end of each topic in the article!

Since we have owned DVC since 2004, our vacations that we have taken have more than covered our contract amount. Example: Our DVC contract 17,000

Hotel cost for 2004 trip $ 1580

Hotel cost for 2005 trip $ 3950

Hotel cost for 2005 Christmas trip $ 9450

Hotel cost for 2006 trips $ 3150

Hotel cost for 2007 trip $ 2540

Hotel cost for 2008 trip $ 2725

Grand total in just hotel bills would have been $ 23,395.00! More than $6,000 over our contract amount to date!

We know that we still 33 years left on our contract! And yes, this can be willed to our girls to have and enjoy with their own families one day.

I am going to cover the reason why we bought into DVC ownership:

#1 Disney luxury resorts! You get larger accomadations then just your regular hotel room. Friendly Disney high quality service too! You can basically just stay at the resort all week and never go to DisneyWorld and you still have that Disney feeling of being there!

#2 They also have other resorts that are not on Disney property. Examples Hilton Head, Vero Beach and soon expanding out to California and Hawaii! Rumor are that they are looking at Myrtle Beach next.

#3 We can book 7 to 11 months in advance! Yes it is great when you love to plan out every detail for your vacation. I have gotten better about this and have become more flexible in this area.

#4 We can sort of prepay for our vacations! We would have to budget each month to save up for one vacation anyways so why not do it this way.

#5 Guaranteed vacation each year whether to Disney or the beach! Some times we can even manage to do two trips during off peak times and in a studio room for less point usage. This is the first year, we have banked our points in to the next year. Going to save up points to hit Hawaii once it opens!

One of the things I love the best is when we arrive to the resort and they check our ids at the gate for check in....they say "Welcome Home Schuster Family!" I sometimes response with a "Thank you! It's good to be home!" Heehee!

If you have any further questions about DVC, please email me at nutmeg1197@aol.com and I can try to answer them from my experience with DVC.

Have a magical day!

Cindy

Wacky Wednesday

Today is a project that I did on UStamp - an online class where you get to do several projects at your own pace and keep the project pdf's for future use. See the UStamp Blinkie spot at the top right if you are interested. I wanted to make it a spa theme so I went with a calming color combo. This was a simple 4 square boxes put together. They were taped together with a 5 3/4 x 5 3/4 square and hole punched with large oval to make the handle. The color combo is Certainly Celery and retired Blue Bayou. (I still have some of that left and need to use it!) The paper is from Urban Garden which matches perfectly. The flower is from my friend Monika. She had a class that I attended where she taught us how to make this sweet thing! You take a 1 x 12 sheet of DSP and scallop edge punch one side. Then score it every half inch, make folds and tape ends together. Squeeze together and place on glue dot to secure it. Add a button to finish the center off. The first one can be tricky so that your time if you try it. I remembered that I had some Mary Kay spa products left and decided to add them to this. Unbelievable that they match the color theme! What a great gift this would make for Mother's Day! Have a magical day! Cindy I leave tomorrow morning for my scrap camp weekend but have scheduled posts for the rest of the week. Be sure to check in! I will be showing some of my COMPLETED scrapbooks next week!

Disney Tip Tuesday

Some people have asked me about DVC or Disney Vacation Club, so this week's tips I will cover some of the basics about DVC. Howard is such a saleman of DVC when he talked to people about it. It was meant so much to us to have this timeshare ownership! Our history with DVC started back in May 2003. We were on a Disney vacation with my parents,brother/his wife and us. We were staying at the Beach Club in a two bedroom suite with a large kitchen and living room area. It was luxury at the best! Howard had stopped at the DVC area at the front of the resort and asked to come on a tour at the Boardwalk Resort Preview Center. I was NO where interested in going with him. He went and thought it was a great idea but not the right time for us financially. Then forward one year, Howard's dear grandfather had passed away and left an inheritance for his family members. After much thought and budgeting, we took some of the money for a good deposit on the DVC loan. Howard remembers the trips to Disney that his Grandparents took them on over the years and thought this was a way to honor those special memories with Grandpa and Grandma Schuster by spending Disney vacations with our girls. Sort of like a gift of Disney from them each year. We know that he would approve. So we bought in February 2004 with a start date of April 2004 as owners at the new Saratoga Springs Resort and Spa. We have a 250 points per year contract that expires in 2054. We bought back then $93 per point and they had a mear 60,000 owners at that time. It has grown so much in the past 5 years! Big increase in price too! I found this website below and click on it to read about the details of DVC. You will have to scroll down to see this excellent article. I thought it gave the pros and cons of having a DVC ownership and explained the details as well. DVC is not for everyone but to some of us that have ownership, we LOVE it! http://www.mouseplanet.com/8739/A_Disney_Vacation_Club_Primer I will cover more DVC details on Thursday! Have a magical day! Cindy

Made for Monday

I always struggle with masculine cards. You have to keep them SIMPLE! NO girly frills ya know! I found a card on Splitcoaststampers.com (I am sorry that I can not find it now to give that person proper credit) and had to cased it! I made this card for my Brother's birthday. I used retired River Rock (should be a neutral color), chocolate chip and whisper white cardstock. I took the classic ink pad and swipped it across for a grainy look on the background. I love this tree from the Lovely as a Tree stamp set. The sentiment is from Upsy Daisy stamp set.

Here is the photo frame that I made for him to hold pictures of his sweet baby girl. I used chipboard coasters (thanks Taco Mac) and covered them with chocolate chip paper. Add jumbo eyelets and ribbon to hold together. I used a clear envelope to make the photo sleeve to change out the picture as she grows.

Have a magical day!

Cindy