Love You Much Valentine Card Kit

I know it seems like Christmas just ended and we've all finally got all of our decorations put away, but it is time to start thinking about Valentine's Day. This card kit is just the thing to get you going on all things Valentine.




Love You Much Card Kit ($15) includes:
All cardstock stamped, punched, cut and pre-scored
All designer series paper cut to size.
Envelopes for each card
Detailed instructions to make the 3 cards pictured above
** This is perfect for first time cardmakers as the only tools you will need to have are tape and scissors.
If you need this item shipped, there will be an additional $4.95 for priority mail shipping.

For the more advanced cardmaker I recommend the featured item – Love You Much Bundle ($41.48 until Jan 31st) a 20% savings from individual items. Those choosing this option will receive an email copy of the directions to make the cards above.
Bundle includes:
Love You Much Stamp Set
Heart to Heart punch
Candy Lane designer series paper
Price listed does not include tax and shipping.

Please note that the purchase of the Love You Much Bundle does not include any cardstock or inkpads used in the making of the cards pictured above. If you are interested in purchasing any of the cardstock and inkpads used, please contact me.

Contact me today at kelleycrafts@gmail.com to purchase your card kit and/or Love You Much Bundle. Prices are valid until January 31st, 2009.

Stampin' Up Inventory Blowout

I admit that I'm a little late in getting this posted but I wanted to make sure that everyone knows about it and has a chance to get their orders placed before the promotion is over.

This is a first ever inventory blowout sale held by Stampin' Up. Getting retired, retired and some current products up to 50% off. Be sure to act fast, these prices are only available thru January 18th!


Click here to embiggen.

All retired/retiring items are available while supplies last, current products are available in limited quantity.

Visit my Stampin' Up website for contact information or to order online.

Country Living Holiday Collection

Invite the warmth and coziness of the holidays into your home with Stampin' Up!'s Country Living Holiday Collection Stampin' Kit. This kit has everything you need to create beautiful handcrafted ornaments.

* Holiday Collection stamp set
* Die-cut chipboard and Designer Series paper
* Card stock
* Ribbon and cord
* Pretties Kit brads
* Dazzling Diamonds Stampin' Glitter
* Adhesives
* Classic Stampin' Spots

Create dazzling ornaments and memories that will last a lifetime! Contact me TODAY to place your order because this offer is only good through December 31, or while supplies last. To shop online, click here, be sure to click on the shop now button in the top right corner. Or, call or email me with your order.

Sorry for the silence

So sorry about the long silence but November turned out to be very busy. We had a couple of dog fight issues with Aristotle. We drove to Texas for Thanksgiving and spent a week visiting with family and friends. (and totally realizing that we miss living there and really want to go back) We no sooner got home and I fell ill with what turned out to be bronchitis but felt like I was on my death bed.

But finally things are back to normal. The house is decorated and ready for Christmas and I'm in Christmas knitting mode.

I tried to finish as much as possible to take with me to Texas so save on shipping costs. All of the purchased gifts made the trip with us but only one handknit was ready to go in time. I made a pair of toeless socks for my mother.


She and my sister are easy to make socks for because we all have the same size foot. (which is why I'm modeling these socks) I really think mom is going to love these because she always says she breathes through her feet and is always cutting the toes off her socks.

I'm currently working on a pair of socks for my sister which will hopefully be done tonight or tomorrow. I'll have pictures of those as soon as they are done.

I've got a couple more posts to make today and tomorrow so be on the lookout.

Some Papercrafting updates

I have been really bad about posting on a regular basis lately and I promise that will be one of my New Year's Resolutions! I must be a better blogger.

I really don't have all that much in the way of an update to the happenings of life, it's been mostly dull. I've been playing a lot of World of Warcraft lately. The only excitement around was last Friday when Aristotle got in a fight with one of his doggy friends. Nobody really knows what happened and the other dog-mommy insists that it just happens sometimes and we shouldn't worry. We still feel bad and insist on paying half of her vet bills.

So, there you have it, that's really the only exciting thing that has happened since the last time I posted. Let's get on to some papercrafting news.

If you remember my last post I mentioned that we went to a wedding in Sedona. It was a really lovely wedding of a dear knitting friend. I promised you I would post a picture of the gift I made for them, and I certainly don't want to disappoint! Without further ado, here is the set of Thank You cards and box I made.





She had a totally DIY wedding and it was beautiful. I just wanted to make sure that after it was all done that she could relax. So, I used her invitations as a starting point in figuring out a color scheme and set out to make the Thank You cards. In the end, I think it turned out great, the box fit all 40 cards and envelopes perfectly. The best part....she loved them! (and I did save her time just like I had hoped since she didn't have to make them herself)

In other news, my sister's birthday was November 7th. Since I'm no there to take her out to give her a gift, I sent along this card/gift card holder.





That's pretty much all I have for now...but get ready as there are some big plans for some virtual classes coming to my blog soon.

1st Annual Pumpkin Carving

First let me say I am sorry that there hasn't been much posting going on around here lately, but I've been a little distracted. Not that it's all that good of a reason but the hubby and I have started playing World of Warcraft again. The last week hubby was off for vacation and since we couldn't afford to go anywhere we kind of holed up at home and played a lot of WoW.

Last weekend, to kick off vacation we initiated a new tradition in our household. Growing up my family never carved pumpkins and it just sounded like so much fun that we decided to start a new tradition. So while out shopping I found the perfect little pumpkin and this is what we came up with.....

Pre-carving drawing:


cleaning out the pumpkin:



(obviously NOT my favorite part and never again to be my job)

And finally, the end result:



And, the biggest reason I haven't been around this past week...the reason for the vacation...


We celebrated our 3rd wedding anniversary on Wednesday. And our 4th year together on Thursday.

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I promise not to be gone so long again. Next time I'll tell you about our trip to Sedona for a friend's wedding!

World Card Making Day 2008

I'm posting a bit late I know (yesterday was World Card Making Day), I got sidetracked yesterday appliance shopping. But I didn't want any of you to miss out on taking advantage of this great deal from Stampin' Up.



This offer is only good until Oct. 11th, so don't let it pass you by. Online ordering is available through my website at www.kelleyerickson.stampinup.net Once there just click on the shop now button under my name in the top right corner, or give me a call and I'll be happy to help you.


I'll be back with pictures as soon as I figure out where my camera charger is hiding.

SP12 Final Package

I got my final package this week from my SP12 partner Katja from Finland! Thank you so much! You have no idea how nice it was to get something fun in the mail with all this other stuff going on around the house.

Look at the picture on the box, isn't that pretty? It was kind of late at night when I took the photos so sorry about the flash.


And look at the goodies! I can't wait to try and find the perfect pattern to use with the yarns.

There are 2 skeins of Novita Luxus Wind and 2 skeins of Novita Malibu. Katja also sent along some Finnish candies that my husband is loving and some Finnish chocolate that I will have to share with him. Unfortunately I didn't get to the mail fast enough and so it sat in the mailbox melting until we got it. (nothing a short stint in the fridge can't fix!)

Thanks again Katja, you have been such a wonderful SP partner and I really do hope that we can continue our friendship!


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For those of you wondering about the house, have no fear, I will be making another post soon with all the updates.

Minor tragedy on the homefront

The day seemed to be pretty normal, you could even say we were having a good day. Hubby is home for a couple of weeks rather than travelling so we have been enjoying our afternoons together. (he has to work on eastern time)

We had just gotten home from picking up a Craigslist find and were settling in for the evening getting ready to cook dinner and doing a bit of laundry. Hubby started dinner and went to take the trash out while I started some laundry. Hubby came in from the garage and as he rounded the corner into the living room he started yelling. The pot on the stove was on fire! He tried to put it out as I came running and he saw it wasn't going to stop he yelled for me to call 911.

Everyone is ok, we got all the animals out of the house and over to the neighbors but not before I freaked out. I was on the phone while he was searching for the animals and he couldn't find Ellie...thats when I freaked. I wouldn't know what to do if I'd lost one of the animals. As soon as I saw that she was ok I stopped crying and collected myself.

So what once looked like this:


Now looks like this: (angle is different)


and the oven is in the back yard for now


We were the talk of the neighborhood tonight, one family even brought out their grandmother in her wheelchair to stare at us. Talk about humiliating! Thankfully the neighbors were home to take the animals for us until the fire department left and we got a bit of initial clean up done. Tomorrow we start the heavy duty cleaning going through each room and washing EVERYTHING!

The firemen probably thought I was crazy because as soon as we walked back in the house I gasped...the first thing I thought was "damn, I have to repaint the whole kitchen!" To me it looks devastating, but I know it could have been so much worse. I just can't let myself think of if that had happened.

I'm still alive!!!

I admit I've been a very bad blogger but I have been busy. And sadly tonight's post isn't going to be long, it's late and I haven't knit a single stitch today so I really want to do that before going to bed. In the interest of brevity, I'm going to bullet point what I've been doing since last post.

- Photographing and posting yarn to my Ravelry Stash (still not done but Flickr won't let me upload more until next month)

- Organizing said stash into something other than piles

- lots of jewelry making (mostly earrings)

- making lots of cards

- general cleaning, getting ready for MyMary who will be here next week!!!!! :)

- making loads of progress on my Gathered Pullover sweater (sadly no photos, soon though)

- a completed pair of Dunes of Tinfou socks, pictures to follow soon I promise

I'm sure there has been more but this is really all that I can think of at the moment. It's getting late so I'm going but I'll leave you with a few pictures of some cards I've made lately. These open up to a show a Ghiradelli Chocolate Square. If you are interested, they are $5 each or $12 for 3.

SP12 Question of the week #12

I know I'm behind again but only by one week, I think the new question comes out tomorrow and hopefully I'll be back on track by then.

This weeks question:


I’m sure most of us have a proudest moment when it comes to knitting. A project or technique that you’ve tackled and completed beautifully. What is your proudest knitting moment??

And on the flip side? What is the one thing that you can’t get right? What is that one project that you’ve never been able to complete? Or that you did complete but then hid away instantly because it was too embarrassing?


So far my proudest moment had to be completing a pair of socks in just 4 days. I decided to push myself this year and try my hand at Sock Wars. After a rough start not being able to figure out parts of the pattern, I knit like the wind and was able to kill off 3 people before my assassin found me.

On the other side of that is my very first knit purse, which still is just an eyesore. I know what needs to be done to fix it but I'm not likely to do it. I'll probably keep it around as a reminder of my improvements.


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I'm hoping to get a real post up sometime tomorrow complete with pictures since my USB port seems to finally be working. Look for a picture heavy post coming soon to a blog near you!

Catch up post - SP12 questions

I've been bad the last few weeks about answering the SP12 questions so here I am doing a catch up post while being tortured with hiccups that won't go away.

Question #9 - Have you ever entered your knitting (or anything else) in the fair? Would you ever consider it?

It has never even occurred to me to enter anything in the fair so of course I've never done it. And now that I've been reading a few blogs and seen a few people entering their knitting in the fair it has me thinking. Maybe one day I will but it's still a ways off.

Question #10 - What Olympic event would best descibe your knitting/knitting style?

I honestly can't say since I don't watch the Olympics. Not to mention I haven't had nearly enough coffee to come up with a decent metaphor. Maybe cross country marathons because I can stay focused on one project if I put my mind to it.

Question #11 - What is the best thing you've ever received in the mail/post?

Anything that isn't a bill or junk mail!

4 Things Meme

Four jobs I’ve had:

McDonald's Drive-thru girl
Receptionist for interior decorator from hell
Curves trainer
Nanny to my little Sunshine whom I miss every day

Four movies I can watch over and over:

The Princess Bride - there are just too many good lines in this movie
Grease - and don't even try to stop me from singing along
anything with "The Rock" in it because he's yummy!
Mary Poppins - again the singing along thing gets me every time


Four TV shows I love to watch:

HGTV's Design Star - because you never know when you'll see something you want to do in your own home

House - he ROCKS

How I Met Your Mother - they make me laugh

Boston Legal - again...they make me laugh

Four places I’ve been on vacation:

DisneyWorld - otherwise known as my honeymoon, we had a great time and would like to go back

France - this is definitely one to do again, I went when I was in high school. I want to do it over as an adult

Blue Eye, MO - hubby's family goes every year for family reunion, we go whenever we can. I've never had this much fun at my own family reunion!

Home - it's nice to be lazy around the house sometimes


Four favorite dishes:

Chili Cheeseburger - from Red Robin with 4 different cheeses

Chicken Bryan from Carraba's

Crab cakes with roumalade sauce

Fettucini Alfredo

Four Websites I visit daily:
Ravelry
Plurk
Stampin' Up!
My Bloglines

Four places I’d rather be:

Mary's house
Toronto
swimming in a HUGE yarn stash of my very own
Ireland

Blog Candy

Darcy (aka the Knotty Knitter) and Leslie Wind are celebrating the addition of a new buy now button and Darcy's 200th blog post by offering a great give away. Leslie handcrafts these wonderful cable needle necklaces that are just pure genius...don't believe me? Then just click on over to Darcy's Knotty Knitter blog and check out the video on how easy they are to use. (and not lose)

SP12 Question of the week #8

What is your favorite supper for a hot summer evening?

I don't really have a favorite supper for hot months. Granted I try to stay away from things like chili....unless it's on a burger or a hot dog. I've never been one to shy away from a food just because of the weather outside, if I am craving it, I eat it.

In which I show off cards

It seems that very few people know that I am a Stampin' Up Demonstrator but I suppose that could be because I haven't shown off many of the cards and things that I've made. Well I'm going to put and end to that, this is not only a place for me to talk knitting but to talk about all of my crafting.

I started teaching classes a couple of weeks ago and I'm really please with how well everyone did. None of my students had any experience with card making and they all did so well on their cards. I don't have pictures of their work but here are the cards we made.





As the weeks go by I'll be posting pictures of more of cards and projects, and will do my best to have a recipe for each item...however, it's already 2:45 AM here so you'll have to forgive me this time.

Actual Knitting Content!

Ok, so I know I said I was going to make this post a couple of weeks ago but I'm a slacker. It isn't because I haven't been knitting (though I did take a break for about 3 weeks when I thought all my projects were cursed). So...for you today I have picture updates of 2 projects I've been working on.

First up, is the MS7 Shawl, which most people have long since completed and I am still working on. Truth be told, I was diligently working on this shawl through the first clues and then went on vacation back in April and didn't take it with me. (it's my first lace so naturally a quiet time knit) Next thing I know, it's been 3 months since I picked it up again.


Imbolc by Renee Leverington (rav link)

Remember the curse I mentioned? Well I think it all started with this shawl, I think it is mad at me for putting it down for so long. Anyway, I am back at it though slowly right now due to these Mystery Socks I've been working on.



Mystery Sock June 08 by Renee Leverington (rav link)

I have had to frog this sock 3 times but I think I've finally got it. They are going be very warm socks, they are done in a DK weight and the cable pattern makes for thick socks. I am loving how the colors are working together.

Well that's all for me, next up is going to be some card making I've been doing.

Favorite Things

I saw this on another blog and thought it might be fun, play along if you like and post your favorite things on your blog.

Sport: hocky
Game: Phase 10 or Rummy
Color: these days teal and purple
Movie: Grease
Broadway play I have seen: Les Miserables
Broadway Musical I have seen: Phantom of the Opera
Song: Merideth Brooks "Bitch"
American city I have visited: New York City
Foreign city I have visited: Paris, France
Book: anything by Clive Barker, Stephen King, Gregory MacGuire, Ann Rice or Christopher Rice
Children's Book: Dr. Suess all the way
Classic television show: Family Ties
Recent television show: House
Actor: Tom Hanks
Actress: not sure
Perfume: almost anything in a pretty bottle
Food: Fettucini Alfredo
Dessert: caramel anything
Chain Restaurant: Chili's
Local Restaurant: Oregeno's
Car: still deciding
Condiment: Mayo
Kitchen Appliance: coffee pot
Home Appliance: my computer
Beauty Product: Japanese Cherry Blossom shower gel by Bath & Body Works
Piece of clothing: swimsuit.....it's Arizona after all
HGTV Show: Design Star
Food Network show: don't know, rarely watch it
Author: see fave book above
Male Songwriter: Rob Thomas
Female Songwriter: unsure
Holiday: Christmas
Ballet I have seen: The Nutcracker
Disney character: Tinkerbell
Flower: Tiger Lily

Alcoholic drink: frozen strawberry margarita
Non-Alcoholic drink: caramel frappuccino
Magazine: Interweave Knits
Animated movie: Lion King

Television network miniseries: Band of Brothers
Season: Winter
Male vocalist: Rob Thomas

Female vocalist: don't know
Day of the week: Saturday
Household Chore: no such thing
Ice Cream: Dulce de Leche from Hagan Daaz
Candy: Nilla Cakesters
Artist: too much beauty to choose from

SP12 Question of the Week #6 & 7

I completely forgot to post my answers to the question for last week so I'm going to do that today. And I promise to have some actual knitting content very very soon. I have been working on my knitting.

Questions #6
What is your favorite type of project to take along on holiday/vacation?

I like to take small projects with me when I travel, socks or purses usually. I always seem to have a sock on the needles so it's pretty easy to decide what to take with me and I don't worry about not having enough because I like to try and plan a visit to a yarn store anyway so I will invariably come out with more yarn.

Questions #7

What is(are) your favorite place(s) to knit?

Oh this is easy....my office, the couch or any Starbucks!

What supplies (besides yarn & needles) make the setting perfect for knitting?

Other than the necessities (scissors, etc.) natural light and a nice venti Caramel Frappucino make for the perfect setting.

Stampin' Up! Discounted Retiring Accessories

July 21 - August 10 (or while supplies last!)
Get them now while you still can! Contact me to place an order!

Item #	Pg. #	Description	Regular Price	25% Off Price
109117	167	Pocket Notes assortment	$9.95	$7.46
110479	168	Jersey Shore Designer Series paper	$9.95	$7.46
110699	168	East Coast Prep Designer Series paper	$9.95	$7.46
109159	169	Flowers For You Designer Series paper	$9.95	$7.46
110273	169	Spring Fling Designer Series paper	$9.95	$7.46
110748	170	Notebook Designer Series paper	$9.95	$7.46
109153	170	Porcelain Prints Designer Series paper	$9.95	$7.46
110751	171	Azure Designer Series paper	$9.95	$7.46
109164	171	River Rock Prints Designer Series paper	$9.95	$7.46
109175	171	Almost Amethyst Prints Designer Series paper	$9.95	$7.46
109168	171	Groovy Guava Prints Designer Series paper	$9.95	$7.46
109169	171	Close to Cocoa Prints Designer Series paper	$9.95	$7.46
110284	182	Eastern Elegance Rub-Ons	$10.95	$8.21
110285	182	Urban West Rub-Ons	$10.95	$8.21
110281	182	Cherished Memories Rub-Ons	$10.95	$8.21
109185	190	Jersey Ribbon Originals	$12.95	$9.71
109187	190	District Ribbon Originals	$12.95	$9.71
109189	190	Beachfront Ribbon Originals	$12.95	$9.71
110716	191	Wild Wasabi striped grosgrain ribbon	$7.95	$5.96
109062	191	River Rock double-stitched grosgrain ribbon	$8.95	$6.71