Hello!!

Can ya BELIEVE it? I’m finally updating the blog!

Heh ;)
First I’m going to tell you that below I posted things referring to pictures that were SUPPOSED to come up right behind what I said, but they didn’t. I’m working on figuring that out ;) For now, class pictures are in the stream at the left of this entry and you can sort of match them up, maybe, with commentary, til I can get this fixed, as the pictures aren’t posting properly at the moment ;)

Okay!

ANYway! It’s been a little crazy for the past several weeks over here at Cynful Designs, but I’m happy to snatch a chance to post some good news and some fun happenings here now :)

First things first! I dove in and bought a lot more SuedePaper! I am in LOVE with the SuedePaper, I confess ;)   I am now a proud retailer of SuedePaper in the colors of: Carbon, Snow, Moka, Bordeaux, Forest, Iris, Violet, Cream, Canary, Flame, Smoke, Sage, Apple and Sienna. Lots and lots of beautifully luxurious, soft, textured 8.5 x 11″ SuedePapers!

 Alright, then also I’ve been very busy working on labeling my dies and I’ve come up with, what I think is, an AWESOME system! If you’re curious and you don’t know about it, feel free to drop me a line about it :)

 THEN for my birthday, an early QVC inspired birthday present… the QuicKutz Silhouette Digital Cutter! Oh, how I’ve been going crazy with that! I took a class at Scrappin Good Times, Juli and Gilbert were wonderful and amazing enough to squeeze me in and I learned lots of good tips and tricks in their Silhouette 101 class. Thanks Guys!! :)

 Then I’ve been busy downloading dingbat fonts, creating character sheets and a binder for them and cutting all my new shapes and fonts. I purchased a subscription to clipart.com and got some really uber-cool pieces of clipart that the Silhouette EFFORTLESSLY transformed into shapes it could cut. Words can’t express how much I love the Silhouette! I bought the personal Cricut for myself last November, and I could never get into using it. I wasn’t sure I would want the Silhouette, based on that. In fact, I was fairly sure I *didn’t* want it, til recently. Oh, how glad I am that I learned more about it and that it was offered at a great price through QVC! AND that my boyfriend was crazy enough to buy it for me for my Birthday! (Thanks Dan!!) :)

 Okay, next! I planned and held the first Cynful Designs Halloween class,  of which, if all goes well, I hope for there to be at least two more before the grand day arrives! (Hehe!) It was large enough, and I had people coming from far enough, that I split it into two separate classes.

 We held the first on Sunday, September 2nd, and though it was 105 degrees in Burbank, we managed to have a GREAT time! The class was from Noon until 4pm, and I was kicking myself for it that morning as the weather forecasted another 105 degree high. I took as many precautions as I could beforehand, though, and I dare say we weren’t unbearably uncomfortable thanks to the A/C, some impromptu window coverings, the fan and some nice cool Witch Brew Punch, liberally garnished with Berry Rainbow Sherbet (did you know Sherbet has no second “r” in it? I learn something new every day!).

I made up goody boxes for the class attendees, as this is a very special time of year for me, and I want these particular classes to be the VERY best Cynful Designs has to offer! :)   They were lovely black boxes with holes cut in the top, covered with clear cello. They are intended for use as cupcake boxes, but not here they weren’t! Each attendee had a goody box comprised of: a mini bone paper punch, a glow in the dark plastic skeleton, Pumpkin Patch Pop Rocks candy, a Candy Corn and a Vampire Face eraser, a hard plastic witch’s hat (in either black or orange), a 4 sided halloween foam stamp, a bottle of Eucalyptus Stickles and a mini vial filled with the non-flat portions of their class kits. They looked like this :)

There were 5 of us participating for this Sunday class, Sandy, Danielle, Jessica, Renee and I. We played a little trivia game at that Sunday class, as well, and Sandy was the winner! She won a foam stamp set (from Michael’s) and a Monster Pen (from Oriental Trading Company). 

I ordered a meat and cheese tray and a fruit tray for the classes, and set out bowls of candy corn and miniature bite sized candy bars. We had a large bowl of Ruffles with our sandwiches. The deli tray was turkey, roast beef, swiss, provolone and cheddar cheese and it was good! It came with presliced wheat and french bread baguettes. I ordered from a place called Store2Door and I will use them again, undoubtedly! The fruit tray was lovely, and included red and green grapes, cantaloupe, honeydew, pineapple and strawberries. YUM!  

 I also put out caramel apples, to really try and capture the spirit. I figured eating whole caramel apples wouldn’t be easy or clean, with our projects, so I cut up a bunch of Gala apples and set them out with caramel dipping sauce. Here’s a picture of that :)

The punch was a big hit as well, it was VERY tasty!

It’s not PRETTY, but with Ginger Ale, Concentrated Fruit Punch, a bit of water and a LOT of berry rainbow sherbet, it was WAY yummy ;)

After we’d eaten, I had everyone roll a die. We went in numerical order and people were allowed to pick their card kits out of a little wagon. One card was the winner, but it could not be fathomed by anything you could see on the outside…

But inside Danielle’s chosen card kit, inside the card, was a QuicKutz ghost, stating, “You Win!”, and she won the centerpiece, a copper colored pumpkin shaped tea light holder with a skeleton, a ghost jingle bell and a purple metallic spider all attached :)

We finished the class before 4pm and had a little time to relax and hang out, and time for another round of Witch’s Brew Punch ;)

Wednesday night we repeated the class for my local participants, Judy, Jackie, Cindy.  We had the rest of the food trays, more caramel apples, more Witch’s Punch, all the good stuff! Jackie won the centerpiece this time :) This class was also comprised of folks all pretty new to this kind of thing, with none of their own tools, so it went a bit slower, but not too bad, we also finished before the 4 hours was done (and that included about an hour for each class meal, too). This class went much quicker than I thought, these guys are great at this, they catch on quick! I wanted more pictures of this class, but I forgot to ask Dan to come out and take them, there was some excitement that day regarding his new job :)

If you’re still with me, I have very exciting news to finish up with! Last night, late last night, I faxed in an order for the remaining 25 colors of SuedePaper! This will give me the entire color line in the SuedePaper for your purchasing pleasure! :)   The new colors include:

Sand, Putty, Antelope, Shammy, Taupe, Platinum, Gray, Charcoal, Peach, Azalea, Pink, Coral, Fuchsia, Tomato, Brick, Mauve, Cobalt, Ocean, Navy, Aquarius, Powder Blue, Baby Blue, Seafoam, Olive and Moss.

And I restocked on Carbon and Snow, of which Snow has sold the most of the papers I have thus far, and of which I use the absolute most of Carbon for the things I create to sell. I love this stuff! I’m also experimenting with their new item, Suede Cardstock, as it is the closest thing to the SuedePaper I can get in the color Orange. It comes in sheets of 20″ x 26″, which is just… odd, lol. So we’ll see how that goes.

And for those of you who might not have heard yet, Stickles lovers rejoice! There are 5 new 2007 colors out and available! The new colors are Cinnamon, Burgundy, Baby Blue, Cotton Candy and Gun Metal. They’re beautiful, as are the rest of them. 2 big addictions of mine, right now. SuedePaper and Stickles!

Okay, so I’m not the best at this whole blog thing on Typepad yet, and so I’m not sure if the pictures loaded right. I’m going to add the rest of them, if I can, here below, pictures of both classes.

 I’ll announce the next classes as soon as I know when they will be. We had a great time and the Halloween classes are going to kick ASS over any of the other classes I have during the year, as it’s my super special time of year. Space is *extremely* limited, as the classes are held right out of my house, so if you’re interested, you will want to let me know quickly when I inform everyone, as I have more people murmuring about wanting to come than I did for the last ones!

Alright, let’s see if I can figure this picture posting thing out… ;)

Class Goody Box Prep -Class Goody Box Prep

Table Setting – Class Table Setting

In the spirit! A little mood setting :) – Halloween Decor. In the mood!

Sunday Class – Sunday Class - Working Away!

Sunday Class - Jessica! Look up! :)

Sunday Class - Oh, SO industrious! heh!

Sunday Class - In their natural element ;)

Wed. Class - We're havin' fun!

Wed. Class - Us again!

Alright, that’s it! I really hope that worked ;) Tomorrow is a new day with birthday celebration starting, so I best get myself off to bed shortly, here! :)