if you get the Paperthreads newsletter that is … January 21st is a Paperthreads sale. All the designers are having a sale on their files from 20%-50% off. My section is 50% off. So don’t buy any files until then. It is a Customer Appreciation Day and make sure to hit my blog that day because I should have some appreciation to download as well. And I know a few of the others will be offering specials on their blogs. So don’t miss it. There should be lots of activities and fun in the forum with lots of chances to win extra prizes and enter new challenges.

Here is a bit about Vicki and you can find her future projects and contact info on my main site HERE.

Vicki has been married for 23 years, has 3 grown daughters and 7 grandchildren ranging in age from 16 years to 5 months. Charlie, who just turned 7, loves to do paper crafts with “Mimi” and has his own album just for his drawings and things that he makes. Cutting and pasting are two of his favorite things to do.
Vicki has done several types of crafting through the years from sewing to handmade Christmas Ornaments and cards. In recent years she has worked as a Professional Photographer doing primarily children’s portraits or NHRA & NRBC Equestrian Events for a local doctor who is also an Equine Chiropractor. Vicki has also done Logo Design, Brochure Design, Advertising Design & Web Design.
In 1998 a friend introduced her to Creative Memories Scrapbooks and it was LOVE at first sight for Vicki. Vicki loves the convenience and ease of purchasing files from designers rather than making her own. This is how she discovered Visual Designs by Chris. The WishBlade is a great expansion of her already acquired tools for Scrapping! She does have a blog and you can see her projects there from time to time as well as in the Gallery at the Paperthreads Forum.

Welcome Vicki!!

So I better run. I have to look for the shinguards for practice and the soccer ball. Lord knows where they are. AHHHHH!!! And my hubby said he would be at practice. My son will be so happy. And I was worried about the Coach. He has it under total control and doesn’t need my help much at all.

Have a wonderful weekend! Enjoy the newsletter! And keep smiling… I am cause tomorrow I get to work on cutter files most of the day. WOOOHOOOO!!!

Enjoy!

Chris

And here is her Bio…

I have been married for almost 15 years to my wonderful husband, Keith. We have two great children. Zachary is 13 and Olivia is 6.We live in Central New Jersey, half way between Philadelphia and New York City. I am student teaching to finish up my teaching degree. I am an avid scrapbooker. I love creating keepsakes for my family and future generations so that they can know where they came from. I own a Silhouette and have been enjoying so much! I use it for everything from scrapbook layouts to cards to bulletin boards for my classroom. I am very excited to be part of this creative team.

Welcome to the team Dana!!

If you are not a subscriber to the newsletter at Paperthreads, then you will miss out on the announcement for the 21st… so don’t miss it…

I have been going through a major revamp on my mainsite and recently registered the website http://www.visualdesignsbychris.com/ It has been a new learning experience. I am definitely more relaxed about making cutter files then about websites. wow. So maybe this summer I will consider a class so I can better get a handle on it. But at least the site for now is making it’s way. The next site I will be revamping will be the Colton’s Friends site. busy busy.

On to life…

Here are some pics of my little one and Dad working on the fort. They were having a good old time. My two guys are cheese monsters with their cheesy grins.

Love the red boots. He picked them out himself in Vegas.

This is my Ruby Girl. when we got her she was skittish and didn’t trust us. She obviously had spent some serious time in a kennel and not being handled. She talks to me when I get home and chats and loves us completely. She shies away from the camera alot So this is a rare occurence of her face. Usually the pics are with her looking away or looking down. I love my pups for sure!

Well I better run!!

Enjoy!

Chris

Hello to everyone I have a lot to ramble so pull up your Diet Coke, Coke, Coffee, Lemonade, Hot Tea or what you have to drink and get comfy..

It is an exciting time for me. It is almost a year since I started this blog and what a year it has been. I am proud to announce that I have come to the point where I realize I don’t use my files to their potential and so therefore a Creative Team is born. I have a few to members announce and am announcing them as they send me their pictures and bios. Today’s Creative Team Member announcement is Karen aka Scrappin Mama. You may be familiar with her work because I have posted them here many times and they are all included along the left of today’s post. I look forward to seeing her projects come in and working with her.

Hi everyone. My name is Karen Krumpe, aka “scrappinmama” on the message boards.
I’m a full time house wife, mother of 3 girls and grandmother of 6 (Soon to be 7).
I have always been pretty crafty, but 5 years ago, my daughter talked me into trying
something that I hadn’t tried before. She was all excited about”Scrapbooking”. I put off
trying it for a long time, but finally did it, just so she would shut up. What can I say? I
have now become an addict and if there is a cure, PLEASE don’t tell me what it is. I’m
having too much fun! When I first heard of the Silhouette, I thought “Wow, I’ll never have to buy another alphabet set again.” Little did I know, at the time, just what amazing things this machine could produce. Thanks to the many message boards, and designers like Chris, I have found the possibilities unlimited. I’m so excited to be a part of this team and look forward to sharing my layouts with you all, as well as seeing what others have to share.
Thank you Karen for joining the Creative Team! See the next Creative Team Member tomorrow!!

Hello to everyone!
It is Friday!! Have any great plans?? I don’t have any that are huge. Woohoo!! I am beginning to love those weekends that are void of to many plans. I know there will be more working on the fort going on. I am hoping when my little one’s birthday comes up in April that it will be done and we can have the Birthday party at our house! I am sure the owner of the fort and the caretaker (my hubby) will be beaming proud.

I have a ton of files to get together and put up in the store. and I just recently uploaded a frame to the Membership. The Membership closes at the end of January for this quarter. All the information you can find out about it are listed on the left hand side of my blog.

Also, make sure you are signed up for the newsletter because I have a download in it again.

I, also, have been working on my main website. Man I get frustrated with website design and just cannot wrap my mind around it. I have been watching all the youtube videos possible for designing in dreamweaver. I have an older version of DW and may have to pony up for the newer version. It seems to be a little more user friendly. We shall see how it goes.

On to life…
Soccer practice was fun. My little boy ran and ran and ran his feet off. He had such a great time with all the kids. I hope it is a fun year. A few moms did the stand back and gossip thing and a few participated. My husband came between appointments so he could watch. I am excited for him. He wore his shinguards for the rest of the night. I signed up for assistant coach, but the coach seemed to have his wife and sister in law help out quite a bit so I got to just kick the soccer ball around. I never played soccer when I was younger. It was fun! And I am hoping instead of running my feet off. I am running my bum off hahaha.

Beautiful weather here. I was outside feeding horses in work out pants and a tshirt and wasn’t chillyin the least. In fact, I think it is time to consider the garden and getting it together. This will probably be my project this weekend. Organizing and regrouping. I have a bunch of crabgrass that has grown under one of the trees. so I think I am going to bypass the fighting with this year and put down the ground cover and cover the top of the groundcover with all my different pots in different sizes and plant some veggie plants in them and some flowers. The beds are going to be alot of work, but have to get out there soon before it starts to really warm up during the day. I usually plant in february. Most states you can’t plant so early. Here you are fighting the heat so you want the plants to grow and drop fruit before it gets to hot.

Can I ramble…. I guess I will let you know what I did this weekend on Monday!! Because I obviously am not sure!

Have a wonderful weekend!!
Enjoy!
Chris

Okay, so did I tell you I am the assistant coach to my Son’s soccer time. Yeah. Went to a team meeting with all the different teams and parents and one lady had stepped up to the plate to coach and she was staring at the other parents. And I thought it drives me crazy when there are 20 people in the room and one person volunteers to do all the work for 20 and no one does their part. So guess what I am the Coaches Assistant. There was a switch of coaches and I tried to get out of it when there was a late comer offer to be coach. Woohoo!! I can just go and enjoy the games and root for my child. But umm. nope.. When one offered to do it. The other didn’t want to do it anymore.

So this should be fun and interesting. I am looking for my tennis shoes and getting dressed and thinking that I hope the Head Coach is ready to go because I have never played on the soccer team. I have seen alot of games throughout my life. My cousin will be so impressed with me when he finds out. He is 20 something soccer fan that has played since he was 5. Hopefully he won’t show at any of the games to roll his eyes at me.

Well I am off to put together something to wear and be the Coaches Assistant. Hopefully he won’t ask me to run to much because I still am coughing up a lung. My son however is excited beyond all belief. He has been ready to go for the last two hours. He is sitting on the couch waiting patiently with his shin guards and tennis shoes sitting next to him playing Leapster. But asking every few minutes if it is time yet. Can’t wait should be lots of fun. Will let you know how it went. I can see some new titles for pages because of this… Soccer Coach.. Me What? No Hands? What? haha…
Have a wonderful day and Enjoy!
Chris

Well here I am no voice. Stress usually leads me to getting sick. So today I have no voice. My son keeps smiling and saying… Can I talk for you?? And it is the cutesy troublemaker smile. :0) But luckily my hands still work and I can type So I can post away today….

Membership… Membership closes January 31st for this first quarter which goes through the 3rd week of March. I will need a week to add all the new members for the next quarter. So if you are thinking about it… Now is the time. It will be closed until the second quarter. Also, to clear a few things up. If it is in the store, it won’t be in the membership. The membership is new files. Right now it is a bit slow because of the holidays, but I am gearing up again and I am trying to offer a variety of files so not all twenty will be on the same topic. This is why you may see one or two added to the membership and then some added to the store. Just like I used to do here on my blog. I have promised 20 files or more and we are almost to the 20 files and have three months to go in the membership so there should be plenty of extras.

And for those seeking out the party!! Well it isn’t here, but I will be hosting again soon. For today the hostess has some beautiful sounding files offered up, but I am sure they will echo until she gets all her walls up and then she might be able to get some beautiful echo in her hubbies work area.

This weekend I take my son and hubby (because he is not gonna be out of my sight for a while) to the first parent soccer meeting. Our son lovessss soccer and I am looking forward to the practices and the games. I can use the practices to walk big circles around where they are practicing and get some exercise in and the games to just beam my big proud smile.

Here is a pic of my hubby and I from Christmas Eve. Wew my frizzy party hair has calm down just a bit thank goodness! I went into the holidays a little blue and came out of them feeling blessed for all the love I feel in my life and those I can turn to in a crisis. (I am still mushy.. I will share the vday proposal story closer to vday for those who have asked for it)

I hope my friend Lori had an awesome birthday!!!

And for those who missed my super holiday bundle at cheap cheap.. just hold your horses before jumping into purchasing it just yet. (trust me!!)

Well I better run.. I have heard some banging going on in the bambino’s room. I am hoping it is just the new work bench from the holidays, but it can always be questionable. I already heard once this morning when I walked past his slightly closed door room… “I’m doing nothing” and then the grin. Needless to say all the teddies have bandaids on their eyes, noses, legs and we better not need one. So I called the hubby to pick up another box. I should have stock in that company.

Love my life..

Enjoy!
Chris

Membership area at Paperthreads

Membership Details

My corner of the store at Paperthreads

I am off. Tomorrow will be a busy day. I am chauffeuring (sp?) my hubby and son to school and work. and then bring them home after Preschool is done. I am being the nervous nelly for now, but I told my hubby to give me through the weekend then I might calm down. Might being the keyword. If anyone has a book on heart healthy recipes that they really enjoy. I would take any recommendations. email

Gotta run.

Enjoy!
Chris

My hubby is home. Thank goodness. for now I am going to sit on the couch with him and enjoy! Could be my best new year’s eve ever. just bringing him home. Thank you to everyone for their prayers.
enjoy!
Chris