Kristie Strum - Independent Stampin’ Up!® Demonstrator

Stamped Cards, Stamping

Return of the Demonstrator

Once in a while, you just have to do something for you. My day job is in public service. I also spend a lot of my time volunteering for the Minnesota Genealogical Society, and while I find the work important and worthwhile, it is work.

You may remember that back in the early days of this blog, I was an independent Stampin’ Up! demonstrator, from 2006 to 2012. The reasons I left made sense for my life at the time, but I’ve always missed it. I missed being able to preorder products, I missed the demonstrator exclusives, I missed the inspiration to design and create. This introverted person even missed the special national and regional events and the other socializing opportunities. I never stopped buying Stampin’ Up! products, but I used them less and less over time.

I have thought about rejoining many times over the years. I’m not sure why I didn’t. Part of it was certainly my frustration of having to start over as if the six years I spent didn’t happen, and the lingering sadness about having to make the decision to leave in the first place.

A month ago (January 19), I decided to get over it and signed back up. It’s a little weird to sign up under a friend I helped introduce to SU! back in the day, but I also seemed to have lucked out into a great upline group.

Most of my time over the past month has been spent getting my crafting space (some might call it my dining room) reorganized. I have been playing around with my stamps and supplies, but so far haven’t managed to quite produce a card I’m happy with.

I have though, also been working on a card kit I bought a while back (I’ll get back to that in a future post) and a couple of Paper Pumpkin kits. I’ve been subscribing for years, but have not been so great at actually creating items. I really love playing around with the items to see what else I can do, but for now, a few items completed more or less as presented in the kit. I really like to ink the edges of paper when they’re not layered onto another piece (and sometimes when they are), so that’s something you’ll see with these projects.

First, cards from the August 2018 Paper Pumpkin, Blissful Blooms. The colors that coordinate with this kit are Blackberry Bliss (the sentiments are stamped in this), Flirty Flamingo (I inked the edges of the labels with this), Lemon Lime Twist, and Old Olive. I used the stamp set that came with the kit to add a flower to each envelope, using Blackberry Bliss, Flirty Flamingo, and Pineapple Punch.

Images ©️ Stampin’ Up!

Images ©️ Stampin’ Up!

The January 2019 Paper Pumpkin, Be Mine Valentine, provided materials for adorable treat boxes. I plan to use most of the materials for other projects (in combination with the Animal Expedition Suite from the 2019-2019 annual catalog), but I did want to make one of each box. I sponged the edges of the Pool Party scalloped pieces a bit to bring out the stitched edge a little more, and of course inked around the edges of the white sentiments with Melon Mambo. The coordinating colors for this kit are Crumb Cake, Flirty Flamingo, Lemon Lime Twist, Melon Mambo, Petal Pink, and Pool Party.

Images ©️ Stampin’ Up!

More to come!

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