Celebrating the Year!

Aloha, all!

     As I begin my last day of 2015, I decided to go back over what I've posted here in my blog during the year to see if there was anything that stood out for me as a special post. It wasn't long before I came across my post on May 25, 2015. I didn't know it at the time, but this post was pivotal in my development as a stamping artist.

     There isn't anything in this card that was new or exciting in the way of card layouts. I certainly didn't develop the idea of "Triple Time Stamping," or whatever you may have learned to call it. But something about the way I made this card caught the attention of a lot of stampers online. My discovering this attention happened as I was participating in an online class and we were asked to see what happened if we entered something specific in a Pinterest search bar. When my results came up, pins of this card were all over the screen! What????  I had no idea people were paying that much attention to my work.

     Up until this point, I had been somewhat critical of my own work. Even though there were many people who bought my tutorials and eBooks, I still was not confident that I was more than an ordinary stamper. From this point on, though, my attitude about my work changed and my new confidence in myself made my paper crafting far more enjoyable than it had ever been. I'm sure that not everyone likes my work – that's the way it goes in art. But now I know that there are many people who do like it, and I now create my projects with those people in mind.

     Shortly after I published the above card, Stampin' Up! released its 2015-2016 Annual Catalog. This coincided with lots (!) of requests for the measurements for the card's many layers.It was at this point that I also decided that I would begin sharing layout measurements for projects such as this one only in my monthly Newsletter. So I redid the project, using newer Stampin' Up! colors, and provided all the measurements needed to copy this card, and published it in my newsletter..

     Now that I look at this card, I think I'll come up with a new layout with a new stamp set that's in the Stampin' Up! 2016 Occasions Catalog, to be published next week. It may not be in next week's Newsletter (it's pretty full already!). But that's where I'll be publishing the new design with new stamps. So be sure to sign up for my newsletter to get any of my FREE tutorials each month!  The sign up form is up at the left.

     I hope you've had some wonderful moments in your live during 2015 that will carry you forward into a new and exciting year in 2016. I know I will!

 

.