I had SUCH a good mail week last week! And I finally finished taking pics and editing so that I can share here too!
First off - I got sucked into the vortex and ordered a Janome Sew Mini LOL!! It was on sale at Hancock Fabrics PLUS free shipping so I ordered it and sent it to Lauren who then mailed it on to me (the site won't ship to Canada so I had to do a little fudging with my billing addy and all that and sent it to a US address first).
I have been looking at getting one for a while and as of yet I can't find anywhere in Canada to get one of these machines (someone told me that they aren't available at all in Canada? I'm not sure if that is true or not - I wouldn't know tho as I'm not totally up on sewing machines!). I've heard ppl getting them from e-bay but unless I'm buying stuff from my fave e-bay stores I avoid that place like the plague *wink*. Getting it on sale with free shipping, then paying to have it mailed to me (that wasn't cheap - it cost about $23 or so to mail it to Canada??) ended up costing me about the same price this machine retails for - which is $60 US. So I think I did pretty good!
Anywho - it's here and I got it all set up and practiced with it and today I sewed on my first card! I can't share the card yet but will soon - I did pretty good if I do say so myself - this machine is pretty easy to use. If **I** can figure it out then anyone can that's for sure!! I'm glad I got it - every once in a while I need to sew something and I normally borrow my mom's sewing machine - and then never use it b/c it scares the heck out of me! It's a big expensive machine and I'm always terrified I'm going to break something - so a machine like this is much more my style - plus it's small enough I can just keep it out in my studio and use whenever I want!
I also received my pre-order from Stampin' Up!'s Holiday Mini (available on the 1st of September). Of course my pre-order turned out to be the 2 new rolls of ribbon (5th and 6th from the top) and one stamp set - the rest was all this yummy ribbon and some other accessories.......what can I say I LOVE ribbon!!! And even tho I have TONS of ribbon (yes TONS) I still can often find myself during a project going through ALL my ribbon and finding I don't have quite the right one!! Oh the HORROR!!
Everyone has been chattering about the fact that all the sets in the Holiday mini are die cut (AND from now on ALL the mini catty sets will be this way - nothing has been said about sets in the big catalog tho so we'll have to wait and see on that.....) - and I must admit I was pretty skeptical about the whole thing.
I actually enjoy cutting and mounting my stamps - and I cut pretty close to the image b/c it really bugs me when I catch the edge of the rubber with ink and mess up my card!! So I wondered if the die-cut stamps would REALLY be worth it or if I'd still have to trim them - making the whole process useless (in my opinion!)
This is the Merry & Bright set - it was so cute I HAD to get it. And I am pleased to say that the die-cutting is fabulous!! I didn't need to trim them at ALL!
It took me all of 2 or 3 minutes to mount the set - just had to pop them out, pull off the backing and stick them to the block and then slapped on the stickers. I LOVED it!!
I have my fingers crossed that SU! will eventually have all the sets this way - I still like cutting and mounting the stamps myself - but the TIME it saves when they're die cut?? Just imagine how well a double-mounted alpha would go..................a gal can hope right??
