While I was at my husband’s reunion I started talking to one of his classmates (strangely enough his younger brother was a highschool friend of my brother in VA). He and his wife were just about to launch their own website so we definitely had something to chat about. The site is www.giftgirl.com and I LOVE their concept! It’s based on the premise that there aren’t that many husbands/partners/boyfriends out there that really know what a good gift is. Take it from a person who has endured a tool box, bread knife, cutting board, fanny pack (WHAT!?!?!), slipper socks, office chair, etc (I could go on much, much longer) that there are men desperately in need of good advice in the gift giving department. And that’s precisely what their site sets out to do. They have everything catagorized to fit different personalities and different styles. I really enjoyed checking it all out. Their site went live on Thursday and debuted with a really cool launch party in the meatpacking district of NYC. In attendence were reps from the Today Show, Oprah and my sister! I couldn’t quite make the hop over there from the west coast to attend so she went in my stead. Sounds like it was quite the shindig…

Just thought I’d share in case you have a husband that is as clueless about gifts as mine is! And, if you would like to read more about their site, here’s the first article out on it.

Thursday night Emily taught a class at our friend Jill’s house.  17 women came to take the class and we had a great time.  It was so fun to see that many people playing with the kit and all their interpretations of Emily’s projects.   Emily taught the class by setting up 3 stations around Jill’s house, each with a different project and I think everyone really enjoyed doing something  a bit different.  I enjoyed meeting new people and also having a chance to put faces with customers’ names. 

And then we had a “surprise” visitor come (ok, not really that much of a surprise…), Ali! 

 It was also a treat to visit Jill’s house.  It’s really beautifully decorated and so cleverly done.  Almost everything in her house is from a garage sale, junk store or flea market.  I admire anyone with the determination (and time) to do that!

This is a photo of one of her numerous Halloween displays.  Who knew old cheese graters could be so cute!?!?

These are a couple of pictures of her scrapbook room; the ugly green monster was rearing his head!

I got home a little before 11:00; just in time to catch a bit of John Stewart — our favorite show.  I started falling asleep about halfway through (it was a rerun!) and went to bed.  I was out.  That is until exactly 3:48 when I woke to Scott screaming “YES! YES! YES!”   WHAT?!?!?!!!?!?  I later found out that was in response to the policeman screaming into the house, “IS ANYONE HOME???”  He goes running out into the hall and I was trying to orient myself to the situation.  Not an easy thing to do because, like most people I’m not accustomed to a policeman entering my house, screaming at 3am. 

Next thing I hear is him screaming repeatedly at Scott to get his hands up.  I am figuring at this point it’s a case of mistaken identity and he thinks we are escaped convicts or something.  I then go out into the hall and put my hands up as well.  He then asked who we were.  The homeowners.  He then wanted to know why our door was wide open in the middle of the night.  And then he wanted to know where the pet was because he knew there was a dog (and that would be because when I was pregnant with Jack Scott was out of town and I guess the pregnancy hormones took over my sanity. 

I called the police in the middle of the night to tell them there were people downstairs whisphering in my familyroom.  I made this same policeman come and open every closet and door and walk the premises.  No one there.).  He asked for id and once he realized that we really were the homeowners and not freaks that break into others’ homes, leave the door wide open and then crash in their bed, he told us how he happened to be there.  Apparently our newspaper carrier had noticed our door wide open and called the police. 

We were both feeling very grateful to her.  So now this exchange has been going on for about 5 minutes with lots of screaming in the beginning and only NOW does Hannah (our very large shaggy Briard who likes to bark at the slighest noise outside) finally realize that something is going on and she should let out a few obligatory barks.  Quite the watchdog…

So why was the front door open?  That would be because Scott let the dog out before going to bed and not only forgot to lock but failed to shut it completely.  Good thing I’m usually the last one up.  It was more than a bit scary in the moment, but now I’m getting a good laugh out of it!

YAY!!! The Tara Whitney stamp sets have finally arrived!  We will get all orders waiting on the stamps out by tomorrow.  Thank you so much for your patience!

Also in the box with the stamp sets…  one of the little goodies that will go into all the subscribers’ orders next month in celebration of our 1 year anniversary.  November is shaping up to be a very fun month — the amazing Karen Russell as our guest designer AND free goodies!    :eek: 

Wow! Another crazy busy week — still just trying to get caught up in every aspect of my life… I think I’m finally making progess. Sometimes it seems it’s almost not even worth going on vacation!

I wanted to mention that if you order the Tara Whitney Exclusive stamp set and are still waiting on your order, those are due in tomorrow. There was a miscommunication with Sassafras Lass and we were under the impression that we would receive them on Thursday. I’m sorry to keep you waiting a couple of days more! Thank you for your patience.

We started putting together the Karen Russell kit this week. I just love everything she’s included in it! All the product is laying out in our assembly area and it’s just making me happy to see all those gorgeous papers.

In case you haven’t had a chance to see the kit on the message board, here’s a photo of it (the Waste Not Paper chartreuse scalloped circle cut-out card is not pictured).

I’ve heard from the design team that they’ve really loved playing with this kit. I have too! Amazingly enough, I actually had a chance to scrapbook this weekend! Yesterday I met Ali and her friend Jill at Scrapbook Fever in Salem (it is such a cool store, if you are ever passing through Oregon, it’s right off of I-5) and we had such a fun, relaxed day!

Ali was there for a book signing and then the three of us had a blast scrapbooking, laughing and chatting with all the very cool women who work there. And Shelly, the owner, is the most incredible woman. She made sure we really had an amazing day! THANK YOU SHELLY!!!

They continued to scrap and I headed home. A family friend in Portland wanted to see the kids so they went to spend the weekend with her and Scott and I had a nice evening together. We went out for a drink and app at a fun bar. Then we came home and king crab legs for dinner. YUMMY! And then we actually sat down and watched a movie.

We haven’t watched a movie in months because we are usually working in the evening. I’m sure everyone else has already seen it but we saw Knocked Up. We both thought it was hilarious. And I actually stayed awake for the whole thing (something else that is rather unusual!). All in all, a much needed needed day or R&R.

Friday morning I took Alice on her preschool field trip to the pumpkin patch on Friday morning. She had such a good time eating doughnuts, climbing on haybales, going on a tracker ride and picking her pumpkin. And as we are we are in Oregon we got incredibly lucky with the weather. It poured earlier in the morning but stopped while we were there.

I imagine that many of you read Ali’s post today about the environment and things that we can do as scrapbookers to be more earth friendly.  As a consumer, I do my best to buy products with the least amount of packaging.  For example, does a deoderant stick really need to be in a box that is then wrapped in plastic?  I buy the one with just the plastic seal.  And I avoid buying product that is sitting in plasic egg cartons, etc.  But as a the owner of a kit company, it is difficult to avoid buying products with excess packaging that might be something our customers would really love.  I love the Queen & Co die cut felt ribbon but they package it in 1 yard increments in this over the top plastic container.  I think a better method might be to create small spools of it that the owners of stores (or kit companies!) can then cut onsite.  The packaging is awfully cute, but what a waste.  We at Cocoa Daisy recycle every single thing that we can, but at the end of the week there is still a massive amount of packaging that goes into the garbage.  I hate contributing so much waste to our landfills.

I’ve spoken to several scrapbook companies about producing products with less packaging or that uses post-consumer content.  None seemed very interested.  I think there is definitely a market for scrapbook products that are environmentally friendly and yet are still appealing.  If any of you know of such companies, like Ali, I’d love to hear about them.  If that’s something that you are interested in as well, tell the owners of your LSS and let them pass it on to the manufacturers.  Or better yet, send a letter to your favorite manufacturers. 

Kit companies are decidedly resource intensive (the waste, the shipping of products to us and then the shipping of products to customers, etc) and there are days that I think perhaps this is something that we shouldn’t be doing.  We try our best to be as environmentally friendly as possible by recycling, by using biodegradable peanuts for packing and trying to buy products, whenever possible, in bulk. 
If anyone has any ideas on how we could be easier on the earth, I’d love to hear them!

And thanks Ali for the inspiration today!