CTMH Convention ... in Disneyland

The annual Convention for Close To My Heart was held in June at the Disneyland Resort.  This fun event, attended by over 1,000 consultants from the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, is the highlight of the CTMH year.  New products are introduced, the Annual Inspirations catalog and idea book is revealed, projects are created with new papers and ink, Extravaganza presenters share their beautiful creations, and friends from across the country get to spend an inspiring weekend together.  

The theme was 'The Artistic Adventure' and the CTMH corporate staff prepared a wonderful series of General Sessions, business classes, and creative projects for all consultants. 

Even 'Sticky Boy' was prepared for an adventure, wearing a fedora and carrying a suitcase.  Each year, CTMH creates some new 'Sticky Boy' stamps and hides them on surfaces (doors, windows, phones, walls) in the Convention Center.  It is a special surprise to be able to find one. 

In order to keep the color palette fresh and up-to-date, CTMH introduced five new colors available as ink and cardstock.   These will be available in the new Annual Inspirations idea book and catalog being released August 1.    

During the Awards Banquet, which included a delicious formal dinner, Janice Hodgkin (my friend and upline) received a special pin honoring her 15 years as a CTMH consultant. 

A new cartridge for the Cricut machine was introduced.  The Artfully Sent cartridge is specially designed for card makers.  It includes 5 styles of cards (pop-up, build-a-scene, sentiment, sleeve, pocket), an alphabet, and coordinating envelopes.  Look for it to be available for purchase during August.   

Disneyland Resort offered a great hotel room rate for everyone attending Convention.  The room is filled with Disney magic, including a headboard which twinkles with fireworks and music.  

For the first time, CTMH organized a "Rise & Shine 5K" run/walk.  More than 300 consultants met early on Saturday morning and were excited to walk 3.1 miles through the California Adventure park before it opened to the public.   By 8 am, I had already logged more than 7,600 steps on my FitBit Flex.  

An early morning in the theme park, with almost no one else around, is truly magical. 

Seeing Disney characters around the hotel and parks always makes me smile.  Even though Cruella de Vil is an evil villain, her outfit is striking.   

The annual Close To My Heart Convention is open to all Consultants.  Next year will be held in the Convention Center at the Disneyland Resort again, July 8 thru 11.  Join the CTMH family, and you can enjoy all the fun too! 

All papers and stamps are from Close To My Heart (CTMH).

	Sheila Bennett Close To My Heart Independent Consultant (913) 485-4355

Life is Good ... in Mexico!

If you were not able to join us for Crop Tuesday this week, this is the 2-page layout that you missed.  We are meeting on the first Tuesday of each month at 10:00 am.  Please join us!  If that day and time is not convenient and you would like to create this layout, contact me and we can schedule a time for you.  

For Thanksgiving last year, we spent the week in Mexico at the Azul Fives resort for the wedding of some friends.  It was a beautiful week, and a very nice get-away.   Of course I took quite a few pictures while in Mexico, so it was nice to be able to put some of them on a 2-page layout that the Fabulously Artsy Tresa Black taught at Creative University this year.  And it was perfect to share for Crop Tuesday.  

The "nature" colors of the Skylark kit are a great combo to our pictures at the beach.  Images from both the Believe in Yourself and True to Life stamp sets, as well as the Keyboard Uppercase alphabet, were used to accent the pages.  Other embellishments include Aqua Dots, Topiary Mini Chevron Ribbon, and the 'shipping tag' and striped banner which were cut from the first piece of patterned paper shown with the Skylark kit in the Spring/Summer Idea Book.       

The letters "good" and the label with the 'cherish this' stamp were both cut using the Artbooking Cricut cartridge.   The view from the poolside lounge chair is my favorite photo from the week.  This was the same view out from one of the balconies of our spacious 3 bedroom suite.  

If you would like to join us for Crop Tuesday, or if you would like to schedule a time to create this layout, please contact me via email or phone.  All of the pieces will be pre-cut and ready for you to stamp, assemble and embellish.  The cost is $10 per kit, or the fee is waived if you order $30 or more in CTMH products. 

All papers and stamps are from Close To My Heart (CTMH).

	Sheila Bennett Close To My Heart Independent Consultant (913) 485-4355

Lady Liberty

The Statue of Liberty is a beautiful monument, and we were able to visit the museum in the pedestal base.  There are fabulous exhibits which detail the design, building, and other history.  It is a very interesting place to visit.  Just be prepared for climbing - we had to go up almost 200 steps to reach the top of the pedestal.  If you are planning a visit, be sure to reserve tickets in advance through the National Park Service website.  We wanted to visit the crown, but those tickets were already sold out five weeks in advance.    

A Day in Central Park

The beautiful Inscope Arch in this photo was built in 1873.  During Samantha's Spring Break from school in March, we visited New York City for a few days.  While there, we spent a day exploring Central Park.  It was a nice day, if a bit too cool at times. 

Even though we saw many statues, memorials, and other 'famous' Central Park attractions, our favorite was definitely the Central Park Zoo.  This polar bear was having a lot of fun playing with the big 'stick' in front of him. 

Since it was so quiet and peaceful in there, it was such a surprise to turn around from watching the polar bear and see this view of the city.

A polar bear paw is quite a bit larger than Samantha's hand.

It was truly delightful to see this wonderful Delacorte Music Clock.   During daylight hours, on the hour and the half-hour, a nursery rhyme plays and the bronze animals dance around the clock.  Fortunately, we only had to wait a couple of minutes for the clock performance.

Every kid loves to feed the animals. 

Is that a turtle - or two turtles?

Texting Mitts!

Found a new knitting project that I am really enjoying.  In the past month, I have completed five pair and am working on a sixth pair of what I am calling 'Texting Mitts' since the tips of your fingers and thumb are exposed so you can still use your "touch screen" device (phone, iPod) while wearing them.

The pattern is Nona's Rosy Fingerless Gloves, and it is a fabulous pattern for someone just beginning to knit with double-point needles.  The instructions are easy to follow, it does not take very much yarn, and it only takes a few hours to finish one of the mitts. For the first two pair that I knit, I following Nona's pattern exactly.  After that, I made some slight modifications to include ribbing at the top and to extend the length of the thumb.  Everyone who sees the mitts just loves them and has to try them on to see how they feel.  

While Samantha and I were visiting New York City for Spring Break, we visited two different yarn shops.  We found this gorgeous merino wool at Purl Soho, and I just love the look and feel of it.  The yarn is hand-dyed by artisans in Uruguay, and is ultra soft.  One pair of the mitts took slightly more than half of the skein, so I bought some neutral yarn to complement it and you can see that I am adding some stripes to the cuff of the next pair so that I can complete another pair of the Texting Mitts out of the skein. 

We also took a bus trip to Hoboken, New Jersey in hopes of visiting Carlo's Bake Shop (of TLC's Cake Boss fame).  Oh my, we were absolutely not prepared for the 2-block long line to get into the bakery.  Estimates were that it would take 3 hours to get in the doors from our starting point.  We waited just a few minutes and then decided against staying.  Afterall, it is just a bakery!  But we did not regret the trip to Hoboken.  It was such a lovely community, and only a 10 minute bus ride from the 42nd Street Bus Terminal in NYC.

Fortunately, I had researched yarn shops in Hoboken and we visited Patricia's Yarns on our walk to Carlo's.  We arrived just as the owner was walking up to the shop to open it for the day, pushing her sleeping baby in a stroller and carrying her small dog in a shoulder bag.  She visited with us for a while and even recommended La Isla, a Cuban place where we had a fabulous bowl of soup for lunch.  The yarn we bought from Patricia is not the correct weight for Texting Mitts, so we are still on the search for a great pattern to use with this fun, bright pink and yellow yarn.