Cosmo Cricket

Easy but Dramatic Centerpiece

OK, it's Saturday and I don't usually blog, but I couldn't help it. This entry has nothing to do with scrapbooking...... as most of my entries, but I am excited about this project! It's easy and not too expensive. Take a look.
Here's how to make it, if you'd like to give it a try.

First, you'll need two to three vases. I used three so that I could change the water and flowers more often than I'll be changing the fruit. Place the smaller vase inside the larger one and start putting your fruit around the edges. I found my vases at TJ Max. Together they cost me $15.00.
Work your way up until it is filled with fruit. Obviously, I used limes, but lemons, oranges, cranberries and mixed fruit are all pretty. It took me two bags of about 14 limes each to fill my vase. I got them for $3.00 a bag.

Then, I put a third vase filled with water, a little lemon juice and some sugar into the center and added my flowers to it. I bought my flowers for $5.00.
Next, if your arrangement is as big as mine, put it where you'll want it to stay. Then, you can either fill up the space around the limes with water or vinegar. The pros to water is that it doesn't smell like vinegar, but your limes will need to be replaced more often because they will go bad. The pros to vinegar are that your limes will last an entire season. So, if the arrangement will not be right under your nose, I'd opt for vinegar.

Then, add some greenery around the edges. I used Lupine leaves from my garden. The total price for the arrangement......... $26.00. Not too bad, especially considering the next time I won't have to buy the vases!

Holy Cow! I hung my plates!

In other words, I am finally moving on and letting go of the past!

When Eric and I started Cosmo Cricket, we lived in Centerville, Utah. I loved everything about it! I lived in a cul-de-sac which was perfect for my little kiddos. It was 10-15 minutes from downtown Salt Lake. I had awesome neighbors and friends and so did my kids. But mostly, I loved our house. It was completely outdated when Eric and I bought it, but after living there 8 years and investing a lot of time and effort, we had it just the way we loved it.

I didn't have Cosmo Cricket taking up my spare time back then and so I had painted murals on the walls of my kids' bedrooms. Here is Abby and Kate's old room. I copied this mural from the cover of a Marth Stewart magazine.
Then, in Jack's room, we were able to make this alcove by taking out a wood burning stove that was in the family room on the level below. What is now the alcove was previously the chimney for the stove. Jack used to kiss this Dinosaur goodnight before every nap and bedtime. You may recognize the clouds...... they were the inspiration for the Storytime Chicken Little paper.
Saying it's been hard for me to get over this house is a huge understatement. Just ask Lindsay......... he has had to suffer with my grumpiness for making me move to Providence. But now, I am determined to move on, get grateful and be happy!

So, Eric and I stopped by Lindsay's house two days ago while on our evening walk and he said, "Come on Julie, you have to admit its great here this time of year." My first inclination was to remind him of the rest of the year, but my new attitude prevailed and I told him he was right (something terribly difficult for me to say). I told him I had even started hanging things on my walls..... it only took two years!
I bought these plates when Eric and I were newly married at a tag sale. They have hung in three different homes now including my dining room........ in Providence!
The mirrors come from all over. I was at a Starbuck's in St George where they had hung an assortment of mirrors. I loved the look and thought to myself....... hmmmmm..... I've got a lot of random mirrors in my basement storage room...... because I refuse to hang things on the walls and actually move in to my house! Well, now I've officially moved in!!

PS: A special thanks to Lindsay for taking care of the blog for me the last two days. You guys have to know something....... when Lindsay does the blog, you HAVE to leave comments. It hurts his feelings if you don't. As grumpy as I have been about moving...... he's at least that grumpy about a low comment blog entry!

Snorkeling on Dry Land.................?

Have any of you ever been snorkeling?

 Well, it is one of my very favorite things to do! If you happen to get to the island of Kauai, let me know, and I'll tell you about a secret snorkeling place that is one of the best in the world.

Speaking of Snorkeling, someone else has been snorkeling, but on dry land and not in the water. The Snorkel mini album below was sent to us buy Julie Johnson. Terrific job Julie, you're timing couldn't be better. Snorkel is our fastest selling collection this year and Summer hasn't even started yet.

Thanks again for sharing!

 

So when you scrapbook with Snorkel this Summer, and your friends or your family ask's what you've been doing all day, tell them "you've been Snorkeling."

Oh I almost forgot, The winners from yesterdays blog are:

Debbi ( who's favorite store is Scrapbooks Forever in Branson, Missouri) $50.00 of Cosmo Cricket product of your choice.

Dianna Fisher $30.00, and no, it's not because were talking about Snorkel and her last name happens to be Fish-er. If that happened to be the case I would have picked, Mary Shrimp, Lois Shark-ey, or Charlie Tuna.

Last, but not least, Jen D. You have a $15.00 Cosmo Cricket credit. I think the "d" stands for "delighted." Right Jen?

You three email kristen@cosmocricket.com, let her know you won, figure out what you can purchase from Cosmo Cricket from the amount you won, and we will take care of the rest.

This was fun and I'm very interested to see what you pick!

The Best people in the world.........A contest too!

First, I thought you might like to see something that Studio Calico put together using our Early Bird Collection. I love the kit! Great job guys! If you haven't checked them out, when you get a minute, go to www.studiocalico.com

Second, I have been in this industry for over 8 years and have met the very  best people who I call friends!

 Whether it be Darlene at Wiggle's n Giggles ( don't you just love that name- Darlene's last name is Wigglesworth) in Conneticut, Gena at the Scrap Shack in St. Charles, IL, Sandy at the Scrapbook Stop in Indiana, Kelly at Green Tangerines in Rocklin, Sue at Scrapbooks Too in Minnesota, Laurie at Scrapbook Island in California. Honestly, I could go on all day. Store owners are my favorite people, along with our customers and blog followers.

These are just a few of my many, many friends I have met along the way. I love them! I hope no one feels slighted. To me they are more than customers!

I get to see most of these friends on average once or twice a year. To me it's like a family reunion.

 I love the passion that they have and how dedicated they are to helping provide their communities with a unique and wonderful shopping experience. I appreciate all of them.

They work hard, most have families to take care of. At work they are the, what I refer to as, "the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker."

They open in the morning, they close at night. They clean the restrooms, count the till, stock the shelves, schedule employee's, pay the bills, have all night crops, talk to salespeople, and once again, the list goes on.

I know that Julie had a contest once where you listed your favorite LSS (local Scrapbook Store.) There were some many great comments that you left.

Today, I want to have a contest! I want to know the last time that you visited your LSS and the name of the store you visited. Online counts too!

Leave a comment and tomorrow we will take all the names that left something for us, put them in a hat, and draw.

Hmmmm......Lets see, how about three lucky winners? The first winner, $50.00 of Cosmo Cricket products, the 2nd $30.00, and the third, $15.00.

Have a great day!

Lindsay

Three Random Things

Random Thing #1. Debbie Olson is amazing. She sent me an email over the weekend with the following cards. Today she is part of the Tattered Angels/Cosmo Cricket blog hop. Check out her site to see what she did and to link through to the others.


Random Thing #2. Lindsay's lawn. For those of you that don't know, Lindsay and I live just a around the corner from each other. Most evenings Eric and I go for a walk that begins by passing by Lindsay's house and we have noticed something. Lindsay's lawn is an extension of his hair. If his hair is longer, his lawn is longer. If his hair is short, his lawn is short.

Now, Lindsay is very competitive about his yard. He called me yesterday evening and he said, "Julie, I want you to drive through the neighborhood and then tell me who's yard looks the best." I told him I didn't have to because I knew that my yard looked the best. He, of course, disagreed. So, later that night I drove by, noticed a few yellow spots in the front lawn and thought..... hmmmmm...... more ammo for teasing. I think that his lawn is responding to his receding hair line. I'm sure that if he started using Rogain, his lawn would recover too.  :)

Random Thing #3. The Cosmo Cricket Fan Club. We have a fan page on facebook, but for those of you that are truly die-hard fans, there is another site you may want to check out. Sarabeth Burke has created a "we love Cosmo Cricket" blog. Although this site is not sponsored by Cosmo Cricket, I think it looks like fun. Check it out!

Make-do Paper Organization

I love my new paper storage solution. It is compact, organized, and it closes and locks...... a real bonus with little kids around! Before my new solution, I had my paper in the organization cubes from Target. It was OK, but there were things about it that drove me crazy! First, it took up a ton of space. Second, it was visible and since it is in stacks within the cubes, it was always being shuffled through and still looked a bit messy. And the final straw, my four and six year olds get into it all the time. I don't mind sharing with them, but I do mind them messing my stuff up!

So, for the past few weeks, I've been thinking about how I could organize my paper differently. Here's the catch, I didn't want to spend any money........ yes, I'm cheap! Fortunately for me, I own a filing cabinet from IKEA. European paper tends to be a bit longer than the 8.5x11 letter size used in the US and so the file cabinets from IKEA have two slots for the hanging bars to fit in (see photos below).

Here's the problem, the US does not make hanging folders to fit the European slots, if they did you could easily organize all your scrapbooking paper in the file drawer. Never fear, with a few things most crafters possess you can retrofit your file drawer.  You will need a little effort, a hot glue gun, a cropadile and these instructions.

This is the filing cabinet I already had. Notice the lock!

Here you can see the two options for the hanging bars. But if you even move just one over, a standard US folder is too narrow.

Open up the fold and remove the metal bar from the folder.

I'm sure metal cutters are more efficient, but I'm too lazy to leave the studio to go up the stairs, into the garage and dig through all Eric's stuff looking for them. The cropadile takes two punches on the wide hole to cut the bar in half.

Like this.

I measured the width of the hanging bars in the cabinet and made two marks on my desk, in pencil, so that all the folders would be identical.

Using the hot glue, glue one half at a time, matching up with the marks on the desk. After the pieces are glued down, glue the flap back down over the top of them.

Put them in the cabinet and fill with paper! I did remove one of the interior drawers so that the height of the paper would fit.

When I was done, I had condensed a 4x2 foot space of paper into this one drawer with room to spare, and did I mention it locks? :)

Glasses Anyone?

We're back from New York. In fact, our plane passed Lindsay's plane as he flew to Minnesota. We apologize for no blogging yesterday. Instead of two ships in the dark, we were two planes in the sky!

Right after I got home, the opthamologist called to let me know that Jack's glasses were in. Now, I have to tell you that for a tiny, boy child that has super thick lenses there aren't many options for frames in the great metropolis of Logan, Utah. We had one to chose from. But I think they are still super cute...... check out my young scholar!

Loving every minute of it!

 

I loved reading your replies yesterday! With some of the lines it was, well, kind of nostalgic. It was great to see such a wide variety of choices. It's funny, some of you may or may not know, we are not even three years old yet, but some of the lines seem like it was forever ago when we released them.

Oh by the way, our Birthday is July 18th. Watch for some fun things on our blog that day.

Okay the six winners from yesterday are:

Samantha Sib,Tina Erdos, Kerry 9657 (that's kind of  a funny last name, but I like it), Jen C. Misspackmanpinky?, Gina (rhiagem), and Sarah (byclops77).

Email Kristen@cosmocricket.com, let her know your address, and then let the UPS stalking begin.

Okay, everyday I get emails with pics from people who have done some fun stuff with our products. I wish we could post everyone's, but if we did, we wouldn't have time for prizes.

Today's come from Kim Arledge. I've never met Kim, she isn't on our Design Team, doesn't attend trade shows, as far as I know doesn't teach classes. But what she does do is create fun stuff!

 I love her projects!

Start thinking Summer! Pictures, camping, family reunions, vacations, getting wet, picnics, sports, and water! 

I hope I'm not being too forward, but I would love to see your layouts! 

Have a great day and love every minute of it!

P.S. Oh by the way- My all-time favorite top three lines from Cosmo: Wanted, Mr. Campy, and Snorkel

It's Monday.........

 

It's Monday, Eric and Julie are in New York, It's Kristen's 21st Birthday and she took the day off, and I'm running way,way behind.

Lisa F., who most of you are getting to know lately is amazing. She is having a little party going on her blog, giving away some fun free Cosmo Cricket products. If you're interested, and I'm sure that most you are, here is the link to Lisa F's BlogShe is pretty nifty when it comes to designing some pretty amazing project.

We also have a little giveaway for the day. I went camping this past weekend with my 16 year old son and took some great photo's that I'm going to scrapbook using Mr. Campy. I love Mr. Campy and wish store's would continue to carry it.

There are some scrapbook collections that will withstand the test of time. From all of the Cosmo Cricket collections, leave a comment about which of our lines that you think will be around for a really long time, and you will be entered in a drawing to win either a Snorkel/LilMan Double Deck paper pad or a Ever After/Girl Friday Double Deck paper pad.

How about we give a total of 6?

Have a great day!

Lil' Man Mini

Happy Friday everyone!

I saw this project featured on a store newsletter. I clicked on the link to see it up close and fell in love. Look how cute!

I looked up the book's creator, Gabrielle Beck, sent her an email and begged her to let me show it to you all on our blog. It took quite an arm twisting, but with just a few techniques I learned from Jack Bauer, she relented.  ;)

Gabrielle is teaching this as a class on June 28th. For all the details check out her blog!

If you are teaching a Cosmo Cricket class, let us know. We would love to spread the word for you here!