CKC Thursday

It's here! The Creating Keepsakes Convention in Charlotte! It took me longer than expected to get here, because I woke up in horrific pain like I haven't seen in a while. I mean, I'm always in pain, but there's a special kind of pain I get treated to from time to time that pulls my body into a fetal position I can't fight. I can't even uncurl my fink bgers without shivvering. So, I got a late start, moving in slow motion to finish packing, even with Scott doing all the real work, acting like the kindest robot in the world (coin operated boy?), doing whatever I say, from grabbing my schedule off the printer, to finding the elusive olive green shorts (which were in the bottom of the smelly laundry and thusly rejected, but he still brought them to me to prove how smelly they were. Good lord I need to do laundry when I get home. Damp towels shouldn't be allowed to age.)

I made it out the door, got geared up for the car, complete with dashboard powered heating pad and neck brace that makes me look like a fat turtle (have you ever seen an overweight turtle? I have. They can't fit all the way back into their shell without another part blooping out. Not pretty.) Slept most of the way and arrived feeling worse than ever. Sigh. I was really down. There's this feeling I get when the pain is particularly intense that I, the being inside this bossy body, is about 1/2 inch big inside this huge, painful body. I can't control it at all. I don't make any of the decisions, I don't have a say in what happens to me. I'm trapped under a mountain. I changed my fentanyl patch (forgive my spelling), took a pain pill and a zanaflex and finally I was able to move enough to hook up into traction. Even in a very nice hotel like this one, you don't want to have to lie on the floor. Seriously, even on top of my formerly yoga mat (now--you guessed it--my traction mat) the carpet smells like someone rubbed a dead raccoon on it. Even as I began to feel like I had grown to about 6" tall vs. 1/2, I couldn't help but feel bitter. Here I was, on the floor of a hotel with my head in the rack, while I was missing the opening crop next door--something I had looked forward to like Christmas. Plus, just riding up in the car I saw like a million little things I wanted to explore around the hotel, down the street, all over, and I couldn't even walk over to check out the restaurant menu.

Then again, sometimes I win. The meds kicked in. The traction did its thing. I made it to the last hour and a half of the crop. So hooray! I actually have something to report on other than my own suckiness!

The opening crop was actually more of an album class with page kits from many of the vendors as sort of a preview of what's to come. How cool. I'm due to make another album for my sister-in-law Kelye, so I gathered up the five kajillion photos I have of my nephew (not even up to date...I'm about a year behind on getting them printed so I don't have to worry about running out of stuff to scrap.) and got to work. Since I missed most of the crop, I only got to make the last three layouts, which you are seeing here. I like the mishmash of styles from all the different sponsors. The Springtime one was from a company I'd never heard of before called Shoestring Productions (no website). The colors are duly festive and we were told are all cut by one woman who runs the company. I can't imagine how long it must take to die cut that many copies. Especially if they do this at all the CKC's. Her cranking arm must be huge.

I loooove SEI, who made the other springy looking kit. They included info on their kit club and I have to say it's tempting, though I'm kind of leaning toward Club Scrap since I saw Barbie playing with their latest kit at the last Archivers Scrap Mania. I like that Club Scrap makes their own stuff with a cool, handmade, artsy look. But then SEI does rock the house. Loved their layout just as it is and that's saying something since I usually feel the need to alter these things (well, I did add one extra tear in the red paper. Does that count?) Which brings us to the fall pumpkin page you see here by Lickety Split. Honestly, I'm not into their look at all. It just seems sort of fussy and dated to me, but that's just a matter of my taste vs. theirs. So I've taken a before and after shot. I couldn't leave the page alone. With my tendency toward the too-much-is-never-enough style, it just looked so sparse. One of my favorite things I added were the stamps which I was surprised to find in the Archivers $1.99 bin. I love the detail on these things and I'll definitely keep my eyes open for more by Stampology.

Well, it's actually Friday morning and I'm feeling a bit better, so I need to get going to the early entry hour of the vendor faire. Wish me luck finding some rockin' scrappy crap. I'll be sure to report back to you asap.

*Blog Challenge: I've got 2 mini packs of cute Archivers Exclusive stamps for the winner of this one: Leave a comment with your name (and Fiskateer# if you are one) and email me (princess.puppy*gmail.com --replace the asterisk with an @) a list of the differences between the original Lickety Split pumpkin layout and the completed version I altered. I will draw a name from the correct entries to choose the winner. Do not put the answer in the comment section! Otherwise other people can't play and it's not nice for the people who worked to get the correct answer. Thanks for playing! :)