Cedar Valley Winery

I had a great time stamping all weekend with other demonstrators in my downline in Peoria, IL, but I also had a great time on my drive home through the southeastern part of Iowa!   I had a place I planned to stop so took a little different route home, and I found some other interesting places to stop along the way.  I saw grapes growing along the road near Batavia, Iowa so stopped to take pictures and check out the winery - Cedar Valley Winery.  Click HERE to go to their web site.  I'm not a big fan of wine, but it's fun to learn about wine making and taste different ones.  I've got one spot left to fill in my pretty wine rack I bought in Carroll, IA.  For it, I'm only buying from wineries I actually visit and ones with pretty labels.  I really like the label to show their vineyard.

Cedar Valley Winery & tasting room

 

 

Look at the Stuff!

It's been a busy week around here.  My Mom arrived here soon after I left for Peoria.  Diane needed a babysitter desperately.  She was the personal attendant for a wedding that weekend.  Soon after I got back from Peoria, Bill left for his annual prairie dog hunting trip to South Dakota.  Mom & I babysat again this weekend while Diane was in a wedding.  Mom left today and Bill got home.

Lacey with her pretty mommy

  
We have had some nice, windows open weather the past few days and some very light scattered showers.  Today we had some rain a couple of times that added up to half a tenth here at our house.  So far the crops are hanging in there.

Back to my Peoria trip - check out these pictures of my stamping friends but mostly check out how much stamping STUFF we haul in to a room for the weekend!  You really can't tell HOW much from the pictures!   There was lots of stuff behind us on chairs and on the floor too!  Wish I would've taken a picture of the bare room after we cleaned up late Sat. night!

Rochelle, Phyllis & Debbie P. and my stamping spot

Rochelle from St. Louis

Debbie D. from Carmel and one of her creations

Trip to Peoria and Back

I've been working for several months on things for my stamping weekend in Peoria.  Once we're back from one of our weekends, we start looking for ideas for the next year.  Then we have to wait until the new Stampin' Up! catalog comes out in early summer so that we'll use all current products for the cards, scrapbooks and other things we make.  

We make five cards for everyone going - there are eight of us.  So that's 40 cards to make before leaving.  Then we also take 3 non-card projects which can be anything from a stamped tile, mini scrapbook, stamped tea towel, candle, etc.  So many possibilities.  So that's 24 of those to make and take.  We also print out lots of the other ideas we've found on the Internet on blogs, our Stampin' Up! demonstrators' site - Stampin' Connection, Splitcoaststampers, etc.  

Then all weekend we stamp, making lots more samples to show our customers.  We came home with 84 new cards this time plus more 3-D items!

   

These are the things I took:  a purse that can hold a gift card or candy or something else, a votive candle holder with butterflies on it, the purple Tea for Two holds two tea bags in pockets inside, an explosion box that when you open it up the sides drop down and you add pictures on each section and this one holds a little tea light birthday cake and then the five cards for each.  

Explosion Box - StampAcademy.com

 

 

Wouldn't this be fun to give to someone and when they open it up, it drops open and they see 12 different pictures inside along with that little birthday cake!

Tea Light birthday cake

Purse from StampAcademy.com

Stampin' Up! Two by Two stamp and watercoloring

I got this card idea from a demonstrator from Germany

Quilt card with vintage button

Holiday Frame embossing folder & Joyous Celebrations

Dress pattern from StampAcademy.com

I'm Back

I've been gone since Thurs. on a stamping weekend with 7 other Stampin' Up! Demonstrators. Three of them live near St. Louis, two in southern Illinois and two in Indiana.   We met in Peoria and made lots of beautiful cards, mini scrapbooks and other things.   They were nice enough to meet me in Peoria, Illinois so that I wouldn't have to drive so far.

Then today I went on an adventure on my way home.  I got to drive through the beautiful southeastern part of Iowa which I had not seen yet.  I made several fun stops today.  Lots of pictures to post!  Will try to get a blog post done tomorrow after getting some catch up sleep.  Here's a sneak peek of one of my stops.

 

Dangerous Job

The other day, I was coming come from taking some papers to Bill up at Tim's shop and saw this crop duster working (or spray plane as they call them here).  I stopped and watched for a while.  I always say that Dad should've done this.  He loved flying and liked doing crazy things in his planes. 

Yesterday Bill & I went out to look at some fields to see if they need to be sprayed.  He was looking for spider mites that normally would be knocked off with rain that we haven't had.  Or, they usually have to spray for aphids which would also kill the spider mites.  But it's been too dry for aphids this summer. We were saying that it's been nice to not have mosquitoes or other bugs this year.  He is out spraying a couple of fields this afternoon. 

Getting Ready

Bill and Tim are getting the combine and other equipment ready for harvest.  We may be going early this year due to the drought.  Bill said that today there was a parade of equipment going north and south past Tim's house/shop.  New equipment, equipment going to West Bend John Deere or Case for repairs or to be checked out and equipment coming back. 

I had never seen the snouts of the corn head up before and what's "inside" of them - lots of moving parts.