Usually I purchase a religious themed stamp set for Mother's holiday cards. It is getting harder and harder to find one that doesn't look like something I've already had. This year in an effort to move things out and not buy more stuff, I used what I had, a Silhouette die cut and my Distress Oxide inks.
The die cut had a pretty negative image that doubled the value of each cut. I've shared the process in this video:
Originally I was going to cut the snowflakes from silver paper but I didn't have enough and was too lazy to go to Michaels so I used gray Stampin' Up! cardstock and embossing powder. It's a pretty effect. I have more bits and pieces left so I may make some more snowflakes and do some cards for myself in a similar style.
Thanks for visiting today! I hope you get to do something crafty this weekend.
This is my first scrapbook page in several weeks. My father passed away in late August. Scrapbooking is very personal to me and I busied myself with cardmaking for awhile before going back to my pages. This one is to capture what was said at the funeral, some of the memorabilia and a good photo I just hadn't gotten scrapped until now.
I realized as I was sharing the video that you could see and read clearly about half of my comments so I could have tried to cover that or just share it so I'm sharing it. While there were many, many things I could have talked about I chose to focus on my father's ability to connect with people and his passion for thanking those who had extended a kindness or sent business his way. (Unfortunately I did not inherit those Wedgewood blue eyes or his innate ability to sell.)
Here are my comments about my dad:
Last Wednesday night when
they moved my father from the ER up to a room, his nurse introduced
herself. She said, “I’m Wendy and I’ll
be your nurse tonight.” She busied
herself with other things for just a moment before turning back to him and
asking “What did you do for a living?”
In a clear voice, he answered, “I ran a carpet shop.” “Oh, I thought I’d seen you before; you did
my house in carpet.”
This happened all the
time. Once when Daddy was picked for
jury duty, he was dismissed after they discovered he knew the prosecuting
attorney, the defense attorney and the judge all because he had sold them
carpet.
In the early 1970’s, L was
working for S & L company building windows in the ‘pink’ building. He had a part time business making picture
frames. A salesman stopped and became acquainted with him persuading Daddy to
just take a carpet sample and try it. He
thought my father would be good at selling carpet. A few years later, he and Mother with her
flawless taste went into the flooring, wallpaper and drapery business full
time. Back then many houses were built
on contract and if a contractor steered work your way, enough contractors could
keep you in business. One Christmas he
had hand mirrors cut at L Mirror and gave them out to the
contractors. Now builders were all men
in those days and I’m not sure how much use they had for a decorative mirror
but the builders were almost all married, too.
Soon he settled on apples as
his annual Christmas gift, usually delivering the boxes to the contractors
house himself to thank them for a year of work.
Individual customers, too, often left the shop with a little something
extra – a box of candy – he bought on sale of course – and kept in a chest
freezer in the storeroom. They came in,
paid their bill and he surprised them with a box of chocolates. And they came back again the next time.
The little man with the
dimples and Wedgewood blue eyes he inherited from his mother, who drove a Ford
F-150 truck, and wore windbreakers, was as unlikely salesman as you would ever
meet.
What my father understood was
that relationships built on giving a little extra would reward you and not just
in business. This was part of who he
was. You never did anything for him that
wasn’t repaid in some way. He never ran
a debt financial or otherwise. He always
wanted you to know you were appreciated.
He nurtured all the
relationships in his life particularly with his older relatives. We spent many Sundays in Kannapolis visiting
his aunts and uncles or made 4th of July trips to family around the
country. Every Sunday we went to visit his mother-in-law.
He liked to get to know
people. We were seldom at a doctor’s
office for any length of time or the ER without him asking his nurses about
their shift or where they lived. When
his nurse from the 2nd day of his last hospitalization returned from
a weekend trip, he remembered her and asked specifically about her drive from
the city she had visited. One of the
last things he told me was how good the people at the hospital’s radiation oncology
unit had been to him. He appreciated
good care the same way he extended it to others. I imagine if he had lived, we would have been
going back to the unit one day with a box of chocolates.
My father seldom told me how
to treat people, or solve a problem, or manage my money. He showed me. He illustrated a life of gratitude, of
matching needs with resources, of saving and of responsibility. And he did those things with a smile and an
interest in who you were as a person. In
the end, his body gave out but his sharp mind and his heart never did.
