Welcome 2025

I have been choosing my Word of Year for some time now, a word that helps guide me as a new year begins. It doesn't always ring true but this year SIMPLIFY just hits home. De clutter and slow down a bit.

Last night at our New Years Eve dinner, we were reflecting on 2024. I had so many mixed emotions as I retired my online classroom and paper crafting business this year. I have been a long long time Cricut and paper crafting teacher. It was time but it also left an empty feeling. My days had been filled with class design, writing and recording and now ... hmmmmm. I wasn't ready to just sit and watch Hallmark movies (although I love that!)

Yarn and knitting needles became my new best friends. Yes I am in love with this. It is a quiet hobby and I have found I really am in love with it. I wanted to be sure it wasn't a fleeting love affair before I shared all of this experience with you.

I am even more excited to share my journey with you. If you have ever thought about knitting, follow along as I help you sort thru all the confusing details.

Where do you start? What kind of needles and yarn? What are the terms? YouTube is overwhelming and so are so many patterns too. As I dove into this new hobby I realized that I felt just like I did when I discovered Cricuts years ago. Yes there is lots of info out there but how do you know where to start. So much conflicting ideas and yes it is personal choices but if you are new at this, you don't even know what you don't know!

Follow along here as I share my discoveries and help keep this new hobby simple. Happy New Year to you and your family.

Collecting Yarn ... or becoming a knitter!

Oh I have to be careful, yarn can be addicting. I am having so much fun with this new hobby. I have not really progressed beyond knitting, casting on and off and even purl stitching! Next up might be exploring and trying to follow a pattern. Yikes they are so daunting.

Stampin' Up! Business or Fun

So you may be thinking, what is different this time around. Yes, I have been in and out as a Stampin' Up! demonstrator over the past few years. I even made a big video about really really retiring! (That makes this even more embarrassing too!) As I worked my way out of my really huge craft room, my huge stockpile of older stamps and papers I realized I had lost sight of why I liked Stampin' Up!

My Stampin' Up! world had morphed into a struggling business that was more headache and pressure than crafty fun. I let my happy place turn into a JOB and it was certainly no longer fun. I was running on a treadmill trying to "sell" the next big thing. Ugh!

Stepping back, donating and selling all my overwhelming stock was so freeing! I remembered what I loved and missed about Stampin' Up! I tried to duplicate that with other stamp sets and realized that I was shopping and certainly not getting a demonstrator discount either.

Sooo, I decided to could just sneak in and not tell anyone and be a happy lil stamper quietly. But I also realized I had shared the journey with all of you, why stop now??!

Here I am sharing my change of heart and a promise that it is different this time.

• No classes for you to buy, no paid classroom membership, no weekly Facebook lives that are really just info-mercials like home shopping club shows.

Thanks for following along! Hugs, Cara