Big Day for Ayden

Yesterday should have been just like any other Monday for Ayden – but it actually turned out to be a pretty big day for him! Not only did our family attend a Cub Scouts Pack meeting last night, where Ayden officially joined Cub Scouts, but while getting ready for bed after the meeting, he lost his first tooth!

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He had been playing with the loose tooth for days (VERY excited to FINALLY have one loose, since most of his friends had already lost one, two, three or more teeth in Kindergarten last year!). He was also taking great pleasure in grossing me out by folding the tooth forward and back as it hung on by just a thread of flesh. As he cozied into bed for the night, I asked if he had tried giving it a yank or a twist… that’s apparently all the prompting he needed, because he grabbed the tooth, twisted, and it immediately came out! The look of HORROR on his face was priceless! You could tell he wasn’t sure if that was actually supposed to happen?!?! I reassured him with some extreme excitement and congratulations and told him that I had to go find the camera right away!!! He clearly was fine and quite proud of himself. He was even more pleased to wake up this morning to find that the tooth he had tenderly placed in a velvet-lined box under his pillow had been replaced by a dollar bill (though NOT the $10-bill he had informed us was the going rate these days!) – and now, Ayden’s new grin!

See a few more pictures here.

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September Heritage Makers Newsletter

    New Heritage Makers Products!

Available now!
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5 x 5 Greeting Cards

Square cards are everywhere this holiday season and Heritage Makers has them! Perfect for celebrations of any kind these cards will add an entire new dimension to our card offerings.

4 x 8 and 8 x 4 One-sided Photo Cards

Want to send cards to everyone you know this holiday season. One of our newest cards is a super sleek design and an exceptional value that will cost Club members around 50 cents.

11.5 x 8.5 Tri-fold Brochure

This heavy-duty business offering comes in pack of 20 and makes the perfect Christmas letter, team roster or standing menu.

6 x 9 Booklet

If you like our 8.5 x 11 booklet, you’ll love its smaller cousin the 6 x 9 booklet. The standard 16 pages are just the right size for a program, neighborhood recipe book or child’s art book. The booklet is expandable to 32 pages in four-page increments.

8 x 8 Soft-bound Book

A fabulous and inexpensive book for those kid or school stories, this 21-page, soft-cover book is perfect bound and expandable to 50 pages.

12 x 12 Wrapped Canvas

Possibly the most applauded new product, the 12 x 12 canvas is the perfect size for wall groupings or photos of every family member.

Pearl Paper

New for Reunion, choose pearl paper at check out for an extra dash of style on cards or 12 x 12 scrap pages. With its glittery, pearlescent finish, this upgrade will be a winner for baby announcements, holiday cards and wedding invitations.

A Note About Quality…
With the recent introduction of the soft-bound 8×8 storybook, HM released the following statement regarding quality concerns (which has been the reason HM has NOT offered a soft-bound book until now): “Heritage Makers is using a new method of perfect binding called “PUR” which is a hot melt adhesive manufactured with polyurethene reactive material. After the adhesive is applied, a natural chemical reaction occurs as it is exposed to moisture in the air. This reaction creates a superior bond within the fibers of the paper giving the product greater pull and flex strength. It also doesn’t allow the adhesive to get brittle and crack (allowing pages to fall out) like traditional perfect binding components. We are one of only a few PUR perfect binders in the U.S. and wanting this new technology was one of the reasons we waited to bring soft-bound books on as a product offering.”

New Studio Features
Import a Page: Ever wanted to make an 8 x 8 version of that 12 x 12 book for each of your children? With the new IMPORT A PAGE function in Studio, you can do just that. Go to your MY PROJECTS tab, select a project and page and the entire designed page is there on your new page.
Improved Page Manager: Making a deck of cards and need to delete most of the deck before copying your new design? With our new enhanced PAGE MANAGER, multiple cards can be deleted or added. It’s a HUGE time saver!
Pearl Card Stock: Printing your project on Pearl Paper gives it a pearlescent sheen that makes special-occasion printing even more beautiful. Best used on projects with colors in pastel to medium tones, sample prints are recommended before printing large orders.

Pearl Paper is available for the following projects:

4 x 6 and 6 x 4 Invitations
5 x 7 and 7 x 5 Invitations
4 x 6 and 6 x 4 Greeting Cards
5 x 7 and 7 x 5 Greeting Cards
5 x 7 and 7 x 5 Postcards
5 x 5 top fold and side fold Greeting Cards
12 x 12 Scrap Pages

Monthly Publishing Specials (Sept-Nov)
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For those of you who are members of Club HM, you can easily “bank” your monthly membership points between now and November (if you so choose) to use toward holiday card publishing and receive the ADDITIONAL 20% off card publishing in Nov on top of your already amazing Club HM savings! If you are not currently a member of Club HM, please contact me today to join! Click here for a quick video intro to Club HM!

Direct Shippable Cards
Please note that all Heritage Makers greeting cards and invitations are direct shippable. The only exception is the new 5×5 greeting card.

Digicrop Dates
Monday, 9/12, 3:30pm @ Playdate PDX
Thursday, 9/22, 7pm @ Carrie’s House (near Aloha High School) – RSVP for directions

Recent Projects
A birthday card I made from scratch for my hubby, using one of the newly released art collections:

Thank-you cards that we sent out after Ayden’s reptile birthday party:

A photo-rich birthday card for great-grandma (nanna) showcasing some of the recent photo session by Zober Babies:

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July Heritage Makers Newsletter

Over the hump for 2011 already and on the downhill slide to the holiday season! Holy cow! It will be here before you know it, and it’s never too soon to start thinking about all the meaningful Heritage Makers projects that you can create for your gift-giving this year!

Now that I’ve given you heart failure with that, let’s talk about the news for July – NOW!

New Studio Art:

Newly released July art collections!

Newly released July art collections!

Click the art photo to see our full art collection.

Bonus Savings:
Publish any 20×20 canvas or 8×8 storybooks this month and receive an additional 10% off at checkout!

Facebook Friends:
“Like” Club HM on Facebook to join the non-stop Digicrop! Joining this very active page will grant you access to a growing, enthusiastic community of like-minded Heritage Makers like yourself – complete with live chat opportunities, Studio tips and tricks, exclusive previews of member projects and craft ideas, plus the chance to participate in weekly (sometimes daily!) challenges to win FREE publishing points! Just log into your Facebook page and search for the “Club HM” page – click “Like”!

Digicrops!

Thursday 7/21, 7pm @ Carrie’s House (near Aloha High School) – RSVP for complete details!

Tuesday 7/26, 3pm @ Playdate PDX (downtown PDX) – bring your kids and let them play in the giant play structure. OK to come if you don’t have kids too! Coffee and cafe are great!

Sunday 7/31, 7pm @ Chloe’s House (South Beaverton) – RSVP for complete details!

Personal Project Features:

The project above was a tri-fold card we made for Ayden as his birthday card. The card featured a picture from each of the past 12 months. He loved it!

This was a fun, patriotic project I did for the boys to be able to pass out to their friends and family for the Independence Day holiday. This project used a 5×7 invitation (prints on both sides). Once I received the cards in the mail, I used a punch to cut a circular hole above and below their clasped hands and then laced a “real” American flag through the card. See the finished product below!

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As always, I am here to answer your questions and offer you assistance with all of your heritage making needs! Please contact me if I can help you in any way. Just a quick heads up – I will be out of town visiting family during the first two weeks of August, though I will be available by phone and email should you need anything! Happy heritage making!!! :)

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Camp Tilikum

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The celebratory end-of-year field trip for Ayden’s kindergarten class was a trip out to Camp Tilikum in Newberg, OR on June 2nd. To add to Ayden’s excitement about this trip, Patrick was able to take the day off from the shop to be one of the parent helpers for the first time this year! Ayden was VERY excited to have his Daddy come to a school event (and I think Patrick was pretty excited too!). The morning started out with a bus ride from the school, complete with some Bus Bingo to keep everyone entertained for the 45 minute drive. The weather wasn’t ideal – a little drizzly and gray, which it had been for months – so much mud and muck was in store. Once the buses arrived at the Camp, the teachers had planned out a full agenda (having done this trip for many years in a row now) to keep everyone busy and engaged. From a rope bridge challenge to a rock wall, then a forest hike with a nature “Hike and Hunt” scavenger activity, the kids were busy from start to finish. There was an old schoolhouse building in which they were able to hide from the rain, then on to fishing for trout and salamanders. Ayden’s favorite part of the trip was catching and holding the salamanders (especially since the girls thought they were gross and slimy!). While the group waited for the buses to take them back to school, the group squeezed in a couple games of Tug-of-War. All in all it was a fun, eventful and memorable trip – and a great way to end a fantastic Kindergarten year! Thank you Mrs. Kohl!!! :)

View the photo gallery here!

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Memorial Weekend Adventures

After suffering hard drive failure on our main home computer, our photo uploading (and therefore blogging) has come to a recent standstill. I realize that this post about our Memorial Day weekend adventures is more than a little tardy… but as they say, better late than never!

The boys technically had a FOUR day weekend, since Ayden didn’t have school on Friday. This worked out beautifully, as Friday also happened to be opening member-preview day for the latest Dinosaur exhibit at our local zoo. Since we have what you’d call a “dino fan” in the family, we were at the zoo the moment the exhibit opened and were among the first to experience the latest batch of prehistoric monsters lurking in the forest. View Full Photo Gallery HERE!

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Saturday the 29th found us taking a little “day-cation” to the coast to visit the Oregon Coast Aquarium – a place I hadn’t been too since Keiko the killer whale (from the movie, “Free Willy”) was there. Suffice it to say, it’s been a long time! The place has changed significantly (for the better) and the boys are the perfect age to visit for the first time.

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The drive out to Newport was a good couple of hours, but really beautiful and scenic – first through wine country and then south on Hwy 101 along the coast. For having lived on the Oregon coast for as much of my life as I have, I have definitely under-appreciated the rugged beauty of our coast (especially on a gorgeous sunny day!). We spent a couple of hours at the Aquarium itself, visiting every nook and cranny (some twice!). The family favorite was the “Passages of the Deep” exhibit which has a series of walk-through glass tubes that puts you in the middle of the ocean. Very cool!

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After the Aquarium, we headed to a nearby restaurant for a waterfront lunch, followed by some frolicking on the beach. The weather really could not have been more perfect. These are the days you live for here in Oregon. They make the other 360 days of rain worthwhile ;) Windblown and weary, we finally made it back to the car and leisurely made our way back up the coast, stopping whenever the mood struck us at various viewpoints, state parks and scenic spots along the way. All in all it was a positively glorious family outing – and a much needed one too. Really recharged our spirits! View Full Photo Gallery HERE!

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And as if we hadn’t crammed enough into an already eventful weekend, Patrick took the boys out “wheelin” the next day. They went out in the Land Cruiser to Brown’s Camp and met up with the two guys from our shop, plus a couple more interested parties. View Full Photo Gallery HERE!

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We polished off the weekend with the customary Memorial Day BBQ and called it good! I hope you all had a weekend to remember as well!

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**Digicrop Date Change**

Please note that the last Digicrop of the month, scheduled for Thursday, June 23rd has been MOVED TO:

TUESDAY, JUNE 21st @ 7pm – Carrie’s House, Beaverton

Please RSVP for address/directions.

Hope to see you there!!! :)

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Heritage Makers Online Inspirations Classes

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Beginning TONIGHT, the first in a series of summer online Inspirations classes begin – and they’re all FREE! You do not have to be a current Heritage Makers client or have a Heritage Makers account to attend these great classes. Please note that the times listed are MOUNTAIN time – so these classes run live at 6pm Pacific. Just click on the class-specific link to register and receive your invite to join the class by email. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact me. Happy memory making! :)

Thu, Jun 9, 2011 7:00 PM MDT
Topic: At the Family Reunion
Instructor: Lynda Angelastro
Show off your heritage and family pride at this summer’s reunion with a host of meaningful and fun family projects from Heritage Makers.
Click here to register

Thu, Jun 23, 2011 7:00 PM MDT
Topic: Baby, Baby
Instructor: Lynda Angelastro
Whether you’re welcoming someone new to the world or catching up on past projects, join us for a wealth of ideas for baby gifts, greetings and memory keeping.
Click here to register

Thu, Jul 14, 2011 7:00 PM MDT
Topic: Christmas in July
Instructor: Lynda Angelastro
Get a jumpstart on winter holiday gifts, greetings and decor with new art, new templates and new ideas.
Click here to register

Thu, Jul 28, 2011 7:00 PM MDT
Topic: Sports Spectacular
Instructor: Lynda Angelastro
Join us for a host of ideas for commemorating your child’s sports participation, including template tricks to personalize projects for your team.
Click here to register

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Teacher Gift in Under 5 Minutes!

So this was just too quick and easy NOT to share with you all! I found this template in the gallery which uses one of the newly released 8.5×11 spiral bound booklets. Actually, the product is so new that I have never even published one, so I’m excited to receive this one next week. It’s a year-long teacher planner, using all of the fun school and teacher art from the art collection. So cute! The template is very nicely built and I was able to simply edit three text boxes and pop in Ayden’s school picture – DONE! It literally took me less than 5 minutes to edit, publish and order this custom, personalized gift for Ayden’s amazing teacher! I think she’s going to love it! Take a look – what do you think

If you’d like me to transfer the template to you, just email/message me and consider it done :)

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Chloe’s June Heritage Makers Newsletter

Announcements:

- The cost to add extra pages to hardbound storybooks has been reduced from .99 to .49 per page on the 11 x 8.5 size storybooks and smaller, and from 1.99 to .99 per page on the 12 x 12 and 11 x 13 storybooks.

- NEW PRODUCTS! Heritage Makers just debuted a new line of business products, including business cards, flyers, booklets, and wire-bound books. But don’t be fooled, these ‘business’ products are available to everyone – business or no business!
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There are lots of great project templates already in the Template Gallery for all of these new products, but here’s an amazing magazine/booklet template that fellow HM consultant Cassie Balser created. Click the image below for the project preview:
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Upcoming Events to Remember:

- Father’s Day June 19th (still plenty of time to make a meaningful, priceless gift for Dad!)
- Graduations (from pre-school to college!)
- Independence Day July 4th (BBQ invitations, party and home decor items, decks of playing cards, and more! Search “patriotic” in the Template Gallery)
- Birthdays, anniversaries, thank-you, get well, thinking of you…

I’m currently booking Workshops and Studio Demos for June and July, so please contact me today to reserve your date! In the meantime, please plan to join me at one of my FREE June Digicrops! All you need to bring is YOU and your LAPTOP :) If you don’t have a laptop, please let me know and I can reserve one for you.

DIGICROPS:
- Saturday, June 4th @ 7pm – Chloe’s House (South Beaverton; please RSVP for address/directions)
- Wednesday, June 8th @ 3pm – Playdate PDX
- Wednesday, June 15th @ 2pm-5pm – Playdate DIGICROP at Chloe’s House (Bring the kids over to play while we work on our HM projects! Please RSVP!)
- Thursday, June 23rd @ 7pm – Carrie’s House (near Aloha High School; please RSVP for address/directions)

Still haven’t joined the Club? Get all the Club HM details below!

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On Peeing…

As a household raising two boys (and I a mother who still insists that her boys sit to pee), this hits particularly close to home – and totally cracks me up!

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