I'm back!

Yea, ha pretty sad I haven't posted here since flippin August, isn't it? Well, I wont apologize and tell you I'll get better because you probably see enough of that every day, lol.

I have thought of posting here again many times because you know me, I DO have lots to say, ALWAYS! But then I decided not to come annoy the ones that love to hate me and all my CAPITALIZED words, heheee. Oh well you win some, you lose some right? I'll hush on this subject though because many of you are probably reading and thing WHAT is she talking about?? If that's you, GOOD, it's nothing important. :)

I did want to pop in here and tell you that I do have a new blog here. Authentic Artistry, is the CRD Shoppe blog where my team and I host challenges, freebies, inspiration and that sort of stuff. I haven't been doing much of the posting there because I sorta took an unannounced break that I KNOW many of you told me to do a DOZEN TIMES! :) Im also sure alot of you already knew this but this "Cyber" biz sorta took over my life, lol. I am back though and FULL of hot air. lol. So, if you care to have hot air blown your way and think you can keep up with my crazy head, I'll see you here. :p.

What's New at CRD?

Hey all it's UP! Cocktail Hour! I just emailed out a newsletter which is also posted HERE on our News page (which we will now keep updated regularly) if for some reason you didn't get it! There's a coupon too! :) Happy Saturday! Be safe, have fun!

Cocktail Hour Sampler #2!

Well I meant to post EARLY when I was not running MAN to get this bad boy finished but I forgot :(. Sorry!

I am SERIOUSLY SOOOOOOOOOOOOO... EXCITED right now! I NEVER EVER get time to just ENJOY a kit release and this time I sorta get to!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Cocktail Hour turned out SOOOOO FABULOUS, FUN, FUNKY and just plain AWESOME, lol! It will be released at Amy's new Shoppe shortly and I will repost here with the link. But for now, grab this freebie and check out or Challenge at DST!

Download Cocktail Hour Sampler HERE (includes part 1 AND 2 both)!

"Cocktail Hour" with Amy...it's almost here!

YAYY!!! We can't wait to show you the finished kit, it releases TOMORROW!!! But for now grab this sampler we have made for you if you want it! :)

Amy will post a challenge at DST in the next hour or so if you wanna play!

Have a good one :)

Edited to add: Download the ENTIRE Sampler in my newer post! :)

Well it's been TOO LONG...

Don't yall get so sick of hearing people apologize for not blogging? Well, I thought so so I won't do it. bwhaaaaa!!


Okay, so my husband has PISSED me OFF for the DAY!! ARGH! :( Now mind you I go to bed usually after he leaves for work in the morning. Sometimes before when I've done that too many days in a row and am tired! So this morning I laid down at about 4:45. He was running his mouth at around 5:30. You know how they do... huffin and puffin looking for this, looking for that, PO'ed about this and that. Well this is my hubby anyways, lol. A HUGE kid that is used to me doing everything for him. This morning was about his glasses, he couldn't find them. Now I have told him a GAZILLION TIMES NOT to leave his stuff where Braden can reach it. You know little kids, they want to be like daddy and use all their stuff! So anyways, apparently Braden got his glasses down and he couldn't find them. So after blowing smoke for 10 or so minutes he comes and asks me to help him look for them. Well of COURSE that took 20 minutes and I found them in a toy box in his room. Now I'm UP for the day! Just IRRITATED :(.




Well the apprentice is doing very well. Everyone seems to LOVE her stuff which is so EXCITING for her! She did already open her own shoppe and we will release our collab there this FRIDAY, yahoooooooooo!!! I posted about it at DST already here http://www.digishoptalk.com/boards/showthread.php?t=78984 but I just wanted to tell the loves of my life RIGHT HERE that we are going to be giving away additional pieces today, tomorrow and Friday for a scrap challenge :). Would love to see you play if you want! Amy is on the scout for a few CT's anyways. I'm making her since she's stealing all mine. bwhaaaaaaaaaa....BRAT! lol


I have some new stuff in the Shoppe! I finally got to get out to play and have been doing a few RAK's at DST and plan to do more too! There's a post in the happy thread and I have asked the team to choose people too. I can't be biased you now that :). You know I wish I could get to everyone but it wont happen unfortunately. :( Which is one of the reasons Amy and I will give away these things to EVERYONE that wants them and I have a freebie below and in the Shoppe for you too! :)

Yep, so me posting the entire collection was a definate mistake :(. Here is the link to the freebie set. http://www.4shared.com/file/24562152/aff2dd/CRenee_AlphaBitsFreebie_Aqua.html

Love you gals! I'm taking SEVERAL weeks off starting next week so lets have LOTS of fun until then, k! :)

New stuffs...

Isn't this BLINGING alpha the coolest of all time!!! lol. I am IN LOVEEE with the girls lo's, HOLEY MOLEY!

Have a great day! :)

My First Apprentice!!!!

Good morninggggg! So how are ya today??

Me? I am EXCITED, THRILLED, ANXIOUS and a little tired, lol. So I have been keeping a little secret :(. Most of why I just haven't bloged because I can't keep secrets, lol! Okay so do yall remember WAYYYYYYYY back when I said I was collabing with a BRAND NEW designer? Well TODAY, I get to reveal her to you!!! YAYY! We had decided to put off the collaboration because things got SO crazy for me during the Grand Opening. But we will still be doing one that will be out the 16th of this month!

Okay, so the designer is.................................. Amy Hutchinson! :) Amy is a true artist, she really is!! You can look at Amy's gallery and tell that right away. She is known for her fabulous blending techniques and her most FAVORITE elements...Circles! I had asked Amy a while back if she had ever thought of designing? She wasn't too sure, hehe. Well I have a TRUE passion of helping people achieve their dreams so I was all up for helping Amy if she was interested. I also know that when I started to design, I couldn't get ANY information out of anyone, lol. I worked really hard for about 3 months solid, figuring it all out on my own. Now I want it share it. I will admit though, I taught Amy a FEW things but this girl's GOT IT! She is sweet as can be. SO CREATIVE and MOST of all INNOVATIVE! Her style, her designs and her Shoppe on the way are truly HER and a one of a Kind! I have asked Amy to join me at the Shoppe for the rest of September as my very FIRST Apprentice! Amy will be selling a few exclusive items here at CRD during her stay! So please help me welcome my first Apprentice, Amy Hutchinson!!!

Now, many of you know that I absolutely LOVE and adore my Creative Team. Well out f no-where they asked Amy (which is on my CT), if she needed help sporting her goodies. Ladies, I must say these girls ROCKED her stuff.........WOW OH WOWIE!!! So I wanted to show you those layouts featuring Amy's new designs you can look forward to. Now this stuff will be in her very own Shoppe next week. So check these baby's out....

(CRUD!! I's not letting me upload for some reason!! ARGGG!!!) I'll post when I figure it out here) Sorry!

Also, I have lots of new stuff! YAYYYY, I know can you believe it?? lol. I almost can't! Things have just been so stinkin chaotic, I can't seem to catch my breath lately! You would THINK that working from home wouldn't be SOOOOO..... stressful, WRONG! Lemme tell you, I used to be the Property Director over many large apartment communities. I have had up to 25 employees under me and I must admit, THIS IS SO MUCH HARDER!!! I don't know what it is...I guess just the balancing between family and work, family and work...oh it's CRAZY! So I am sorta setting myself up to take a little time off. I didn't want to go away without creating you some NEW STUFFS! That would be SO TRAUMATIC, wouldn't it?? lol

So here's the deal...I have working fast and furious to get stuff done, I'm STILL not there!!! :( So what I will do, is upload things as I finish them today. Amy's goodies are already in the Shoppe now! I have uploaded a few things that are older but I never had put in the Shoppe. I knew Amy was coming on, so I did set up a MONTH LONG COUPON as well.... 20% off any order all month. The code is CRDSeptPromo!

Thank you all SO MUCH for your kind words here, by email and Pm's They have really cheered me up and many times I needed it! :(. So thank you!

A couple more things so you don't think I forgot....

• Got some stitches coming your way sometime this week!
• All that purchased the Exotic Adventure kit, your smart, bwhaaaaaa..KIDDING. No but I made you a thank you gift and will send it out this week. It's kinda funky, lol.
• I wanted to give you all the UN-Shadowed version of the Grab Bag flowers. So I am working on a blog freebie that will have those and some other styles in it :). Will be up this week as well!
• Finally, the Songbird RAK's...they were SOOOO... nice over there! They FORCED me to take a refund AND the gift cards. Can you believe that?? So I will send you a gift card to SBA AND one to my Shoppe since it's been so long :(. I will get those out ths week as well!

I think that's it for today. I need to go finish my stuff before my body decides it needs sleep. lol. Talk to you soon! :)

OHHHH LORDY....YOUR EMAILS NOT BEING ANSWERED!!!!

OMG, I could just CROAK, lol. Well we know that it is no secret that this gal is a popular one on an un-mentioned blog. I don't read that thing because the day I did, my attitude about EVERYTHING was HORRIBLE! I also have enough fans and customers such as you gals that watch it for me, hehee. Yall pretty much keep me in the loop and it is MUCH appreciated.

So to the point, sorry...the thing that was REALLY sitting with me WRONG is the ones saying they weren't receiving EMAIL responses!!! Reason is, I STAY on top of these NO MATTER what! I mean COME on WHY wouldn't I, kwim? SO guess what?? It just hit me TODAY...REMEMBER that emergency email addy, christinareneedesigns@yahoo.com, that was set up while I went on vacation??? UMMM YEA....well YIKESS, I just found 26 emails in there :( !!! I could DIEE!! I just STRIVE to ALWAYS answer yalls emails and I am SO mad at myself for that!!! So FORGIVE me, PLEASE!! I am FREAKING out about it right now, lol. I just want to answer them all RIGHT NOW at once, lol. I have 3 CT's helping so we can knoock those out!!! I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO........................SORRRRRRRYYYY!!!

It's HERE!!!

Hey loyal bloggers! Emily Merritt here in for Christina while she goes and gets some rest. I am so excited to bring to you Exotic Adventure!! It's up in the store and ready to go!! There will be more to come later this afternoon, like a contest with prizes, but for now...go get your kit!! Here's a little something to help you out...for 20% off use CRDSeptPromo!!

It's coming, it's coming...........

SOOOOOOOOOO.....SORRY yall! I have been working NON STOP on ths sucker there is just SO MUCH PREP involved that I forget about, lol. It will be up SOON. I do have to take Bray to his first day of school but proll shortly after that. Just now this SUCKER IS SO DARN HUGEE!! SERIOUSLY the BEST deal for your money. Plus I have like 3 freebies in mind to make you to go with it and I haven't even raed your comments, lol. So it'll be up soon!!!!


EDITED to add...I guess I lied and I'm sorry! As I said before there are 4 of us involved and two have been unavailable mostly. I have been at this for 6 days almost straight and I am just physically BEAT! My son missed his first day of school because I kept thinking we could get this up. I can't, not right away anyways. There are things that are still lacking and I have GOT to go rest. I'm SORRY, I really AM. I'm MORE sorry that this all rests on me when I have TRULY done my DARNDEST. NO POOR ME here either, I have just GOT to quit working non-stop, kwim??

Anyways, SORRY. I will post when I am awake and can find out what's up :).

Another Sneak Peak...

Here's another Sneak Peak for ya...My Papers!

Hey, In the mood to make you something free to go along with the kit. There are already 25, 18" long stitches included. What other kind of stitches do you like?? Circles? Grids? Shapes? Majority rules so speak NOW! lol

Okay no heart attacks please!!!

Haha, you like my title?? Well dont pass out cause I'm here, lol...I know I have TOTALLY sucked lately! Well let me assure you, it's because I'm killin myself over here again, lol. NO play or REST, that's for darn sure!! :) You now what it is?? I think I just WAY overbooked myself. I mean I just LOVE to do collabs SO MUCH that I commit SO often. Yet between doing those and playing catch up (YES, STILL :( ) with all the challenges, gift cards, etc. I can't seem to get anything new in the Shoppe... I mean OMG, really, it's starting to actually IRRITATE me, you know?? Nothing to do with ANYONE, it's ME! I dunno, I basically feel like I am working 24 hours a day but not REALLY seeing A HUGE got'er done list. Do you ever feel like that?? Like you are RUNNING 1000 miles and hour, yet going freaking NO WHERE?? (BESIDES in a dream, hahaha. )

Anyways, PLAN is (yes, PLAN that I am going to TRY my DARNDEST to do) is to TRY to get these products only needing previews uploaded THIS week. I really DO have some cool stuff and it was SUPPOSED to be for today when we release the collab. But I couldn't STOP myself from creating for this kit and these girls on my CT. Yall SERIOUSLY MUST go look at their layouts...............OH................MY...............GOSH!! You know how sometimes when you get SO EXCITED you are shaking?? (Or is that just another weird trait of mine, rofl!) Anyhow, I was PRACTICALLY jumping up and down with excitement when I saw these lo's. Oh and btw, I am talking about a collaboaration kit, "Exotic Adventure", that will be released today :). This is what I was coming to tell you too...we are still shooting for today! Now it may be later this evening but I am working REAL hard to hurry! There is 4 of us and one is with out towners for the past three days, one has a day job TOO and one is prego, lol. So I am doing my best with all I have left to do. I will come post here when it's up and tell you about the storewide sale I'm havin :). Stay Tuned.....thanks for stickin around with this busy, NO bloggin gal :).

Wanna a sneak peak?? Above are just my elements for the kit! I told you I couldn't stop, lollol...

I'm BACK...catching up on EMAILS and PM's!

Hey all, I just wanted you to know we got back from our little mini vacation yesterday. I am cathing up on PM's and emails today. I have LOADS but I wanted to post this to say I will try to take care of you just as SOON as possible. Thank you for being patient if you sent one!

ALSO, I can't find you, email you, track you down WITHOUT an email addy, lol. So, if you need something, haven't received something (gift card for example) or want or expect ANY type of reponse from me.... PLEASE, PRETTTTTTTY PLEASE leave me your email addy with your comment! :)

Sorry to cut this short, I haven't slept AGAIN (trying to get to lots of these emails) and I'm BEAT :(!

TTYS!

While Christina's away .....

Hello everyone!

Not Christina, but CT member Sue here. Christina and her family are having a little RR this weekend so I'm here to give some info out to everyone.


(All info from Christina, I'm just the messenger :) )

1. The Hide and Seek zip file is being re-loaded tonight and will be accessible very soon.
2. The corrupt #2 zip file from the grab bag was re-loaded before she left this afternoon.
3. The grab bag will be up until about next Friday. Some people were asking :)
4. Christina's e-mail's may not be able to be forwarded. If there is a hot issue you can send to christinareneedesigns@yahoo.com. There are team members that can access those e-mails at that address. Some have the ability to re-set links, etc., but be patient some live in Australia. Aussie, Aussie, Aussie...oy, oy, oy!


I can't think of anything else right now. If the team thinks of anything, we'll let you know.


Cheers!

Grab Bag Time!!!

Hey you all, first off, OMG has it been 10 DAYSSSS since I last blogged??? WOW! WOW! WOW! Time REALLLLLLY flies you know?? Well I am SURE sorry, I guess I'll be LUCKY if I even have any readers left huh?? SORRY :(. I did take a few days off and then I have been catching up on emails. So you will definitely be hearing from me more now. Well actually we are leaving to go out of town for the weekend. But, if they have Internet, I'll be around, if not, I'll be back soon! :)

So GUESS WHAT??? I made you a Grab Bag! CR Style of course, hehehe! I say that just because of the way I previewed it. Kinda cool, huh? Well I thought so, lol. You know I find NO FUN in copying other people so I had to do something different of course! So check this out, DON'T MISS THIS THING, k! Yall KNOW, I don't EVER tell you that you MUST buy something but this thing, YOU MUST, lol. It's GREAT, it's AWESOME and it's packed full of goodies! You'll EVEN get something from Bray (my son), haha.(hint hint if yall have been seeing them around)! But that's just one small part of what's in this :). I'll shut up now so you can get over there and GRAB IT!!! lol I am also half way done with a WHOLE LOTTA new stuff, so keep watchin!! I REALLLLLLLY wanted to get some up today but NO WAY now, cause Steve is already yelling at me to GO, rofl!

I WILL be checking for emergency emails here right before I go, otherwise, I will catch you when I get back :) Actually, I'm taking the computer so if they have internet I'll keep an eye on them :). We are going to stay in some lake houses with the EXTENDED family in Austin. Sounds really fun, I'm kinda excited. Mostly looking forward to just relaxing with the familty!! I will probably do lots of crafty things too, lol. NO, I can't stop, REALLY!! So bye for now, have fun with your STUFFS, lol, and I'll see ya soon.

Oh and btw, the EXCITING NEWS...we are going to start a CRD Team Challenge Blog!!! YAYYYYYYY, I know. I have received MORE emails than I care to mention, heehee...asking when our next challenge will be because you got SO inspired with the last few. So were gonna do it! We are actually THRILLED to do it and I have the COOLEST first challenge in mind already, rofl! Yea, NO WORRIES, my mind runs 90 to nothing with ideas so I think I have 20 of the MOST fun ones in mind ALREADY, lol. The SCARRRRY thing is I feel like I have also somehow got lucky enough to have JUST as CREATIVE and UNIQUE team members with even BETTER ideas too!! So this will be a blast, you know we will load you up with cool free stuff too. I don't really like doing many of the you gotta buy this to play, not fair to the BROKE FOLK, ya know, bwhaaaaaa!! I been there, TRUST ME, I KNOW!!! lol...So more about this later, I REALLY don't know WHEN we can get this rolling because I have the BUSIEST months coming up :(. But we will FRIGURE it out!! :)

Happy Thursday! Have a FABULOUS weekend! :) Talk to you all SOON!

Oh and I REALLY HOPE you like what's in the Bag!! :)

OHHH and there are a few new products in the Shoppe too, I almost forgot! I'll post pics next time, gotta GO NOWWW according to dh, lmbo! Dirty Notes though...CHECK THOSEEEE OUT!! And Hide and Seek Mini Kit, if you didn't get it from the challenge, it's GRUNGY GREATNESS!! BYE!

Hide and Seek Winners!

Okayyyy....Drumroll Please..........all 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners layouts are clickable so you can congratulate them if you want. Congrats ladies, these are SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO AWESOME!!!!!!

Here are ALL of our entries for the challenge....(click to enlarge so you can actually SEE, lol). I decided to give our 3 runners up a $10 Gift Card to the Shoppe too !!! :) I also made you ALL a little kit just for entering. Hopefully you'll like it! It includes the stuff you see here in these previews and a LOT more! There are actualy 6 papers, not 5 like it says in the preview too. The links to each layout are below in a previous post, if you want to see these fabulous layouts up close.

Thanks again to you all. These layouts were SERIOUSLY just SO AMAZING. Maybe I really like them SOOOOO.... MUCH because they are just LOADED up and I love that!!! Congrats to you all!! I will get your gift cards and kits out to you in the morning. :)

Well we had an action packed weekend of fun with Bray. It was his 3rd birthday this past Saturday. I'll try to go through some of these pictures and show them to you tomorrow. I have a freebie for ya anyways.

I'll go for now, I'm really trying to finish up some things to put in the Shoppe. It's been pretty busy with emails lately but hopefully I'll have some in tomorrow. I am also VERY HAPPILY creating for a SERIOUSLY HUUUUGE Digi Scrap event coming up!! My deadline is in two days and I haven't even started :(...BAD huh?? I'm not really worried though, yall know me and I'll just stay up around the clock if I have to, rofl!! Also, BIG, FUN, HUGE, SUPER HAWT news that I will share with you tomorrow too. It's about CRD :)....Gosh what else?? I really have SOOOOO MUCH to tell you all. SO MANY EXCITING things have been happening for me lately, I just feel SO SUPER BLESSED, really! I have been waiting to say anything because I'm not sure what I can say and what I can't. But TRUST ME, I'll tell you all as SOON as I am able to. So stick around and you KNOW you will WELL taken care of and appreciated by me FOR SURE!!! :)

EDITED TO ADD: Since my computer broke I wasn't ever able to finish getting the gift cards out to you all that responded to Natalie a few days after she PM'ed you. I was caught up with all that responded right away, I think. I lack about 10 that will go out to you tomorrow along with all these new ones here :). Thank you so much for your patience!!!

Computer Broke!!!!

Hey, I just wanted to pop in here to tell you that my computer broke over the weekend :(. Braden bent the power cord down at the back of the laptop where it plugs in. ARRRGHHH!!! Anyway, it's fixed now though. They just called and I have to go pick it up now. When I get back I will post our winners :). See ya soon!

Cute picture of Bray :)

(click to enlarge)

Hey I scrapped....bwhaaaaaa....well not really, lol. But hey for ME, it's alot, lol. Shabby Princess has been giving away these adorable desktops from her blog lately. Her FAB CTM's (Yall should see this CT page btw. She used some of my stuff and I'm JEALOUS it's SO darn cute!) create these and I just love them. At first I'm like ehh.. cute but I don't need that. But NOW that I actually use them, I just LOVE to open my laptop every day only to see my little boy smiling back at me :). GOSH I can not BELIEVE he will be THREE tomorrow! SO sad :((.

So here is a cute little picture of my baby for you to stare at while I finish making something, lol. I used Lauren Barden's Color Sepia action on the photos. Braden's eyes are actually blue, not brown, he even looks quite tan too doesn't he? rofl, well don't let that fool you cause it's been WAYYYY to hot to go out lately. And he is SOOOOO...SLEEPY which are why his eyes are half closed, lol. It was like 1am or something CRAZY. We had so much fun that day and he was in that TOO TIRED mode and TOTALLY fighting it. Btw, he is REALLY into to fieshin as he says. So at the moment he was making due with a bowl of water the he piled some toy fish and trucks of course into, heeeheee...SO CUTE!

Hide and Seek----I'm SORRY, I'm SORRY..I of course decided to play around and make the Hide and Seek winners announcement all cool. NOW....I decided to make this little mini kit for all of you that played along :). So don't be TOOO MAD, k. I am going to go finish it up and come back to post. I have NOOOOOOOOO... IDEA when that will be. I am REALLY liking the stuff and want to make a full kit but I'm trying to hold back sorta just b/c I know you all want to know who won. So, see ya when I see ya, lol...it WILL be before midnight though, PROMISE!

Check your email!!!

Hey you, check your emails please! I sent ya something :).

I am RUNNING out the door to Braden's yearly checkup so I will post our Hide and Seek winners when I get back! Happy Friday!!! :)

edited later to add.... a picture of what I sent to you :) Everyone that had EVER registered at CRD should have gotten this :) Have a GREAT weekend!

Good MORNING!

Wow it's 5:45 AM here. I'm blogging EARLY for a change, lol!

Okay so I updated all the Hide and Seek Challenge links below. We would LOVE to hear your favorites if you aren't entering. Most of the CT has their votes in so either way, we will announce the winners sometime later today! YAYYYY...FINALLY, huh, lol.

Oh yea and I forgot to address the fact that a few of you said you had NOT gotten your coupons and/or GC's yet. I will get those out to you today. Thanks for letting me know! :)

Okay, I am gonna go get some sleep now. See ya soon! :)

Hide and Seek Challenge!!!

OMG, these layouts are SERIOUSLY SOOOO FABULOUS!! Lauren on my CT put them all together for us to look through and vote but the PROBLEM is DST gallery is still down. You KNOW that I want to announce these winners just as bad as you wanna know who they are, lol. But I guess we need to wait until the gallery comes back up because only a few of the CT members have gotten to vote. We also want to know YOUR PICK!!! I will post links to all the submitted entries. When the gallery is back up, will you PRETTY PLEASE tell us your top 3 IN ORDER, hehe. Even if you don't feel comfortable voting, YALL MUST GO TAKE A LOOK, these are SERIOUSLY WOW!!! And there are pretty BIG prizes being given too :).

I'm sorry you all that entered are having to wait. Then again, I KNOW you all know things happen. I am feeling REALLY bad for Shannon (Owner/Founder of DST) and her family right now too. She must be going through SO MUCH stress and that poor girl has a baby on the way. Keep praying for her. Let's hear your votes and we will announce our BIG WINNERS SOON!

Here are our entries...gosh, I HOPE these links work, if not I will be back to update when the Gallery is up...

Summer Visit
Sunday Gravy
Rupa Suja
Walkies
Starbucks
My Girls
Shadow Playing
Pirate vs Ninja
Play
The Faces I Love
Daddy Is Flying
Bonsai
Paparazzi
Future Chef
Two Big Friends
Discover Life

Hola!

So I think I finally got ALL of the coupons and gift cards sent out yesterday. YAYYYY!!! I had lots of help from some CT gals so that was a GOOD! I just LOVE, LOVE, LOVE giving away stuff and this time there were SOO MANY of you. Gosh there must have been at least 30 of you that completed all 7 of our Grand Opening challenges, that is SOOOO AWESOME! But you all should have your 25% off coupon, the $10 gift card for completing all 7 challenges and of course all of our BIG winners coupons also.

Well I tell ya I have been a little overwhelmed with all the stuff I just let build up around here during our Grand Opening month. Not work stuff because for the most part we TRY to stay caught up on that. But do us women not have SOOO MANY duties or WHAT? lol. I know I am like the WORST at concentrating on ONE thing and not all the others too, that is JUST ME. But I swear I must have made a list a MILE long of stuff that needs to be done around here. I just HATE it when I let it all build up like that, ya know? I just want it fixed ALL in one day, rofl.
My sons birthday is even coming up on the 11th, yea, like THIS Saturday. He is turning 3 so it's not like that age where he REALLY realizes what we are doing but he kinda does, you know? Originally I was thinking we would have his party at a place called "Pump it Up" but it might be too late now, hahaa. Pump it up is SO MUCH FUN though. It's a place indoors where they have 2-3 rooms of these HUGE bounce houses. Even the adults have a BLAST! It's kinda funny though because when we went there for my nieces birthday a few months ago, I had SOOOO MUCH fun, WAY TOO much fun actually. It's like I forget I get older though. rofl The next day I am not even sure I could get out of the BED, I was SO DARN sore, lol! But we'll see...most likely we will just hang here at home and have family over. He doesn't really have that many friends anyway considering he stays at home with me. The only ones he DOES have is at the church and mothers day and he has been out for summer.

Anyhow, we are having a REALLY hard time judging our winners for the Hide and Seek Challenge. All of these entries are SERIOUSLY AWESOME!!! I had even thought to ask you that didn't enter to helpus judge but I would need to get these loaded n a slide show or something. We DO have the thread over at DST thst we started way back when but I can't seem to even get IN TO DST right now. That's WEIRD, is something up??? I will keep checking and get these layouts posted there so you can all see. They are just FABULOUSSS! We will choose a winner today though, PROMISE. We started to yesterday but the team has so many favorites, lol.

Oh VERY IMPORTANT!!!
We will need to shut down the Shoppe for a few days. I had told you that we did some MAJOR upgrades right before the Grand Opening so we could increase bandwidth and all. Yet we just kinda did a temporary fix by moving all to .net rather than .com for it to work. So NOW we need to move it all back to .com and that will take us a few days. I will ask Lauren when she is up for doing this and I will keep you posted!! If you want to Shoppe with your coupons and gift cards you just might want to do that SOON. Otherwise, I am HOPING, not promising but HOPING to have some new stuff up by the time we re-open. There is really a LOT of things I am wanting to do for you all, make, etc. yet I have GOT to get caught up around this place too before I LOSE my mind, lol. The MAJOR one being to get BACK on a BETTER sleeping schedule. That way maybe I can be back to blogging at 7-8am rather than 7-8pm, hahahah!!

Off to see what's up with DST and our Hide and Seek winners. ttys!

Real Quick...

I wanted to pop in to say we are working on sending ALL Of the coupons and prizes out to you today. Thank you for being SOOO patient and understanding...Congrats to you all!!!! Woohoooo!!!

Happy Friday! :)

LONGER , MUCH MORE INFORMATIVE post to follow later!

We have WINNERS!!!

Good Afternoon...Gosh it seems like it has been FOREVER since I have blogged in this early, lol. It's definitely not my old days of 7am'ish but hey it's still a little earlier than usual right. :)

Guess WHAT??? We have WINNERS, one HUGE WINNER too...YAYYY!!! When we had our Grand Opening, we announced that there would be someone to win Free Products from ME for 3 FULL MONTHS!!! After THAT, they would receive a coupon for 50% off ANYTHING in the Shoppe for ANOTHER 3 months!!! The way it worked was for every $10 you spent at CRD, you were entered into this drawing. Well we had many people that fell into that category. So we used the random number picker and based our winner off their order number and we matched those up. Sooooooo......Drumrolll pleaseee.................Our OVERALL GRAND PRIZE WINNER of CRD is:

Crystal Blake aka Lukasmommy!!! yayyyyyyyyy!!!!

but WAIT, that's not ALL...there are also three runners up! Congrats to:

Shanah aka Shanah will receive a $100 gift card to the Shoppe
Sarah aka *Sarah* will receive a $75 gift card to the Shoppe
Mabel aka Mabel will receive a $50 gift card to the Shoppe

and there is MORE WINNERS....

During our Grand Opening we also had many challenges throughout the week. I have to give my team a HUGEEEE thank you on these. I had NOTHING to do with them unfortunately, lol. They came UP with them, hosted them and just kept them SOOO FUN! I HONESTLY wonder where they come up with all these FABULOUS ideas!! hehe!! We have gotten TONS of emails from all of you saying how inspired you were and how much FUN you had. SO YAYYYYY TEAM!!! TY, TY, TY!!! I told yall they were AWESOME didn't I!!

Thank you to all of you that played along. We did give little prizes out for the winners of each challenge but we also announced there would be a BIG WINNER! The OVERALL winner was chosen from many of you that participated in all 7 challenges we held. We were SOOO EXCITED to see that SO MANY of you did actually do all 7 too. The winner was chosen based on many things including creativity, how many CRD products were used and overall participation. They will ALSO receive 3 months of FREE stuff from ME!!! Sooooooo......ANOTHER Drumroll pleaseee.................Our GRAND PRIZE WINNER of CRD's Challenge Week is: Chey yayyyyyyy!!!

but WAIT, there is STILL MORE...We didn't say that there would be runners up, but hey you all KNOW me better than that. lol Let's give our 3 runners up something too! You all worked SO HARD!!! Congrats to:

ZaCola, TriciaDoll and JanaM. You will all receive a $25 gift card to the Shoppe as well! I would also like to reward ALL of our scrappers that participated in all 7 challenges so you will receive a $10 gift card to the Shoppe TOO! :) Then for EVERYONE that entered into any ANY challenge at all will receive a 25% off coupon to CRD as well.

SO YAYYYYY, LOTS and LOTS of winners and that is just EXCITING!!!! CONGRATS to you all! :)

We will be in contact with you soon :).

Thanks again to you ALL for making our Grand Opening the best EVER!!!! :)

Update-Winners of the Songbird Kit. I am still waiting to hear back from them on the gift cards, so I will send those out as soon as I do. Sorry! :(

I have been taking a little break this week actually. Well a break to get caught up, lol. How fun is that?? But, you know me, I will be back before you know it! Have a Happy Thursday, I get to go to the doctor now....FUN, FUN, FUN!!! NOTTT :(

SORRY!!! and a MUCH NEEDED UPDATE!!!

Hey I just wanted to pop in here to tell you I was SORRY!!! I feel like I ruined the Hide and Seek Challenge :(. I DO still want to do it though if yall want. What I will do is put ALL the clues here today. You will have until THIS Friday at midnight CST to post a link to your layout HERE in this thread. We will vote and announce the winners Monday, August 6th. How's that sound? Click on the picture above for a larger view.

Also, there are a few product updates. It looks like the Linens Collection is missing 2 papers. One brown and one purple. I have figured out which ones those are and uploaded them as a add on. Also, both of the stitch sets, Ziggity Mess Lines the latest and Ziggity Mess Circles that came out at the Grand Opening are missing the holes only files. I also have added an update for those. I am waiting to hear from Lauren (web master) to see how we can just put these updates on your accounts for those of you that purchased them. So hang tight and I will let you know when I hear from her!

Also, a HUGE CONGRATS to those 5 of you that won the Songbird Kit, wooohooo!!! I purchased the gift cards from Songbird and they are actually valid for any months kit. PLEASE post your email addy here if you are a winner and I will get these to you. If I don't have an email from you all soon, too bad you lose............HAHA, TOTALLY JOKING! I will find ya! Just don't want to if I don't have to, hehe! I have heard from a few of you and those will go out in just a minute if they haven't already.

And FINALLY, we have our BIG winners for the GRAND PRIZES at or Grand Opening!!! Unfortunately, you are gonna have to wait until tomorrow for this one, lol. Tomorrow is August the 1st which starts a Brand NEW month so PERFECT time to announce I think!!!

Today, I am catching up on emails. So if you have sent one, most likely you will have a response today :).

For those of you that have missed me blooging, haha, yea right, huh? lol I am spending this week getting ALLLLL caught up and ORGANIZED, lol. Sooooo....Next week I am hoping things can get back to normal and yall will have to dread hearing from me again.

Ohhhh...have yall seen the add on to the French Countryside Collaboration Kit??? Shabby Princess and I had SO MUCH FUN making that kit that we did an add on. French Countryside Font and Stitched Alphas. You can only get it in her shoppe right now. Yall this sucker is SOOOOO COOL!! She made this COMPLETELY CUSTOM doodley font that I just FELL IN LOVE with. You get the font file so that you can use on anything you want and you can EVEN use it commercially!! I stitched it up 3 times in brown, blue and red. Check it out here, the price is SERIOUSLY a steal on this one!! The Princess is also having a SALE right now, you MUST check out all the NEW stuff she just released....sooo AWESOME!!!

Okay peeps I will see you tomorrow for the big fat announcement of our Grand Prize winners!!! Don't have too much fun without me today, okay. :)

So GET THIS...

Well it's no secret that I sleep very little. So yesterday my body apparently needed it and I woke up at 1pm, lol. Didn't go to bed until 8am, but still 1pm...WOW! Well so GUESS what I wake up to? No electricity!!! My first thought was OMG did I not pay the bill, rofl. See I DO forget to do that sometimes. But NO, it was an accident on their part, WRONG HOUSE! HOW ridiculous is THAT!!! I was FURIOUS! Who wouldn't be when it is freaking 100 degrees here. Now, I am not so much a FREAK OUT reactor. For the most part I guess I just kinda go with the flow, well on SOME things, lol. The air finally came back on around 10pm. Soooo... let's just say after 9 hours of PURE HEAT, Bray and I were SOOO grumpy and truly exhausted!!! :( It never really got above 85 in the house but STILL when you are used to 75, it was HOT!! See we couldn't get out because Steve and I are sharing a vehicle right now. Remember he had that car accident a while back? He got a new car but it was being cleaned and having the windows tinted. Arrrgghhh!

I feel like I have just had the WORST luck lately, rofl. It really makes me wonder if it is not God speaking to me saying, you NEED a break (shrug). I'll tell you my creativity is off the charts, hehe. I must think of 10 new unique ideas everyday. I feel like I am PUMPED to do them, but then my mind just floats around. I feel like I just can NOT focus lately, I don't get it. But to be real HONEST, it is TOTALLY frustrating me! I really do actually have several things made. Some that have even been ready for WEEKS. Yet, they lack previews. It's like I really just have to be in the mood for those, kwim? I feel like my previews are my scrapping, which most of YOU know too...you just HAVE to be in the mood and right NOW, I just wanna create! lol I am feeling really BAD because we are doing the "Hide and Seek" Challenge and some of the clues are supposed to be in with the new products. So let me just say this... I know of a designer that is doing a release tomorrow, a pretty big one actually, heehee. I am somewhat in on that a weee-tiny bit which is really where all my time is going lately. So I tell you this BECAUSE what I think I will do (hopefully you aren't TOO upset) is also release my stuff on Friday! A few of the things will be the ones going in her shoppe also. I promise, it's gonna be AWESOME!!! This girl is working her little tushie off!!! So I will go ahead and post some clues here to catch us up, because we will STILL continue our challenge of course! Then on Friday there will be additional clues in all of my new products in the shoppe also. So EXTRA clues, How's THAT??

Wildflowers!!! Lots of Hide and Seek Clues!

Well I managed to get something new in the Shoppe FINALLY, lol. Wildflowers...YAY!! I am loving these just cause they are different, kwim. Right now I need SLEEP, lol. I will most likely have other things in before tomorrow.

Hide and Seek, are you playing??? It's gonna be fun! Clue 1 was in the newsletter, Clue 2 was in the "Kind Words" freebie, clue 3 will be posted HERE for yesterday, clue 4 will be posted HERE for today, clue 5 should have been in the "Wildflowers Stamps" freebie but I will post here as well just in case and clue 6 is in this new product, "Wildflowers". You can grab it here. :) Have a great day!

ANOTHER Fun Freebie!

Okay, more messes, lol. Please don't hold it against me, lol. Here I was TRYING to be all efficient and send my customers a little gift with their newsletter but noooooooo, rofl! SO, Lauren DID do an edit on the post below, you can now go and grab my little surprise, "Kind Words for Kind People" in the News section of the site.

Okay, I made you something else too :) Digital Stamps!!! Why two freebies in one day, just cause, I love ya and I like making you things, REALLY! Plus yall are WAYYY TO DARN GOOD TO ME! So grab Wildflower Stamps here!

I DO have a new release or two that WILL be up in the Shoppe in a few hours as well. :)

Sorry for all the CRAZYNESS!! I will be having a little or BIG, lol surprise for you on Thursday AND TONS of good NEWS to share. :) In the meantime, go check out Disc Talk Radio. It's FREE, CRD is Spotlighted, you can get a large kit from NANCIE at SA for $3 (crazy) and it's a BLAST to listen too!!

Have a FAB day!!!

Well CRUD!

Okay, I am sorry to see lots of you haven't gotten the newsletter. I do know that tons have also so I'm CLUELESS. I need to wait and ask Lauren (web lady) when she comes on. But I am going to have to guess the following....email incorrect on your account and/or your email provider is not accepting it for some reason or another. If you want to leave your email addy, we can manually send these out at some point today/tonight. When Lauren comes on, I will ask about a newsletter sign up for the blog if at all possible.

EDIT: A copy of the newsletter has been put up on the CRD News page and includes a link to the freebie for all those that didn't receive it in their inbox. We'll be moving to a better newsletter system very soon so hopefully won't have these troubles next time! Thanks for understanding! :)

Newsletter is out!

Hi guys, the newsletter HAS been sent out! If you were signed up, you SHOULD have it. Be sure to check ALL folders (spam, junk mail, etc.) if you don't see it. If you have not signed up and would like to, please go to the Shoppe. When you create a new account, it will ask you at the end if you would like to sign up for the newsletter.



There WILL be a new product and a blog surprise for you later today!



See you lator gators! :)

We are ON for TOMORROW! :)

Hey guys, I just wanted to pop in to say we are on for tomorrow! :) My out of town family just left so I'm gonna get to work, hehe! Soooo... look out for some fun new stuff TOMORROW! A longer post then!!! :)

Have a FABULOUS Monday.....or TRY anyways, lol!

Hi Everyone

This is Mish, Christina's Creative Team Captain.

I'm just popping in to let you all know Christina had some bad news about a family member today and is *very* upset right now. Thankfully it's nothing tragic, but it has still greatly distressed and upset her.

We were planning on having the newsletter & all out today, but I'm not sure where things stand with that right now, so I think it's going to have to wait a couple of days until she is able to finish it. We're so sorry for the delay, but we hope you can understand!

We will be aiming to have it done for Monday, but if that needs to change, I'll come back to let you know.

if anyone can spare a thought or a prayer for Christina and her family right now, I'm sure it would be appreciated.

Thanks for your support everyone, it really means a lot to Christina!

Mish

I'm BAAAACK...

I'm Back and feeling SOOOO.... much better!!! YAYY! I think I was just BEAT I guess! What I do is sleep like 10 hours in a week and I seriously feel TOTALLY fine. I think the adrenaline is just pumping and I'm ALL good!!! BUT, after two weeks of doing it, my body just GIVES I guess. lol...DARN thing!!! It's like my husband will try to wake me up, he says 10 times and I hear NOTHING...that's scary. I guess my body NEEDS sleep every once in a while. So I was getting all these restless feelings and I'm thinking it was me trying to fight it. I don't know, but I'm all good now! hehe.

I DO feel like a total loser though. We were supposed to me doing some new product releases and things on Monday for this week. Well here is what we will do...That will all start tomorrow. You will be getting a newsletter (with a little surprise from me, hehe) that will tell you all about it. We are going to announce the Songbird Kit winners (FINALLY), last weeks challenge winners and the fun challenge for this next 7 days :). So be on the lookout for that.

Okay so about my son...OMG are almost 3 year olds SOOOO FUN or WHAT??? lol. I have always enjoyed my son obviously but these days are just a hoot!!! It's like they form SUCH a personality at this age I guess and he just keeps us rollin. rofl! He also wants to be Mr. Independent though too. I'll fix him a bowl of cereal and he IS RE-FIXING it REGARDLESS. Hey, that is PERFECTLY FINE with me, lol. WHATEVER, I tell him, lol. BUT, not only is he funny, independent, ADORABLE and SO very entertaining, he is a PERSISTENT little butt too. hehe. We have lots of play time but when I go to sit down to work, hecccckk NO. I bet he interrupts me EVERY 2 minutes to get up and do SOMETHING. And it's like I feel BAD if I don't you know? Like guilty for working or something. But I am SO NOT RICH. I HAVE to work and pay the bills just like everyone else, lol. I feel like the LUCKIEST person that I get to do that here WITH HIM and that I LOVEEEE what I do, yall KNOW that, haha. BUT it MUST get done too. So I don't know, it's BEATING me up lately, lol. Not that I'm overwhelmed, I just feel BEAT!!! lol He is only one child too, I SERIOUSLY can not IMAGINE you all that have more. They are CRAAAZY FUN but LOTS of WORK. rofl! I wouldn't trade it for anything though. :)

Do yall realize, you have not really seen pictures?? OMG, I'm crazzy, hehe. I will try to get some up this week so I can you my adorable boys! :)

Oh and hey, you see we are in the spotlight?? How COOL is that. Listen HERE! I can not TELL you how AWESOME that place is, I LOVE IT!!! Not because they are spotlighting us either, lol. I have been a huge fan ever since they first started and I wasn't even a designer, lol. I was even paying for their service and HAPPY to do it. Now it's FREE! You can also get a huge kit from there for like $3 from the FABULOUS Nancie Rowe Janitz at Scrap Artist! You can just really learn so much by listening to their shows I THINK. And get to REALLY know other people including designers. That was my favorite :), You should check it out!

Not feeling so great :(.

Sorry yall. I just feel really funky today. I'll be back tomorrow to post. I just realized I forgot to do the Songbird RAK's to, so I will do those tomorrow also. Sorry guys :(.

Ohhhh DUHHH....I forgot....the DRAMA!

I have been SO darn tired lately. I was just here reading my comments because I KNEW it would make me happy, and they DID!! MWAH!! But then I realized I forgot the most IMPORTANT thing I wanted to say in my earlier post...

I have ONE thing and ONE thing ONLY to say about the drama that is going on at DST about me!

Team, Customers, Fans, Friends, THANK YOU! Thank you so soooo VERY MUCH!!! You guys are LOYAL man, I mean LOYAL! 100% of ANY Drama that arose about me, MY TEAM and the the new Shoppe was QUICKLY stopped by SOOOO many of you! SHOCK, I was TRULY SHOCKEDDD! Not that I didn't have faith in you but for you all to REALLY go out of your way to come to my defense BLOWS me AWAY! Thank you, thank you all SOOO VERY MUCH!

I am off to make something for you now :)!

Songbirds July Kit!

btw, have yall seen Songbirds FABULOUS July Kit? This months kit, EUPHORI is a collaboration with Gina Miller! It is SO COLORFUL, I just LOVE it! Remember these gals do this for charity only so if you can support them in ANY way, MANY people will REAP the rewards!

I myself would like to RAK, 3 people this kit. If you are interested, post here and I will randomly draw names this Saturday!

You can grab the kit here!

They also have a blinkie you can sport, which will support them TOO!!!

Okee dokee, where do I start???

ROFL!!! How about with the GOOD stuff, lol.

WOW, WOW, WOW, what a FABULOUS response you guys. I NEVER, EVER in a million years could have EXPECTED all the traffic the new Shoppe is getting. To be really HONEST with you I was actually REALLY disappointed with myself because there were SOOOOOOOO.... MANY other things I wanted to make and just could NOT get around to it. But overall I think it's going more than well and I thank you from the BOTTOM of my heart!!! All I can really think of right now is what I want to make you, to thank you!!! lol

Okay so there are MANY things I want to cover and I am going to REALLY do my best and try to be brief, lol. ONLYYY because I can chat ALL day and like I said I REALLY wanna make you something after I check all my emails, lol. PLUS, I REALLY don't think you have a bunch of time to listen to me ramble, haha!!!

Bloging--OMG, so WHAT is my problem? lol. I tell you yall I have worked AROUND the clock for WEEKS just trying to catch up on emails ad prepare for this. I have had EVERY good intention of coming over here since Monday to keep you updated but I will be COMPLETELY honest, I am BEATTT. It FINALLY caught up with me, no sleeping that is, and I am just BEAT! I really have not had the energy nor the time to do it. We posted on the sites home page and my team is doing their best to take care of any and all issues for me at DST while I handle the CS. So I SINCERELY apologize and can not WAIT until things are back to normal! :)

New stuff--So are you happy?? Do you like the new stuff?? Can you believe the the UBBERR TALENTED gal I collabed with??? What a DREAMMM, huh? I think I peed myself when she agreed, bwhaaaa!!! I told her that too. That princess, I SERIOUSLY CAN NOT EXPRESS to you (I know you know this, lol) how sweet she is. I know she probably has a GAZILLION offers to collab weekly and I feel SOO honored, TRULY LUCKYY!! So French Countryside, isn't that like THE PERFECT name for it, hahaha. She came up with it after it was all finished and to me it just brought it all together in two words. We had a BLAST creating this even though she was REALLY on vacation and I dealing with the preparation for the Grand Opening, lol. It was just sooo coool to see our different takes on things. I know most of you were probably COMPLETELY SHOCKED just because our styles are slightly different.

But when I think of a collab, I like a challenge. I like too have two opposites come together to make one, kwim? However as I was creating I was getting scared that I was gonna scare off her customers. Just thinking...ohh no this is SOO NOT going to go together and then WOW...it meshed SOOO perfectly!!! This thing is HUGE, I have to say it IS a must have... I think all but 3-4 papers are solids (well with only a slight design such as polkas, grids, ornamental, etc.) and are all the PERFECT go to versatile papers!!! It is just TRULY YUMMY!!! There IS so much in there that I am wanting to put together a little slide type thingy so you can all see what's in it up close. Anyone know anything cool? Anyhow this HUGE almost 500mb kit with NINE (9) downloads is only a little over $6 on sale right now. You MUST grab it Who knows if she will ever collab with me again, ROFL!!! :) , heehee!!!Oh and WHO doesn't know the Shabby Princess right?? But here is link to her Shoppe http://www.theshabbyshoppe.com/. She TRULY has the MOST UNIQUE, AMAZING and SUPER HIGH Quality designs in her shoppe for you to check out. I would have to say personally that her customer service is her TRULY EXCEPTIONAL quality too. She guards her customers like a CHAMP and spends BOO COOS of money just to give away FREE kits at her other site http://www.shabbyprincess.com/, and I have learned she doesn't sleep either, hahaha...see I'm not the only one!!! lol

Issues--HOLY MOLY are there ever issues, ROFL!!! First of all let me say this... a large part of my CT, Lauren Barden (web MASTER) and I are working AROUND the clock taking care of everything we can. However, server issues that are controlled by the people who OWN the server can not be fixed by us especially when the problem is the sheer volume of traffic! Let me explain...

Originally, I had NO IDEA what to expect. First of all I was just opening so I wasn't sure about how much traffic to expect. On top of this the Princess was not going to put the collab in her Shoppe unless I wanted her to. She thought it would be nice for all of the traffic to come to my site. See did I NOT tell you, she is TRULY AMAZING!!! Well I gladly accepted hung up the phone with her and it hit me...HOLLLLYYY MOLLYY, lol. This chick runs on FOUR DEDICATED servers!!! Sooo.. needless to say, I got to work and spent LOADS of money preparing for the largest group possible. I KNEWW I was OVER EXPECTING but best to be safe right! Well come Monday we had server crashing and had to move and re-upload files and all sorts. Tuesday we opened and things went NUTSO. Shabby Princess and I re-discussed our plan and decided it would be best if she did NOT send out an announcement quite yet. There were already SOOOO MANY orders coming through that even the dedicated servers I purchased were not able to handle it.

Hundreds of orders were placed in just the first 2hrs of the store opening.... that is INSANELY HUGE. I am not sure how many stores run on dedicated servers but I can tell you that I was on a shared server which is typical, yet sharing space with 400 other companies. On a dedicated server it is all you. So what I am trying to say I guess is we have done EVERYTHING humanly possible to handle this. It is NOW OUT OF OUR CONTROL!!! The problems are completely because of the volume of traffic and unfortunately the issue can not be fixed.

MOST large stores that have a grand opening or sale of this magnitude, have these SAME problems and I think a lot of people are forgetting that fact. Lauren Barden kept telling me it's gonna go down REGARDLESS, it ALWAYS does. I did NOT want to hear it, I just ventured off and bought all kinds of extra space to help. She installed it, no questions asked, lol, know you know why I LOVE HER so much, lol!!! Yet, here we are, site down every now and then regardless.

Like I explained before, SP and I made a business decision to hold off on her announcement. We did this to PROTECT both of of customers and to have the LEAST amount of problems as possible. So this traffic is merely my FABBBBBBULOUS fans, you all that are coming to grab my stuffs :). And YESSS, I WUV, WUV, WUVVV you for it!!

I am SO SORRY it took me so long to post. My team and I have been working FURIOUSLY trying to get through these emails and PM's to try to assist you in the quickest way possible. However, the list just wasn't getting any smaller so I am hoping this will help. I DO WANT you to know that this is NOT, NOT, my normal way of doing things. Things are just MUCH larger than I EVER anticipated. PLEASE don't let this keep you away in the future!!! Thank you all again! Your support is OVERWHELMINGLY AMAZING and I appreciate is more than you know!!!

Q & A from my Team Captain, Mish:

I sent an email but haven't received a response.

CR has more emails than she can handle. We are helping her as much as we can. If you have a question and/or need something quickly then most likely we can help you before she can. I have typed up these common questions and answers hoping this can help alleviate some of the emails also. If after reading this you still have questions, please email christinareneedesigns@yahoo.com and we will try to respond as quickly as possible.

I can't get into the shop, WHY?

If there are still people who can not see the store at all, it is your OWN ISP that is the issue. We do not handle people’s personal Internet accounts. Therefore we can not intervene with people’s ISP’s. If you can not see the store at all, please contact your ISP and discuss the issue with them. They will be the only ones who can help you with that.

My download links are not showing up in my account, where are they?

The reason they are not showing up is due to traffic to the site. The overload of traffic that is interfering with your home PC & preventing it from connecting right away to the server to grab those links. It seems as if EVERYONE IS getting their links just NOT right away. So if they are not there or some are and some aren't, they will most likely appear soon.

Why are my files that I downloaded are corrupted?

The files themselves are not corrupt, the issue again is due to the overload of traffic that is interfering with your home PC & preventing it from connecting properly with the server while downloading. The traffic overload is slowing download times so much that the server is unable to connect properly to every single computer quick enough. Until traffic slow down at the store, this is out of our hands. We can not slow the amount of traffic in the store ourselves.

Why is is taking SO LONG to download my goodies?

The high volume of traffic is also effecting to download speeds. If you have X amount of bandwidth, then you can handle X amount of downloads at a decent speed. We have purchased an INSANE amount of bandwidth possible. But when the amount of traffic is exceeding 23,000 hits a day, it exceeds the bandwidth available, causing some people to be unable to see the store and others to be able to access, but very, very slowly.

My downloads have expired, what can I do?

If we have to reset download links for every single order we will! But it WILL TAKE TIME TO DO SO. Please keep in mind. Hundreds of orders in 2hrs… times that by a couple of days and we have A LOT OF ORDERS. We will deal with things as swiftly as we can, but please bear in mind this will most likely take a few days. Please email us at christinareneedesigns@yahoo.com an we will do our best to reset them ASAP!!!

Communication

We apologize for the delay in sending out an actual newsletter update, but the CT girls have been constantly at DST filling people in, explaining circumstances, answering questions, responding to PM's, etc etc etc. I realize many of you would have preferred more personal contact with Christina Renee herself like she usually does, but if she wasn't doing the stuff she is doing & was responding to people personally instead, there would be complaints because she wouldn't be doing the other things she is.

For some people, I doubt there is anything we can say because there are a few who don't want to accept that the problem is the NUMBER OF CUSTOMERS nothing else. To those of you who have been so wonderfully patient, THANK YOU. Thank you for your support, your patience and most of all your understanding.

Thank you for your support of Christina Renee Designs, you are all AWESOME!

Mish – Creative Team Captain

So your probably wonder what I'm gonna do about this, right? lol. Well first of all, I am going to be extending the sale at the Shoppe through next week, so through July 22nd. I did not realize certain peoples ISP did not update daily and even thought this is not my problem, I AM going to take care of you!!! I can NOT PROMISE that the French Countryside Collab will still be on sale though, so snatch it up THIS WEEK!!! We also had mentioned an exclusive freebie and a product of the day going in the Shoppe. All of these things will happen next week instead. I don't want to ADD to the traffic until most of you can get the things that you have purchased already. We will also be extending the deadlines of the challenges being held at DST, www.digishoptalk.com. More information can be found there in either the designer announcements forum or the Insirational Scrapping Ideas Forum. I will say this AGAIN, I have the BEST team EVER and THEY are the ones doing these challenges. There is NO way, I could right now. So you can thank THEM for that one! I left it completely up to them! :)

That is all for now yall! I reallly, REALLLY DO hope you understand WHYY we are having these issues and I MOREEE SO hope your realize that is is NOT normal for it to happen. Sure we may end up having to expand more in the VERY near future and are prepared to do so. But anything else we could have done at this point would have ONLY caused even MORE problems!!!

HUGE HUGS! Thank you for your support! :)

Wanna have some fun???

CHECK OUT MY NEW CREATIVE TEAM!!!!! Yahooooooooooooooo!!! This has GOT to be the BEST TEAM EVER, I swear!!! We all say that don't we, hehe. But I promise!!! These gals not only scrap some of THE best layouts I have ever seen but they take care of me too :) Yall KNOW I need that, lol!!! If you get a few minutes you REALLY should go check out their latest work....AWESOME, AWESOME, AWESOME stuff!!! Check them out HERE!!! I am SOOO VERY lucky to have each and every one of them! Than you girls!!!!

So Happy Monday!!! Sorry for the late post. But the team and I have been putting something fun together for ya. As you know the BIG Grand Opening of the store is coming July 9th. Well I ALREADY feel like I have the BEST Creative Team EVER to help me with this. We are SOOO... EXCITED and have SOOOOO... many fun things planned for you that week. We can hardly wait! But I also need to get back to what I do best, lol, DESIGNING...okay, well maybe what I LIKE to do the best, hehe. So we NEED more help! The team is already pretty large but we also have LARGE plans too, lol. So to make this month even more fun we thought we would bring on 3 more SERIOUS SCRAPPERS through the month of July. I say SERIOUS, because there are more requirements than normal only because there will be lots to scrap with. So please ONLY apply if you can commit to a MINIMUM of 5 layouts between now and July 9th. Pretty steep huh? I know, and to be real honest that's MINIMUM. So really I prefer more if you can commit to more WONDERFUL!!! If you are interested, read the CRD CT Challenge above and get scrappin! :) We are SO EXCITED, his will be FUN!!!

Grab your FREE Supplies HERE!

Also, guess what??? Our SECRET, Brand New designer that I am collabing with for the Grand Opening has something for you! A freebie! Yall are going to LOVE these! FRENCH KNOTS...wooohooo...how cool it that? She made you 2 stars in french knots. One Black and White and one Rainbow. That's not it, she also threw in the coolest little ledger paper frame. One thing I think you will notice immediately is this gal's designs are GREAT quality because she seems to be SUPER anal about her designs, lol. That's a GOOD thing though! :) But here is something else, her shadows are FABULOUS too! So with all of her elements you will get a with and without shadow version of each.

Since we wanted to keep her a secret until the BIG DAY, I offered to upload her freebie for you here. LUCKY us huh? lol. This is her FIRST EVER and I KNOW she is DYING To know what you think, so PLEASE do BRING IT (in other words, leave her a comment, ROFL!) PRETTY PLEASE!

Grab the Sampler Freebie HERE!

Thank you BUNCHES!! Feel free to get the challenge goodies and just play if you want. Have a good day! :)