I want to be a Kiwi Lane Designer!!

Hi, my name is Stephanie and I am obsessed with scrapbooking. (As in I might need a support group or a patch)  It’s my creative outlet, my “happy place”, my challenge,  my “me” time, my credit card usage, my sanity, my passion, my hobby,  my “thing”. It calms me down and excites me at the same time. I made some amazing friendships over the use of paper and cutters. It’s my own personal way to take a moment, slow down and reflect and appreciate all that I have in the middle of my crazy and busy day-to-day stay-at-home-with-two-young-kids life. It’s my therapy.  I love it.

I was introduced to Kiwi Lane and their framing process at the Mega Meet in Novi in May of 2012. I was drawn to the beautiful pages hanging on the walls of their booth. It was so simple, yet the examples had such an incredible impact on me. The fact that I could use what I already had was a HUGE plus- I already owned a million stickers that never get used and I have a serious issue with buying paper (I think I have a larger paper stash than most of the local scrapbook stores combined--like I said, I need a patch!!).

Besides the ease of using and creating with the templates, my favorite part of the Kiwi lane company is the DT Doodles sketch/challenge.  The ideas are amazing! My biggest challenge in scrapbooking is creating pages using (most of) my huge stack of pictures.  Most magazines and blogs show sketches using 1 or 2 pictures—I already have a million pictures/ pages to complete and only using one 2x2” picture on a 12x12” page is not an option for me :) I am so thankful Kiwi Designers are like me in the fact they want to actually scrapbook the photos they took- whatta concept ;)!!! I have submitted a handful of layouts to the DT challenges over the past 8+ months and I even won a challenge in February!  For the weeks I am not able to participate in the challenge, I print the design sketches and keep them in an ideas binder for future reference.  They are my “go-to” guide since I am trying soooo hard to catch up on my scrapbooking.

I currently own the original, big shot, and sizzlit sizzix cutting machines, a cricut expression, and a wishblade cutter... yet, I find myself using my kiwi lane templates and a trusty pair of scissors on most of my pages!  Lately, I have been scrapping outside my home, so bringing huge and heavy machines, cartridges, laptops, etc are just not practical. Between my DT doodles sketch printouts, my ring of templates, and my finished pages... I always end up with a couple of ladies asking where they can get ‘that stuff’.  At the last crop I went to, we were half-joking about getting Kiwi lane business cards to hand out so I didn’t have to write down the web site as often ;)!

I would LOVE to be a Kiwi Designer and I feel I would be an asset to the Kiwi Lane design team for two main reasons: I believe in the product and I love the process.  My scrapbooks have improved drastically in the past year, with much thanks going to Kiwi Lane and the designers behind it. I want to be able to inspire others the way the past design teams have inspired and challenged me. I see the Kiwi Lane templates as my Little Black Dress of scrapbooking—I can quickly ‘dress’ a layout up or down by just changing some paper patterns/ colors and switching out a template or two. I love love love that I do not have to buy super expensive stickers and embellishments (or spend HOURS trying to making something similar b/c I do not have the unlimited scrapbook budget!) to make a layout look great. I want to be a part of a team to help encourage others to keep scrapping, even if they are on a budget or have limited scrapping time (isn’t that everyone?).  I want others to know and be confident that it can be done- and I want to show them examples of how to do it.

I consider myself a ‘seasoned’ scrapbooker- I will never see myself as an ‘expert’ because I want to keep growing and learn new things; however, I feel I am at a level that I learn more by teaching and guiding others. I love the challenge of seeing ideas from various layouts, sketches, and other designers and then adding my own personal spin to create a new idea (I think I am physically unable to follow a sketch or page kit layout- I always tweak something- must be the Engineer in me!). I want to keep growing in my craft, and I want to help others grow as well.

 I love Kiwi Lane and I would be honored to be called a Kiwi Designer... but it doesn’t matter if I become an “official” designer or not, I already consider myself to be a huge Kiwi Fan and a Kiwi Girl ;)

Thank you so much for the opportunity to apply for a designer position. Happy Scrapping!

-Stephanie

http://kiwilane.com/2013/07/want-to-be-a-kiwi-girl-or-guy-open-design-team-call-begins-today/

A sample of my recent scrapbook pages:

“Holy Cross Preschool”
my favorite part- I had so many pictures that I “had” to use, I created pockets and put the extra pictures in there.
Templates Used- Happy Trails#1, Aspen Court #3, Paisley Place #3, Brackets #3, Tiny Tags #5, #6, #7

Title and paper clip design from www.misskatecuttables.com

“Apple Picking”

My favorite part- the large tree made from many small inked die cut “clouds”; the use of the contrasting red apple in the circle mats throughout all the pages.

No Kiwi templates were used

“Cutting down the Christmas Tree”
my favorite part- I had the tree die cuts in my stash for a loooong time and was finally able to use them- great contrast against the ripped vellum “snow”

Templates used- Happy trails #1, various Paisley Place and Happy trails templates on the vellum “snow”

“Music to my Ears”
my favorite part- I was able to fit all my pictures onto a one page spread while using up lots of old “mis-matched” scraps!
Templates used- Brackets #1, #3, Happy trails #3, Tint tags #1, #6

Title design from www.misskatecuttables.com, music notes are Cricut

“Pizza Party”
my favorite part- I love how the kiwi templates emphases the great semi-eclectic color theme

Templates used: Paisley Place #1, #3, Tiny Tags #1

Title and banner design from www.misskatecuttables.com