You Know You're In Salt Lake When...

YOU TOTALLY HAVE THE NEW CATALOG!! And it came in this SUPER SASSY BAG!!!

At the end of this post there's going to be a MAJOR catalog spoiler, so don't look if you don't want to see it!!

I'll give you a few minutes to look away or give in to curiousity!! In the meantime, you know you're in Salt Lake when..

Pierre, your Hotel Monaco Goldfish, is happily zipping around his bowl when you get back from a long day..

You grab bright orange flags to walk across the street with.. (Yvonne, Chriss - remember?)

Your dogs are doing some serious barking after tromping through the endless convention center buying the GDP of Brazil's worth of goodies at Memento Mall (Kristina Werner was my cashier!!)

See - I have a problem with closed toed shoes. I hate em. So I'm usually wearing fun Franco Sartos, where my toes can wiggle freely in the hot dry mountain air.

But sometimes this hurts. Today was one of those days. I had to switch to tennies after lunch.

Speaking of lunch, did I mention the sushi? See pics at the end. I went back for lunch.

Anyway, I shopped my butt off at Memento Mall, getting the adorable tote bag, the SERIOUSLY adorable key thingies that you hang on the edge of your purse so you never lose your keys, A TERRIBLY ADORABLE sweater that I'm sure I'll need in the Convention Center, a cute Kiwi Kiss shirt, and THE MAG PLATE FOR THE GOD BLESS AMERICA LIMITED EDITION 9/11 STAMP THEY CAME OUT WITH!! CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT WAS ONE OF THE ONES THEY WERE SELLING??? I got a few more as well, but I'm keeping them a secret because I have a secret plan for a cute project with them.

See - check out these astonishingly cute but impractical shoes!!

Oh PS - my new Calvin stretch jeans were great the first time I wore them, but I gotta tell you they STRETCH a litte too much. They were totally baggy today!! What the heck? The whole point is that they look like they're tight, but they're not. Hmph.

Okay, so you also know you're in Salt Lake when you tour the Corporate Office and the lady on page 88 of the new catalog is one of your tour guides!! Her name is Yuri and she's very sweet! She signed page 88 for me.

Look at this gorgeous building and shipping center!! And take note of how many orders and line items they are shipping these days - WOW.

Wow, Impressive place eh? they have an "Think Room" with Foosball, Ice Hockey, ping pong table, framed Dr. Seuss Quotes, bean bags, and YEAH, stamps - where I guess employees go to brainstorm. WHY DON'T I WORK FOR STAMPIN' UP!! And everywhere we went, employees told us how much they appreciated us and that everything they do they do for us. Such genuinely sweet people here.

Demonstrator Support was hard at work, and there are gorgeous cards and gifts all over everyone's desks.

Back at the ranch, standing in line for Memento Mall was fun, despite anything else you may have heard!!!

There's a beautiful piece of art hung above the grand ballroom. There was a sweet lady named Monique, who was in the earthquake yesterday, who gave me two cards even though I didn't have any swaps, and also some gum called Five, which is my new favorite gum. There's a pic of us together somewhere in this post. Then of course, I saw S-Monk! How nice of him to come in person!! There were a few ladies who were determined not to waste any time and plopped down in line to work on swaps. It was just a sea of stamping humanity in there. A lady had this great 6x6 book with a BILLION ideas for things to make with punches. I only got this one picture in before the doors open and we ran in like bulls in Pamplona. Look at that Hello Kitty Card!! SOO cute!!

Okay so here comes the spoiler alert!!

We got three of the most amazing stamp sets!! I think this is the first time that I would have bought all three of the sets they gave us - I'm so excited.

First, the gorgeous silhouette set - that has a large Black Eyed Susan and some beautiful tall grass. Ohh - I love it.

The silhouette sets in the new catalog are AMAZING!!!! You are going to love them.

And the botanical kind of arty sets are heart stoppers!

There's a sock monkey accessory set that has BUNNY EARS and and ice cream cone among other things.

The DSP is to DIE for, including one with the bird from Always, Pacific Point BLUE in the Prints series and the BEST Halloween paper!!! Marita - check out my pic of the landscape set - beautiful!

A vintage set with a fan and a grater that I LOVE!! Five new punches - a square scallop, large circle and oval, the curly label punch and the scallop.. OMG LOOK AT THE BRADS!!! And FINALLY - a MARTINI!!

And there's VANILLA hodgepodge - it looks like stamped painted tin - gorgeous!!

And there's more, but I gotta go find Jenn!! Enjoy the eye candy!

Hey did I mention the sushi? Check out the cool chalk art for the menu board and my beautiful glass noodle salad. Mmm.

Oh yeah - did I mention my waiter looked JUST LIKE RUSSELL CROWE?? I almost fell out of my chair. He says people tell him that all the time. Wow.