Henson Robinson Zoo and a Free Vintage Santa Image

Hi Everyone

Are you ready for Christmas? I'm not! I really envy the individuals who are so organized that by this time they have all their presents purchased, wrapped and under the tree. Maybe one of these years I'll be that person. lol Probably only in my dreams, but that's ok, I'm still going to hope that one of these days I'll reach that lofty goal. lol

A couple of weeks ago, I received an email from our local zoo - The Henson Robinson Zoo. They were getting ready to put on their yearly fund raiser that they call Holiday Lights. They decorate the zoo with Christmas lights and scenes and hold special after dark hours.  Anyway, they wanted to know if I would like to provide some  PeggyLovesVintage items for the gift shop and help with the fund raiser. I felt pretty honored that they would even ask me to participate and I was more than happy to try and help the zoo out, so of course I said yes.

I've never displayed my items in an actual store setting, so I had a ton of things that I had to do to get ready for it. So after about 2 weeks of work, my display was ready. So what do think?

I printed off lots of the collage sheets, created some cards and made lots and lots of hang tags.  I pondered for a while on how to document what was on the individual CD's and finally settled on creating individual inserts that would contain a description and a few sample images. And of course, things like price tags and package covers had to be made for the physical store setting. It was quite the challenge but I'm pretty happy with the outcome. Now, I'm just hoping that my items sell so that I can say that I helped the zoo.

Here's a couple of the cards that I created for the zoo. I had planned on using the older post card style images for my Christmas cards and had made a couple of test cards. I really liked the way they turned out, so I decided I would make some up for the zoo. The three images are from Christmas Volume 13. You can find more information about this volume by clicking here. I kept them pretty simple, using just black and white card stock and Stickles to give a sparkle to the snow.



Please forgive me, but now I'm stepping up on my soapbox. A couple of posts back, I mentioned that a scrapbook paper supplier was using my images, without my permission, in their Dear Santa line. At that time I didn't share the company's name because I was hoping that they would be a stand up company and would stop using them. I contacted the company via email on October 14, 2012 and, when I didn't hear anything, again on October 24, 2012. Both times I explained my concerns and requested that they stop reselling my images. On October 15-16, 2012, Designs by Reminisce LLC removed the Santa sheet from the Dear Santa line on the web site but left the Snowman sheet as well as all the other items connected to the product line.

Well, the company, turned my email over to their attorney, Mr. Willey,  who sent me a letter dated October 29, 2012 telling me that they weren't using my images, that I had no claim to the images,  that they had been purchased in a legal manner and to stop contacting them. Here's the summary quote from his letter.

"Please cease your communication with my client on this issue unless and until you are able to prove: 1) my client used your images, and 2)  you actually have rights to copyright."

On Novemeber 6, 2012, I sent Mr. Willey a response letter. I told him that Designs by Reminisce LLC owned by a Mr.Matt Gibson was indeed using my images for the Dear Santa line. I provided him with Mr. Matt Gibson's ebay user id, with the date that he purchased both my Santa CD and Snowman CD, with the PayPal transaction id with which Mr. Gibson paid for the CD's, and with the mailing address where the CD's were shipped. I also provided him with information on when the CD's were originally published and offered for sale,  per current copyright laws, at publication, copyright protection is automatically applied to an item.  This information was sent via register mail, so I know Mr. Willey recieved the letter on November 8, 2012. As of today, December 12, 2012, Mr. Willey has not responded nor have I heard from Mr. Gibson.,

Therefore, I feel compelled to tell my story to all of my blog friends. I have heard, although I have not been able to verify it, that Designs by Reminisce LLC may already be involved in a copyright infringement case with another individual. This information came from two different stores in totally different states. So I'm assuming that there is some credence to the information. Have you heard anything about this?  Whether it is true or not, I cannot say, but it definitely makes me wonder about all the other items that the company produces.

I know that I will never purchase anything from Designs by Reminisce LLC either in-store or on-line at http://www.designsbyreminisce.com . How about you?


Ok, I'm stepping off my soapbox now. I have an awesome image to share with you this week. I love this Santa in his Model T. Make sure you click on him before you save it.

Have a great week, plumb full of smiles and successful Christmas shopping!

Peggy

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Merry Christmas and a Free Vintage Christmas Image

Well here we are, Christmas is almost upon us. Are you ready? I'm sure a lot of you are saying YUP! Plus a lot are owning up to having the presents all wrapped and either under the tree or ready to be put there. I hate you! lol

By now, you can probably guess that I'm not ready. Today is going to be one very busy day, I still have some key people that I need to shop for and boy do I hate having to fight the masses. But the ole chin is up, the shoulder pads are on and I'm ready to head off for my adventure. Pray for me.... lol

Have a very Merry Christmas and for those that need a last minute card.... here's a sweet cut out that I used to create my cards for the grandkids. I only used two dimensions because I was mailing them. But with the extra Santa, you could add a third dimension and bring him out even more. I used red and green card stock and just nestled Santa in front of the fireplace. I was in such a rush to get them mailed that I forgot to take a picture of it... figures right... lol Other than the fussy cutting which took about 10 minutes the card went together very quickly and I loved the end result. So here you go.... a quick last minute card that I'm sure will delight the receiver. Make sure you click on the image before you save it.




Important! This image will only be available for a short time, so do your save right now. Oh, it's set up to print on an 8.5 x 11 sheet of card stock.

I hope you have a very Merry Christmas with oodles of love and family and the best food around!

Have a very Merry Christmas!

Peggy

New Cut Outs Announcement and Free Vintage Santa Image

Hi Everyone,
I can't believe it's been so long since I've posted. I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and that you're at least on the way to Christmas. Do you have your tree up yet? We don't, that's an activity that we like to complete on Thanksgiving weekend, but all of our decorations are at our house so they have to be picked up and brought out to DMIL's. That's happening now, so maybe tomorrow we'll be able to complete the tree.

It's been so busy around here the last couple of weeks and I have tons to tell and share. Last weekend, we decided we would try and take care of some of the leaves around here. And you know kids and leaves, well, I just can't resist sharing my Where's Kaiden photo. lol



The Internet connection at our house has been totally unstable for a month or so. Then we found out they were upgrading all the equipment and that new modems had to be installed in order to be compatible. No wonder, I had a devil of a time keeping the ftp and web server up. LOL.... So anyway, since we're at DMIL's it didn't really make any sense to keep the connection up at home. So instead, I got busy and did my research and wound up putting both of them up on the net. It costs me a little bit to rent the disk space and pay for the hosting, but honestly, it's not as much as a broadband internet connection and they have the worry of keeping the hardware up and running. I think that's well worth the few bucks a month that they're charging me. A Christmas present to myself... lol So the web site is totally updated and available to the world. YAHOO!

It's been a busy crafting week. Jordan and I made stars from paper rolls last weekend. We had a great time and really enjoyed spending the quality time together. She is my little crafting buddy and I think she enjoys the time as much as grammy does. lol I was really bummed to find out the batteries were dead in my camera so I don't have any pictures to share, but she was totally into it and as serious as could be while she was working on her stars. Jordan took her very best one home to put on her tree and I didn't get a pic of it, but here's one she decorated with a candy cane.



Thanks so much for the idea DeeDee . I had the rolls all cut and glued together so all we had to do was paint and decorate to heart's content. Jordan had a blast!

I'm really kind of bummed because I like to have new cut outs and CD's for the Christmas season, this year has been such a downer that I really haven't accomplished a whole heck of a lot. But this week, I focused on creating a couple of new cut outs that are available in the stores. Christmas Collection #4 and #5 are from scrapbooks that haven't been published on a CD yet. What do you think?






I'm really loving the Santa's. In fact, I stayed up really late a couple of nights just to try my hand at a couple of Christmas cards - see I told you I was in the crafting mood lol.






Finally, I have a cutie Santa image to share, now you know how much I love Santa right! Anyway, I included him with his sentiment and without. Make sure you click on him before you do the save.




Have a great week, plumb full of smiles!
Peggy

Contest Winner, Covered Bridge Festival and Free Vintage Santa Image

Hi Everyone!
I hope your week has been going great! First off I'd like to publish the winner of the contest. I had such fun reading all the entries and want to thank each and every one who shared their spider stories and wished me a Happy Birthday. I've had a week full of goose bumps and although it was really hard to decide I finally settled upon Curt from Carmel who wrote:


"Hey There! I hope you have a very happy birthday! Here's my spider story. . .
my father loved to squirrel hunt and he would take us out with him when
I was a teenager to "teach" us how to hunt. Well, he would insist that
we get into the woods before daybreak. As we would be walking in the
gloom of the woods, you would walk right into these giant spider webs
(the kind where the spider lays in the center)and you would have to
wait to feel the spider crawling on you to figure out where it was.
Some of them were huge, and they would end up on your face, neck or
in your hair. I still get creeped out thinking about those spiders on me!
LOL Best, Curt"

I have a major aversion to walking into spider webs and each time I read his story I shook and shivered more! So Curt, please select the CD of your choice from HERE and EMAIL me your snail mail info and I'll get it off to you.

Now if you've been following me for a while you know that I often like to offer booby prizes to participants and this little contest is no different. So..

sucor
Rhonda Emery
Sharon aka Sharrabhug

Please select two cut outs of your choice from HERE and EMAIL me with your selection.

I'd like to give special mention to Sharon Caudle, DeeDee and The Memory Keeper. Sherri, oh my gosh the moving cacti gave me the creeps. I can't imagine having that Sci Fi horror in my house. DeeDee, even though your story didn't give me goose bumps you had me laughing for a good 5 minutes thinking about your hubby and his tidy whities. Thanks for sharing! Memory Keeper, every time I get in my freezer I see those creepy crawlies hanging around...thanks for sharing your nightmare.. lol

Now on to other things, this last weekend we attended the Parke County Indiana, Covered Bridge Festival. This is annual event for my family and we all, well most of us anyway, really enjoy spending the day out in the crisp autumn air and searching for bargains and hard to find items. It's about a 3 hour drive for us so we start out early.

We always stop at the Ernie Pyle Memorial Park which is just on the other side of the Indiana border near a town called Dana. Ernie was a WW II correspondent who was published in 300 different papers. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1944 and died while in combat. His stories were about the out-of-the-way places he visited and the people who lived there.

We encounter our first covered bridge at this little park. The kids always enjoy romping through the leaves and expending some of their energy and being little investigators. This is Kaiden's first year where he really remembers and understands what's going on. He was totally enthralled with the bridge.



Usually, there's a little stream that runs under the bridge, but this year it was dry. So part of the fun was being able to actually climb down and check out the bottom of the bridge.



This was his third trip through..or maybe it was his fourth. He had the most fun running through the bridge, then down to the stream and up the other side.



But we had to get on the road, we had about another hour of drive time before we reached our destination. There's 30 different covered bridges throughout the county. And during the festival, there are tons of flea markets, craft sales, garage sales and vendors scattered throughout the area.

We usually head to Mansfield which is one of the biggest sites. The last time we checked, they claimed over 5,000 different vendors. It was a glorious day and it was the next to last day of the festival so it was packed with tons of people. This is a pic of the row we had just completed. It's kind of hard to see but there are plenty of heads bobbing up and down the row.



There's so much to look at and choose from that it's really hard to decide what to buy. I thought these little Snowmen were just the cutest. Maybe I'll try to make something like these, if I can find the parts.



This vendor has been here for several years and I keep thinking that one of these days I'll make one of these. I think they're just the cutest and would be perfect for the grandkid's bedrooms. Just in case you can't tell, they're little individual chalk boards that have been decorated around the edges.



At the end of the day we were exhausted and our carts were full of purchases as you can see here. But we had a great time and spent lots of money. Some of my best buys included some potpourri from the vendor in the picture below. It smelled so good and had some cute teeny tiny pumpkins mixed in. I thought it would be great for Thanksgiving. One of my other great buys was a set of 1000 count sheets for 15.00.



I know this is a really long post but I thought I'd share another image with you. This is from the Saint Clair collection. I love the Santa in this image and thought he would be great in a collage. So as usual, make sure you double click on it so you can save him at the max size.



Have a great week, plumb full of smiles!
Peggy