Sponsors:
Y'all, I am so excited to announce that the one and only original YODA is in the newspaper.
MELANIE BRUNER from Knoxville, TN. She is the reason that I am on the Ranger DT.
She called me while Amy, Renee and I were at CKC Charlotte. I was running around looking for Scenic Route Paper and something else, I can't remember now. She sends me a series text messages.
Let me digress...
Mel hastes talking on the phone. The only time I can seem to speak with her on the phone is when I am heading to Costco. Yes, really, she is home and I am on my way to the warehouse to buy food for the kids. So if we want to really "speak" to her, we have realized that texting is the only way. Hell, I will text from my Yahoo! acct so that I do not have to mess with all the buttons.
first text message reads: "Put down the Scenic Route Paper"
second message reads: "I said put it down"
third message: "PUT IT DOWN NOW!!!"
last message: "Ranger Ink and Tim Holtz are looking for a Design Team I think you should do it!!!"
OK, so here I am in Charlotte NC and wondering what the F**K. I am not ready for this. So she calls me on the phone and says "Put on your big girl panties and get to steppin." I see the list of things to do complete. I get my friend Kathryn, who always saves me when I am last minute and need a photo, to take pictures of my stuff. I send them off at the 11th hour and the rest is history.
I made Tim speak to Melanie when I was at DT Ranger U. I loved it. She did tell him about the fact that the girls get unleashed after 6pm and if I am not reminded, they might not find there home again during the weekend. Really she did. Ask him.
So here is the article and a picture of the Original Yoda...
========================================================
Designer Spotlight
By Jennifer Kiilerich
[liPublished]: Thursday, 08/30/07
Anybody who's tried rifling through piles of old
photos and compiling them into albums knows that organizing those
memories is much harder — and more time-consuming — than it looks.
Enter Melanie Bruner, craft and scrapbook extraordinaire.
The youthful, energetic (and busy) mother of two, including an autistic child who keeps her on her toes, began scrapbooking as a therapeutic way to spend time with friends while preserving family memories. On the day of our phone conversation, Bruner's kids have just gone back to school, and she's enjoying a rare moment to herself. "My house is quiet — there's no TV, no cartoons, it's fabulous," she says.
Bruner is a New Jersey native with an interior design degree and was deep into crafts well before her husband's job moved her to Knoxville. Once in Knoxville, she took a part-time job at a scrapbooking store, and as she delved further into the hobby, friends and family members began to take notice. As it turned out, she says, "People will pay ridiculous amounts of money for albums!"
One of her current projects is creating a photo album to commemorate a Memphis weatherman's 30-year job anniversary. In addition to building albums, Bruner teaches scrapbooking classes and has recently begun creating uncommon wedding invitations and place-card holders. Her last wedding was for a bride as far away as Boston. "We did it all via the phone," she says.
"I just love being unique and different," says Bruner of her theme-oriented wedding accessories, which include golf-ball place markers and elaborate money boxes. A creative soul, Bruner also dabbles in jewelry-making and once tried her hand at wood-working. "That didn't work out," she laughs, "but I've got to try."
Bruner says her crafts projects have taken over her living room, kitchen and dining room now, but she shows no signs of slowing down. "Surrounding myself with papers and scissors makes me feel good. It's a friendship thing, and it's also about family," she says of scrapbooking. "It should be up there with all the other addictions!"
Contact Melanie Bruner for your own project: 865-671-4354.
[liPublished]: Thursday, 08/30/07
========================================================
until we meet again,
