Exciting NEWS coming!!!

By the end of this week, we will be selecting our Featured Instructors for our next Crop and Cruise Scrapbooking Cruise to the Caribbean this November!!!!

We are so impressed by the vast and amazing talent this country has to offer and are very excited to introduce you to our chosen ladies real soon!

Meanwhile, we have more wonderful sponsors coming on board that will add to the over-the-top experience of this ultimate vacation!!

First up, one of Canada's newest companies!!!!!!

KIKI ART  is based in Montreal,  proudly influenced by the many cultures, languages and stories inhabiting the city.  Always aiming to transfer the multicultural perspective in to the creation of unique products, so they can serve in the making of projects and layouts for people from around the world.


AND... one of my favourite organizing companies...

Check out this video from CHA where I discovered their Tropical Tool Box!!!!!!

Hostess Bio - Allison Orthner

Allison is a retired Jr. High school teacher turned photographer and scrapbooker who still LOVES to teach anyone willing to learn! She appears regularly on City TV helping Canadians improve their scrapbooking and photography skills, has been published numerous times including 9 front cover photos and has just launched her new column called "Lights! Camera! Action!" in Canadian Scrapbooker magazine.

On the cruise, Allison is looking forward to creating the ultimate vacation and is especially excited to help you capture all your memories in photos! She specializes in being as practical as possible and only as technical as necessary and brings the fun back to photography the way it should be! Allison plays house in Calgary with her "gorgeous gadget guy" husband and two "delightfully fun" kids!!

Click HERE to check out Allison's website!

Instructor Bios - Kathy Thompson-Laffoley

Kathy Thompson Laffoley is a talented photographer and scrapbooker hiding out in Riverview, New Brunswick! For Kathy, life with husband Jim and daughters Emma (16) and Rebecca (13) – two teenage girls -- is always a photo op waiting to happen!! She runs a small photography business and has been scrapbooking for about 6 years... and absolutely LOVES this hobby of ours! She is a Design Team Member for Canadian Scrapbooker Magazine and Upsy Daisy Designs, and is the Creative Planner for Scrap Shotz, an online site serving scrapbookers all across Canada!

Kathy's style leans towards bright and graphic, usually with the photos being front and centre and believes that with only a simple piece of white cardstock and a great piece of striped paper, she can put a great page together!!!! She is beyond excited to be a part of the Crop and Cruise team and is looking forward to sharing her talents and skills, getting to know other Canadians and helping everyone capture some great photos along the way!

Click

HERE to check out Kathy's website!

Instructor Bios - Jill Hildebrand

Jill Hildebrand is back to Crop and Cruise by populer demand for her "life of the party" attitude and ability to put a smile on everyone's face especially as she guides them through the creative process of making "art"! Jill loves the emotion involved in the creative journey and is passionate about all the fun products available today... patterned paper, paint, ribbon, acrylic stamps, hand journaling & altered art are just a few of her many addictions! With an easy-going personality, she encourages scrappers to go a little CRAZY and become excited about the products in front of them firmly believing there are "NO MISTAKES – ONLY UNEXPECTED CREATIONS.”

Jill is currently a design team member of 5 years for Smalltown Scrappers in Manitoba, a published scrapbook artist in numerous Canadian Scrapbooker issues and one of last year's Crop and Cruise featured instructors. She lives on a grain farm in Crystal City, MB with husband Ron of 13 years and three beautiful children, Daria (10), Carter (7) & Asha (4). When not farming or scrapbooking, Jill uses her Bachelor of Education degree working as a substitute and enjoys home decorating & watching NBA games with her family!

Click HERE to check out Jill's website!

Instructor Bios - Leica Forrest

Leica (pronounced "Lisa") is back to Crop and Cruise by popular demand for her amazing powerhouse of creativity!! She has been scrapbooking for 10 years and with a degree in education, it was a natural progression to start teaching scrapbooking classes. Leica is currently part of the Canadian Scrapbooker Magazine as a designer and writer and is also on the design teams for Stix2, Tilano Fresco and was Luxe Designs November Pin Up girl!

Leica makes her home in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan and is married to an awesome guy, Jim, and together they have 2 little boys; Riley & Jager, and a little baby on the way (we're praying for a girl)! She loves to travel and teach so joining the team on this cruise is the perfect adventure combining all of her loves!

Click HERE to check out Leica's website!

Instructor Bios - Trisha Ladouceur

Trisha comes to Crop and Cruise from Edmonton where the long, cold winters provide plenty of scrapbooking time for her! She has been an avid scrapbooker for nearly 10 years and has taught for nearly 9 years in Canada and at stores and conventions across North America representing some of the hottest companies in the scrapbooking industry.

Most recently, Trisha has been given the honour of becoming an official"Primadonna" which will enable all class attendees the unique opportunity to take Prima Endorsed classes! She is also thrilled to be a part of the duo, "FIRE AND ICE", releasing their first collection in February 2008 at CHA-Winter, the extremely popular "Build-A-Book". As a Clear Album expert, many of her classes incorporate tips and techniques for working with this fun medium and you will quickly learn that Trisha loves to create projects that are very detail oriented and incorporate texture and dimension wherever possible! The best part is that she shows her students that ANY level of scrapbooker CAN create beautiful works of art when the steps are broken down!

Trisha has been married to her best friend Drew for more than 15 years and has 2 wild, but devilishly handsome boys, Logan and Carter who are more often than not, the source of her inspiration.

Click HERE to check out Trisha's website!

Instructor Bios - Deanna Hutchison

Deanna Hutchison from BC

Deanna comes to our team from beautiful British Columbia where she works as regional manager for Clipper Street Scrapbook Company (www.clipperstreet.com) and has been scrapbooking for just over 10 years. She considers scrapbooking her true passion and teaching pure joy as her classes regularly sell out with over 100 students per month! Deanna's approach ensures that every student has an amazing classroom experience full of energy and enthusiasm!

With over 155 projects published in various magazines, it is no wonder that Deanna has also been fortunate to work for many different design teams and on freelance projects for companies such as Canvas Concepts, Pebbles Inc, Memories Complete, EK Success and Sweetwater. Also, as a buyer for Clipper Street and their new online store (www.clipperstreetonline.com), she has travelled to shows like CHA where she gets to connect with super fun companies in the industry and do her favorite job - teach!! She feels truly blessed to be able to work in a job that is very fulfilling and rewarding and have a blast doing it—what could be a better combination?

Deanna has been married 19 years to an amazingly supportive husband, Geordie and has two Roller Hockey Stars—Aaron, 15 and Justin, 10 and is looking forward to being a featured instructor on our Crop and Cruise the Caribbean in February 2009!

Click HERE to check out Deanna's website!

We've selected our Crop and Cruise Team!

This is what I've looked like for the last few days between interviewing our TOP instructors that applied, reference checks and conference calls with my team agonizing over which of these talented ladies to bring on board!

But now the last phone call has been made and we officially have our new Crop and Cruise "dream team" selected and boy am I excited!! They were pretty excited too evident by the screams in my ear... too much fun!!

This team stretches from "sea to sea" and we are excited to introduce these talented ladies to fellow Canadians this weekend!

We will be at two major events making the announcement... Camp Croppin' in Alberta and Scrapfest in Ontario so watch for it!!!

And of course you can check our www.CropandCruise.com website for all the details coming soon!

Call for Instructors CLOSED!!

WOW WOW WOW!!!! My goodness Canada, we have some amazingly talented artists and I'm so very proud of all of you!! Thanks so much to each and every one of you who sent in your applications and PLEASE don't quit submitting to magazines and design teams or give up as you ALL have something to offer this great hobby!!

Over the next couple weeks, we will be contacting our TOP 10 list for further discussions and then will be announcing our featured Crop and Cruise 2009 instructors mid April... so WATCH for it!!!

Call for Instructors NOW OPEN!!

We are looking for Canada's TOP instructors to apply!! Check out this video and look for details on our http://www.cropandcruise.com/ website under "instructors"!! We want the BEST Canada has to offer!