Hi Ethel, Good to see you here. The stars must be realigning...Sherry stopped in some weeks ago and also talked of possibly stamping again. It would be wonderful to have both of you back.

The world of papercrafting has changed alot. The financial crisis caused real struggles and closure of many small stores and impacted lots of individual stampers too. You will see far less stampers on the large internet sites but some have spread out to all the small stamping businesses. We have lost several of our magazines. Leading scrapbooking businesses worked hard to diversify to include stamping and now the trend is to add mixed medium. Journalling became a big trend this past year which is seen in current stamps taking on a strong graphic look. The expansion includes folks trying their hand developing skills with paints and inks that they never explored before. The great news is individual creativity is embraced more than ever. Stenciling is a big new trend. Embossing folders and dies have expanded lots in size and with more intricate details. Sizzix and Spellbinders websites provide info on the compatibility of EF and dies. I'm sure many of these same changes have crossed over into quilting.

Hope to see you back soon.