Craft project for Valentine's Day

One of the most creative people on earth, Darcy Miller, sent out a Valentine's day box last year that was the cutest thing I had ever seen. It inspired me to create my own little personalized box greeting. Here are the supplies you need.
Craft Scissors (I used the Majestic pattern), Elmer's Glue, a fine point red pen, 2 style of boxes from papermart.com; a 31/8x21/16x11/4 slide box and a 4x3x2 white tuck box, craft paper shred, $1.68 stamp, Hershey's kisses, shiny card stock or photo paper, velum and label paper. A paper cutter is a huge help also.
I'll confess for an over-achiever, time-stressed, business woman, with child this was a challenge to complete quickly. I would rate it a code red on the crafty time scale. I have to give a big THANK YOU to Julianne Austin, Laura Irizarry and Caitlin McGettigan. Without my co-workers I would have not pulled this off.





Print 2 different photos on glossy card stock, cut with craft scissors- the corners take a little work (thanks Julianne), glue on front and back of slide box. Create vellumn artwork - I just drew mine on plain paper- print on vellumn. I recommend using an inexpensive paper cutter to cut these sheets. Add Hershey's kisses and place vellum on top. Volia instant message Kisses from Cathy and family.

For the outer box, again, I did original artwork and made copies on label paper. Stuff with paper shred, I used red foil shred that I found at Lee's Art Supply in NYC for $3.99 a bag. You only need 1 or 2 bags - I sent out 75 boxes and 2 bags were perfect.

Add stamps and mail!!!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Connection through celebration

I would like to help guide people to become more connected to each other. I believe connection through celebration is one way to a better life, cultivating your relationships and connection to family and friends. A vital part of a healthy lifestyle is the act of celebrating the everyday rituals of life; meals, games, story time, relaxing on weekends, that we have pushed aside in recent years. Carving time out of our busy schedules is essential to our long term happiness, something that is not found through instant gratification. So the next time you sit down for breakfast, lunch or dinner make it a celebration. Create a fun theme or turn an idea upside down, like a a breakfast picnic in your living room, Involve your family to help prepare the meal, set the table, don't be afraid to ask for help or offer to teach a new skill and open your mind to a new way of doing things.


I teach a class "How to Become an Event Planner" and I often tell a story about how I got into party planning as a career. It was because of the sense of control and instant gratification I felt once a successful event was completed. Now that I have a young daughter, it has made me reflect on "instant gratification" a little more deeply. We are in an age where almost everything can be "On Demand" your music, your TV, your video games. Is having such easy access to these things eroding our sense of patience and perserverance? So for my belated New Year's resolution I'm dedicating a day every week to celebrate, in my own way, my family. I hope I can inspire you to do the same.

Alpine Creative Invitations

For the Engagement Party and my Mother's surprise 60th Birthday I went to one of the BEST invitation spots in the country. Alpine Creative, based in NYC. Here is what we created for the celebration. Its a 2-ply, square, two color invite. I ordered personalized stamps and extra postage was needed because I chose a square shaped card. They were a hit!