Throw Back Thursday: Remember D.O.T.S.?

Let's jump into the Way Back Machine and see who remembers these:

L-R: First Ever CTMH catalog, D.O.T.S 1997-1998 Catalog Collection, 

D.O.T.S. 1998-99 Catalog Collection, Vintage (1994?) D.O.T.S. Catalog 

In August 1995 I became a D.O.T.S. demonstrator.  D.O.T.S. stood for Dozens Of Terrific Stamps and it's the company that eventually gave birth to Close To My Heart.  

Our first CTMH catalog. This little sweetheart was just 48 pages of new products and inspiration. I think it was introduced in 1996 at the first convention I attended. Close To My Heart was a separate company at it's inception.  D.O.T.S demonstrators automatically became CTMH consultants.  It was recommended we do parties for one or the other, not necessarily both at one time. While I didn't embrace scrapbooking right away, I did fall in love with the many new products and saw immediate use for my stamping addiction business.  The CTMH catalog had so much new fun stuff - stencils for which I won't even go into the myriad of possibilities they gave me, and so many new alphabet stamp sets I couldn't believe I hadn't died and gone to heaven! 

The D.O.T.S. 1997-98 "Catalog Collection" was one of the original "Big Bertha" catalogs - 192 pages of rubber stamping goodness!  It featured our Calendar Cuties and lots of country styled stamps.  And to assist our consultants with our heavy loads carried to and from gatherings, the CTMH catalog became a section within big Bertha.   It made the Close To My Heart and D.O.T.S. parties so much easier to combine and feature all our great products. 

The 1998-99 D.O.T.S. "Catalog Collection" was another amazing Big Bertha with just 256 pages.  This gem was heavy!  Heavy to mail, heavy to tote to parties and had a hefty price of $7.95.  It was worth it's weight in gold so no problem, but I do recall the days I really had to consider if I wanted more stamps or more catalogs.  This darlin' had more color photos of completed projects and more papers and accessories.  These are some stamps I look back at with great fondness and would use to this day if I'd had room to keep them all.  Love the Easter Bunny and the Chickadee.  

This vintage D.O.T.S. catalog is a tiny little 76 page beauty.  Since the label on the back is neither mine nor my original upline's, I assume it's 1994 or prior. All the stamps with the exception of alphabet sets were sold singly. Two favorites, company wide, were This Much Bear and Frank.  They were $9.25 and $8.25 respectively.  Wow!  Wood is expensive!!  Color in this catalog was very limited but where it was, it was gorgeous!  Even now I want to drool all over that page of glitter, chalks, pens and all the other stuff there.  It's my candy store!! 

I hope you've enjoyed this trip back in time.  It's been fun reminiscing.