Hi there! My name is Dawn McVey and I've been stamping for quite a few years now. I got started in paper-crafting by making cards that friends and family eventually started asking to purchase from me. In the fall of 2007, I started my blog and started submitting my work to magazines and went on to have over 100 projects published in various paper-crafting magazines.
In July of 2008 I accepted a position on the Design Team for Papertrey Ink and in February of 2009, I became a Stamp/Product Designer for Papertrey as well. I am thoroughly enjoying working with such a creative and innovative company. In the summer of 2009, I was laid off from my office job and my husband and I made the decision for me to work from home, full time, as a designer. At the time, it was a very hard decision to make, with the uncertainty of losing the guaranteed income that came with that day job. It was not a move we would have chosen to make on our own at that time, however, years later, Bart and I can both say that God clearly had other (better!) plans in store for us and this career change has certainly been a tremendous blessing! I love working from home and have so enjoyed adding many new products to my Raspberry Suite product line over the last few years! I was on the Studio Calico Design Team from 2011-2013 and enjoyed the variety in working with their kits of products each month.
In 2008 or so, I began to be sick off and on and that progressed over the years until I was extremely sick every day. After years of bouncing around from one local doctor to the next, as they tried to diagnose my illness, I was eventually referred to Mayo Clinic. The doctors there quickly determined that my immune system had created three antibodies that had attacked the nerves in my own small intestine, causing it to not push food through properly, resulting in some pretty debilitating symptoms. There was no cure for the problem, however they tried everything they could thing of to simply treat the symptoms. In 2016, they referred me to Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington, D.C. for a small intestine transplant -- a very rare surgery that they don't even do at Mayo Clinic. I was on IV nutrition for a year and a half, but at that point, I became unable to eat any food at all, and went five months without eating anything. After more testing in D.C. and after trying all other options Mayo could think of, we finally decided to move forward with the transplant. We went on the wait list in July of 2017, we received THE CALL on October 27, 2017 at 3am, telling us their was an organ available for me if we wanted it. We felt like the Lord was prompting us to GO, so we said yes and 24 hours later, they began my transplant surgery! I lived in D.C. for 4-1/2 months after the surgery, in order to be close to the hospital and we were thrilled when they finally gave us the all-clear to come back home. Since then, my recovery has been wonderful and full of blessings as I started eating anything and everything again, and experiencing so much joy over feeling so well!
God has blessed me abundantly with health, a job that I love and with a wonderful husband who encourages me to follow my dreams! Bart is my best friend and I'm so grateful to get to share each day with him. We love traveling and spending as much time together as we can. We also have a labrador retriever, Windsor, who is as lovable as they come! He's my little (big!) shadow in the studio each day and he's brought so much joy to our lives.
It's a wonderful life and I'm so, so thankful.
