My 2014 CHA Highlights & The Goods

Hi again Crafters! Thank you thank you for the awesome comments on the first post, and more words of encouragement! I love you all! Now, longly...not quickly...here are my favorite booths that I visited at the 2014 CHA Mega Show! There was so much to see and be inspired by, and many types of products that seem to trending. I hope you see some inspiration too!

The Ranger Booth:

Fabulous, fun, and colorful treats from Dyan and Kaz!

 

 

 

 

The Ranger Design Challenge: Using Distress Paint (For some reason I didn't have all the photos of the pieces on my camera...hmmm!!!)

These metal sheet colored butterflies were gorgeous!

 

 

Shelly's flowers were busting with color!

You could pick Wendy's out instantly! I LOVE her style, her Art Parts, her stamps!

There was so much to see on Tim's. I loved all the embellishment!

Paula hand painted those flowers!!!

 

Jim's was genius! The dimension was fabulous!

 

Richele's piece caught my eye first thing! I was in LOVE with it!

Speaking of Ranger, here is a photo I didn't have yesterday, and I so have to post some of my Ranger U Sistas!!! I love them so! 

I'm loving this photo with Cheryl, Linda, Candy, Marjie, and Susan.

The Idea-ology Booth:

Inspiration heaven! These windows were filled with beautiful projects!

I was in LOVE with the old piano music sheet used as the base of this beauty! I totally need to get some!

I love all the new papers and embellies! Wait, haven't I said that?

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Sizzix Booth:

The Susan's Garden line was fantastic! I used the tools and dies in the Sizzix class, and made a gorgeous flower. I so need the tools used to make gorgeous paper florals that really look real. So so so pretty!

 

What a wonderful display! I just loved the top hat on the corner of the sofa!

The wall of books always mesmerizes me!

Americana goodness!

More Artist Trading Blocks!

The Stamper's Anonymous Booth:

I loved all the new stamps from Tim and Wendy. There are some really fun Blueprints and the Hash Tag set is super FUN!!!

 

 

 

The Spellbinders Booth:

I could have sat on the sofa in this booth, and stared for hours! It was so beautiful, elegant, and yet vintage. Shabby chic inspiration abounded with old world European flair! AWESOME!!!

 

Jars of bezels were so so beautiful!

They have so many new bezels, embellies, and metal dies!

 

The Prima Booth:

A new vintage line, with places around the world is out. Cool stuff!

 

 

The Coats & Clark Booth:

Again, I thought I took more photos here! This chair is AMAZING!!! There was even a poster of the new Tim fabrics coming out soon! Gorgeous makes! I need to get a new sewing machine...seriously!!!

The Lion Brand Yarns Booth:

This booth had to be the most unusual and grandiose! The Wonders of the World were all made of yarn! It was truly so COOL and inspiring!!! I wish I would have taken more photos!

 

The Wobble Works, Inc. Booth:

The new 3Doodler is a super cool tool that is like a glue gun, except it puts out colored plastic that is not hot, and you can create all kinds of things with it. The ferris wheel, plane, and all these other goodies were all created with this plastic that you control with the tool. It's so cool! Jim and I had fun playing with it!

 

What's was trending at CHA?
-There were booths and booths of new tools and gadgets galore. So many companies were demoing tools! There is even a new movement called Maker's Spaces or Hacker's Spaces, which are these places filled with awesome crafting machines and tools for people to just go and create. It's my understanding that they are all over the globe, and each one has a monthly fee. Search for one near you, and meet new friends while creating Art! They even had a place set up at CHA, and people were creating and learning to use these incredible state of the art machines! So cool, and a little above my head, but so worth looking in to.
-The chalk board look is still growing strong. Several companies have various chalk board paints in every color, and there were many projects with the chalk board look, even furniture painted with it. It makes a super matte and soft look, and very vintage looking!
-Spray Paints for every job and decor look were available at so many booths as well. From mirrored, to etched glass, to frosted glass, to metallic, to soft and transparent, there seems to be a spray paint for everything now. I LOVE it!
-Handmade jewelry is all the rage, and the more metals, beads, and images, the better! There were so many gorgeous pieces everywhere. So many had a retro grunge feel, and the bead choices were endless.
-Fabric, material, yarns, burlap, and twine were scattered everywhere. People are really back in to sewing, crocheting, knitting, and just embellishing with these tactile yummies! There were even Make-n-Takes at two different places for using your arms and fingers to crochet a scarf out of the most soft, luxurious, and fuzzy yarns! I wish I would have made one, but lines were long!
-There was a plethora of paints and paintbrushes...from acrylic, to watercolor, and even oil paints! There was a booth with the most fabulous Make-n-Take, that you had to have an appointment time for, where an instructor was showing everyone the strokes and you would copy them to make your own oil painted snowy mountain scene. It was GORGEOUS, and everyone did so well with the copying of the strokes. I REALLY wanted to do this one, but by the time I discovered this Make-n-Take, it was the last day and all times were taken. Bummer! Very very very cool!!!
-WOOD items were all over the place!!! Yes, I'm so EXCITED about that, as you know how much I LOVE WOOD! There were papers, tape, tags, laser cuts, embellies, beads, all made from good ol' wood!
-Resins are still going strong. There are now several companies making the clear, moldable goodness! There are now so many to choose from with different properties ranging from drying fast to slow and steady.
-Metallic and prism like papers are going strong. There are so many colors and designs from several companies.

Thanks for traveling along on this 2014 CHA Mega Show journey, and join me again tomorrow to see my Top 10 Picks from the show, as  well as put your name in the running for TWO GIVE-AWAYS! 

I hope your hands get creatively dirty soon!

My 2014 CHA Highlights & The People

I think the 2014 Winter CHA Mega Show was the best yet...at least that I've been to! CHA posted that the numbers were even up 10% from last year, and there seemed to be more rows of vendors, but I have to say it didn't seem that crowded. Personally, I like less crowding...I think they just stretched it out more. I really don't know though for sure. Some people I saw a lot, and some people I never saw, and really wanted to, and I stayed at the show opening to closing all four days. This place was really really big. I think I walked 10 miles every day, no kidding. Anytime we saw someone limping around, it was assumed they had the CHA walk...sore legs and feet, nursing blisters as well. There was even a CHA Flu going around! Regardless, it was awesome to see people, take classes, see fabulous Art work, and just talk! The people are what makes this show so fabulous for me.

This was my walk to my hotel! Gorgeous trees!

I loved this large sculpture right outside of the doors leading into the show.  Then when you walked in, it was crazy busy. People were talking, ordering, and demoing.

The awesome Wendy Vecchi was demoing her new Crackle Paste! Love this stuff and her!

The amazing Tim Holtz was demoing his new Marker Spritzer! A must have!

The super creative Dyan Reaveley and Dina Wakley liked posing for pics!

Dyan again posing with the nicest person ever, Eileen Hull.

Speaking of Eileen...I had the pleasure of helping out in one of her classes with Amy Bowerman, my roomie for the week. They have joined forces and started the Artist Trading Blocks movement. Marjie Kemper even helped out. It was quite interesting and fun! 

Marjie and I were hiding behind boxes.

I ran into Jim, the Gentleman Crafter, and he showed me around to where some of his samples were in the Graphic 45 booth. FABULOUS is what they were. This one is a tea box with kinds of hidden gems.  He made a trophy, a lighthouse, and a violin...all complete with hidden albums!

 

The first night of the show, CHA put on a Block Party! The band was absolutely fantastic! They played songs from the 60's to the hits of today! Yes, I danced...a lot! But everyone I knew was out there too!!!

There was even a crazy hat photo booth, so a few of us posed...Carolyn and Gina from The Crafty Scrapper, Johnna and Darcie from Scrappy Camper Sisters, and Jim and I...we had too much fun! They even used this photo for the daily digest online!

The next night, several of us attended the Prime Publishing & Fave Crafts Blogger Event! It was fun meeting new people and learning about new opportunities, and they ended the night with four bags...yes four...of loot to use! What awesome companies to give us so much stuff!

All of those companies gave us products to use for future projects! AWESOME!

My four bags of loot!

Johnnie of Saved By Love Creations (My other roomie and new bestie!), me, Marjie (Old bestie!), France Pappilon (Just met her and now love her!), and Amy (Old bestie!)...we all had a grand time!

We shared dessert after Paula Cheney posted it on FaceBook, and just had to have it! YUMMY!

I took a couple of classes, sat in on Make n Takes, and went to book signings too! There was so much to do, and so many to see!

The Make n Take at the Idea-ology booth! LOVED LOVED LOVED all the new papers, ephemera, and embellies!

Pam Carriker signed her new book "Creating Art at the Speed of Life" for me.

This is one of the cards I made during the Sizzix class, and Tim taught us to use his new Shadow Press Embossing Folders, which actually deboss. Very COOL!

Of course, I walked round and round my favorite area, the Ranger, Sizzix, Idea-ology, and Stamper's Anonymous booths, and I talked and talked and talked to everyone! I even saw a few of my samples...what a THRILL!!!

At Ranger (Click on that link to sign up for a Ranger give away!), I made the Butterfly Tag using their Black and White Enamel Accents.

Also at Ranger, I used every color of Archival Ink to make several tags also using the Stamper's Anonymous Tiny Things mini images. One is used here, but I'll be showing you the rest of the tags in another post.

 

At Sizzix, Eileen Hull, had my Industrial Dice hanging up at the Artist Trading Block display.

It was great to see my banner up for Charity Wings Banner's of Hope as well! All of the banners were stunning, and there were so many! I was honored to be participating in this, and hope these small pieces of Art, cheer some people up! 

And then, where I talked to more people than I can even remember, was the Designer Showcase at Booth 14...my booth. 

 

Johnnie took this collage of photos of my Showcase!

You cannot even imagine how nervous I was about the Showcase...a real wreck. I felt like the junkyard dog amongst clean, professional, and beautiful displays from the other artists, but I think sticking out worked in my favor. I talked to many manufacturers and gave out almost 300 business cards. I highly recommend joining CHA as a Designer Member and showing your work in the Designer Showcase, if you want to further your Art business.  It was well worth my hysteria and hard work! Thank you to all the people who left notes and gave me words of encouragement! I could not have done this without you!

I made my business card holder with Eileen's Candy Drawer Box die, Ranger's Foil Sheets, and Sizzix Texture Fades.

Tuesday, I will show you some of the gorgeous booths and their products. Then on Wednesday, I'll share my top 10 Must Haves, trends that I saw, plus I have TWO FABULOUS GIVE-AWAYS, so stay tuned to see the rest of my 2014 CHA highlights!!!

I hope your hands get creatively dirty soon!