I had full and sincere intentions of sitting down at the end of my first day here at CHA to summarize my findings, go through order forms, plan a blog post and upload a tone of pics to FB and Blogger (I took 170 pics…not bad). Then I got an invite to have dinner with a peer and it turned out to be a wine and cheese party that eventually ended up at restaurant and by the time I got back to the hotel room it was 1:17am EST precisely and I was cut off from the hotel lobby where the free internet was.
They say the road to hell was paved with good intentions too…anyways. I did manage to sit down and do write this blog post which I intend to post as soon as I am ambulatory in the morning.
Let me see what I can remember at this point…
Vintaj – LOVE it! Maybe its my heritage or just being part raven but I love metal and being able to play with it. I took a blank metal shape (this time a butterfly) and turned it into a beautiful charm that was so easy and fun I wanted to make a whole flock of them. Vintaj has dies that can emboss and etch thin metal charms and pieces!!! They also have “Patinas” to colour and enhance the metal! Then you can put Glossy Accents on top or dip into a melting pot to give it an enamel look – I tell you the list just goes on and on with what you can do with these. LOVE LOVE LOVE! Got the 3 “LOVE” rating with this make & take.
Ranger – Didn’t get a chance to play with the Distress Markers but I saw them – and anyone who did use them just loved them too. I have put in an order already for the Distress Markers, new Ice Stickles colours (which are bold and beautiful instead of being washed out) and Dylan’s new Dylusional Sprays which are bright colour sprays that are rich and perfect for wanting to add just colour to a project without any sparkle. They are water reactive and so fun to play with.
As a side note, I want one of those cash receipt journals but Dyan was very circumspect with her source of such journals. Me LIKEY!!!!
As I was passing through the Ranger booth I saw that Debbie was doing a Demo with the new Tire Treads. Since this was a request from a dear friend Monica to check this out, I happily obliged. Besides, there was a melting pot involved, so I stepped up to the counter to check it out. SUCH FUN!!!!!
As you can see I made a lovely heart shaped pendant from UTee, poured into a mold made from 'Mold&pour' that was sitting on softly flexable Texture Treads that are beautiful and easy to use. I see this happening in your class Monica! I couldn't help but put my sweet little Vintaj Charm on there too! Happy!
And Tim was Tim – busy, doing demos and impossible to reach on a personal level. Or should I say when I saw him relaxing at the Ranger Booth at the end of the day with Mario I didn’t have it in me to go up and bother them with small talk. They really bust their butts to put together a great show and it just didn’t seem to be the time. On a funny note though – did anyone see me in one of Mario’s first BTW on Facebook or Twitter? While he took a picture of us, I took a picture of him. He ended up using a different pic but I thought it was ironic.
I also spent a goodly amount of time at the Faber Castell Booth and received some instruction on their gelatos, pitt pens and different pencil crayons and was able to play in an art journal with how they react with water and blend so beautifully. I will be placing an order of these beautiful mediums so watch for them to be in store soon! Here is the sweet little M&T I did with them too! Awesome girls there...very helpful too.
Oh and then there was Prima. I must have taken more pictures at their booth than any other. I have an album started over at FB to put all of the pics I took (its taking a long time to update though) and I couldn't stop taking pictures of their beauitful demos and products. WOW!!! Anyways - here is the last M&T I did of the day at Prima. There wasn't a real demo to work from, the lovely designer just said my old line of "Here is the product, here are the tools, here is what we did - you do your own thing!!!" And this is what I did...quite lovely I thought.
So I hope your appetite has been 'whetted' for more. I seemed to be able to get my phone hooked into the free internet at the convention centre about half way through the day so was able to get a few fun shots up there. I will do more posting as time and internet connection permits!
I also bumped into some chums from Ranger U in line for a book signing with Wendy Vicci (which I also got - very cool!) and will be having lunch and dinner with them too. Anyways...time for breakfast and then heading over to the convention centre. If I have more time I will try to upload more pics to my FB album.
Later!
Jenn
