CHA Day One

Hi everyone! I'm here in Anaheim, CA for the CHA 2010 Winter show. The show starts tomorrow. Today was an "education" day.

This is a shot of the hallway in the convention center. It's not busy today. Wait until tomorrow. This will look completely different!

Here's a photo of the hallway where my class was held today. Room 213A. Lucky number 13! My class today was with Hero Arts.

These are the projects we were supposed to make. You know how it goes at these things. You never have time to finish everything. What you do finish usually isn't so great as you're hurrying trying to get it done. We had to share supplies, so that slowed things down too. Honestly, I cannot stamp in classes. I don't what my deal is, but my stamping in classes is horrible.

Here's the package of stuff that was waiting for us. These classes are always great. They cost $25 and you always walk away with lots of stuff for your $25. Sometimes I win door prizes in the classes, but not this time. :(

One thing about this class that was different. Hero Arts is using a LOT of the Ranger/Tim Holtz stuff and selling these items too. They are selling the new Distress Inks pads, Diamond Glaze, the Mini Misters and I don't know what all else.

Here's the first card we did. The person next to me got this dot stamp in her kit. We had to share it. She liked the WM big stamp that was in my class kit, so we traded! A win-win situation. We put Diamond Glaze on the donut.

For this one, the big flower was already stamped and embossed on watercolor paper. (See the Dots stamp again?) We colored it with distress inks. Then we sprayed it with a mini mister with perfect pearls and water. The distress inks were supposed to run together, but of course, mine did NOT! I didn't feel bad as the person next to me, hers looked just like mine.

In the sample, the donut didn't look this big. When I was trying to put this all together like the sample, I said something like "This donut is freaking huge!" And of course the instructors heard me and laughed. It really is too big for the coffee cups.

Here's the clear stamps that I got. I think they made special kits for us with stamps from several different sets. I like this set better than the one that had the coffee cups and donuts.

A boring photo, but here's the dot stamps. It's mounted on vinyl cling and is big enough for a greeting card.

In the class kit, I got a Scattered Straw Distess Ink Pad, 3 acrylic blocks (now I can only find two of them here at the hotel), a tape runner and a black Hero Arts stamp pad.

We had like 10 minutes to do this bracelet. Right! I used the new Barn Red Distress Ink - smooshed it around some. They had this gold glitter spray stuff, so that went on next. I used one of the clear stamps with black ink. I wanted to color in parts of the stamped parts, but alas, the class was over. I have one card to finish up too.

I enjoyed the class. The show starts in earnest tomorrow. I have two classes. The first is the "Amazing Stamped Mini Book" and I have no clue who is putting this on. I can't remember and it's not on my ticket. The second is the "Latest and Greatest of My Little Shoebox," I also have no clue what we'll be doing in this class, but I can always learn something and the MLS products are cool.

I can't wait for the show tomorrow. It's always so much fun to see what's new and place orders. The hard thing is not being able to order everything I'd like to order.

More tomorrow!