CHA Round Up

I'm finally back in the UK (via Madrid but that's for another post) from CHA in Anaheim. The show was full on from start to finish and but it was lots of fun and I got chance to catch up with lots of colleagues, friends, and my Partner in Crime Tracy Weinzapfel.

I arrived after a marathon eighteen-hour journey and headed straight to The Cheesecake Factory to meet the DecoArt team for dinner; it felt great to meet up with them all again and we had a few laughs and a few drinks before the hard work began.

DecoArt Booth Tour

From then on it was all hands on deck for the final day of set-up at the DecoArt booth - we had a large booth this year so lots of work to do. 

On Friday I helped out with Tracy Weinzapfel's workshop at which 'bobble head Andy' made his debut appearance (the first of many as it happened - he kept cropping up everywhere!). I am already plotting my revenge and it will be sweet..... hope she has eyes in the back of her head at the next show.

One of the highlights of the show for me was my workshop on Saturday evening - we were sold out to a crowd of 50 enthusiastic participants. The project was an altered book entitled 'The Mindful Eye' and of course plenty of paint was spilled in the process. Everyone who came along got goodies to take away and a link to the workshop video so they can refresh themselves on what they learned once they get home.

Copper Patina Technique

Vintage Picture Frame

Above are a couple of videos of my demos. I was demoing pretty much all day every day from when we opened on Saturday morning, for either DecoArt or Stampendous. I've already shared my new stamps here and will be sharing my stencils soon. There are also several new Media launches - Clear Modeling Paste, Heavy Gel Medium Gloss, Texure Paste and Black Crackle Paint.

On Monday Tracy and I broadcast our fourth Dare to Create live from the show - we had a few teething problems but it was the first time we'd attempted anything like this from a show venue and all things considered it went pretty well. We created a collaborative piece of art between us - you can clearly see a bit of both of our styles in the finished piece.

All in all a great show - except for the panic stations early on when I realised one of my suitcases had gone missing - and with it ALL my samples and demo stuff. Quite a bit of scrounging later I had some bits and pieces to demo with thanks to some very kind souls! It still hasn't turned up....

And after a whirlwind three days which went past in the blink of an eye it was time to pack the booth down again and head back via Madrid for a brief few days of much-needed rest.

Next stop - PaperWorld in Germany!

Andy