Monday, July 23, 2012

CHA whirlwind & booth projects

I was asked to attend CHA last minute to work in the October Afternoon booth so this last week has been craziness. Fun craziness.

Here's a mini recap of the CHA experience, minus all the fun product photos from other companies. If you've ever worked at CHA you know you rarely get out of the booth and when you do it's not exact cooth (or is it couth? is that even the word I'm wanting?!) to go into other booths and start snapping away. So you get the OA experience, pretty much via my instagram feed ;) Photos of actual new OA product was done via video, which I hope to have up tomorrow.

Prior to leaving for CHA, I left this mess on my scrap floor. Unfortunately, it was still there when I got back. That scrap cleaning fairy is fired.
Flying with the pink skinnies. That's right. I wore the pink pants and wasn't the only one thankyouverymuch.
Ride from the airport with my mini on my lap. 
I mustache you if you like this look.
Trying to decide my favorite Midway tin pin. 
Pizza at Giordano's is always a must. 
I realized about 30,00 feet I had left half my clothes in the dryer at home. No wonder my bag was so light. Geez! Thankfully I had at least one more outfit, although I paired this top with red shorts and quickly came to the conclusion that if I had a fireman's hat on I would pass as a fire station dog. 
It wouldn't be CHA without a Target run. (to replace missing clothes. not such a bad thing ;)) I found this fun notebook too. 
This is the Make it Merry kitty. She looks so innocent, but reminds me of the devil cat we have at home. Don't let her innocence fool you. She's up to something...
The Target clearance skirt comes through. Stripes & floral? Why not. 
One of my favorite things about CHA is meeting people that you only know via the internet. Was so happy these lovely ladies stopped by---
Glad to see Jenni again. She is golden. Love her.
I had never met Kristina of Two Peas in a Bucket before. She's a doll! It's always nice to meet genuinely nice, good people. And dear iPhone: please improve your turn around camera function. As you can see, it gives my nose abnormal growths that aren't there in real life. thank you. 
Emily is precious. No other word to describe her.
Some Studio Calico girls stopped by, Nik and Jen. Awesome to see them as always. 
Mandy! Hey you, sweet girl! Nice to meet a twitter buddy :) 

A couple of Garden Girls came by, Amy Tan & Shimelle, two talented ladies with sweet smiles who are as nice as can be. I met other great 'I only know you from online' girls, but we didn't get a photo. Maybe next time :)

The four new lines from October Afternoon are very different from each other. I really think there is something for everyone. These were some of my booth projects:
Witch Hazel is their first Halloween line ever. Classic Halloween, with a vintage twist:

 I made this card more fallish to show that not every element in the line is strictly Halloweeny. For the record: halloweeny is a fun word to say.
Midway pretty much has my heart. I love this line.

 I was asked at CHA to do a tutorial on this cotton candy card. Look for that on the OA blog once Midway starts becoming available.
 This layout was nice a nice way to show off most of the papers and the fun nature of the line. I have too many favorites in this line to choose one, but at the top of that list is the gray paper with the stars.
And the divided circle paper.
And the tin pins.
And the label stickers.
And..okay. I'll stop ;)
Make it Merry is the new Christmas line. I don't think OA has ever made a Christmas line I don't love. This is no exception. The papers and embellishments in this are perfect. I love that the colors aren't crazy. They stuck with classic green and red, with some pink and blue and a bit of yellow as well. If you have some of the previous Christmas lines, Good Cheer, Holiday Style, you can mix in some of these new pieces and they will totally coordinate. 

 I've decided if vellum is wrong I don't wanna be right! It keeps popping up on my projects in happy little bits.
The last line is Farm girl. If you liked Farmhouse and Farm fresh you'll like this one. But again, not all the papers/embellishments are "farmy", so very usable for other projects. They introduced woodgrain mini markets which I have begged for so I was pretty happy to see those. The background stamp alone is beautiful! Can't wait to play with it. I did 3 projects for the booth with this line, but forgot to take photos. I have only one from the show:
If you do any canning, there are a few items you will love in this line. I think it would also be great to use it for recipe books/cards. 
And then the day after I got back...I ran my first 5k. And I didn't die. Yay!
Check back here tomorrow for a video tour of the new October Afternoon products, line by line. Happy Monday to you!

11 comments:

  1. I think your suitcase was too light because subconciously you trying to sneak me in. :)

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  2. I wish I would have had a chance to say hi!! You were swamped. :) You are maybe the only person I know that can rock stripes AND floral. ;) Um...the arrows pin is my favorite. AND...you layouts are gorgeous...you outdid yourself!! Congrats on the run, even though I think running is a tad crazy. ;)

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  3. Glad you had fun @ CHA girly and way to git er done pounding out your first 5K! Woot! Woot! :) Thanks for the shares!

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  4. WOW! Looks like you had an amazing time. Midway looks right up my street too.

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  5. You are too cute!!! Love seeing these photos again. Looks like you had a blast.

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  6. You look like you had lots of fun and that pizza looks yummy and so do the badges!

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  7. Can't wait to see video. I am completely curious about CHA and how you get in and do all that? Love the OA line...I really want to start using it. I love love love the midwest :) Congrats on the 5K...I think us 4 have started something...inspiring each other to do some more!

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  8. Someday I hope to have the CHA experience, pizza (yum!), exhaustion, and all!

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  9. i still have to chuckle at the firedog analogy. i never would have thought that unless you had said. you looked so cute! you'd be a cute firedog ;) it was awesome to chat with you for a while and yay on the 5K!

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  10. That Midway layout is insane (in a good way!). Also love all the paper strips on the Halloween LO. Looks like you had a lot of fun!

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