CHA Trip

What a fabulous time I had going out to Indiana to see Joan and Jon then off to CHA.  Joan organized a day for me to meet some of our followers.  We all enjoyed a wonderful lunch and lots of time to visit. In the afternoon I showed them how to create a couple of flowers and furnished a box for them to decorate.  Joan has the names of everyone  listed on her blog.  Many of these wonderful ladies drove 5 to 6 hours.  I want to thank all of them for taking the time to come spend the day with us.

I flew in to South Bend, Indiana so I could spend some time with Joan and Jon before going to CHA. I have wanted to see Notre Dame and they took me on a tour.  What a beautiful campus.  Joan also took me shopping and lunch at a great place called the Village.    It was so fun to get to spend a day shopping with Joan.

I got to enjoy so much great food on this trip.  I only took a picture of this one meal.  I was amazed when I saw this and had  to send this picture to my husband.  This is a Chicago pizza.  Oh my -- you can only eat one piece but so delicious.  Every day we dined at some of the most popular restaurants in Chicago.  Another fabulous entree was one Joan ordered at a different restaurant.  It was pasta placed in a huge wedge of cheese that was hollowed out, stirred around scrapping the cheese off the bottom and sides, then scooped out onto a plate.  Joan said it was so delicious.  

This is the group I hung out with at CHA -- Bette, Cathy, and Joan.  Cathy is Joan's niece.  She is such a great organizer and kept Joan and me on track all through the show.  She is such a fun person to hang out with.  Bette is such a sweet person and I loved that we got to spend a lot of time with her too.  Joan and I had so much fun checking out all the new products and deciding what all of you would like to see in her store.  We found lots of great things but one we are both really excited about is the EBosser, which is a new electronic die cutting machine. It will emboss 8.5" x 11" card stock and the other fabulous thing is that it won't allow improper "sandwiches" to go through that will jam the machine.   Joan has posted a video on her blog about this new machine.  Joan and I will have one in a couple of weeks and we will be able to tell you more about it then.

 We had fun dressing up at the Graphic 45 Booth to have our photo taken.
Left to right - Bette, Cathy, me, and Joan sitting.

I loved to hang out at the LaBlanche booth and watch Jacqueline create her beautiful cards.

Tim Holtz always has amazing demonstrations.  Joan and I hung out at Tim's booth a lot and learned lots of new things we plan to share with you. 

On the last day, we all had an opportunity to get a picture taken with Tim Holtz and his team.  We all received an autographed stamp set too.

 This is a picture of Pam (Stampin' Pam).  She took me to a fabulous restaurant for dinner and we had a wonderful time visiting.

One of the fun things about going to CHA is seeing so many people you know only through blogging.  I had many people, I don't know, come up to me and say they follow me on my blog.  It was so exciting to see them.  I think we all love Becca (www.amazingpapergrace.com)   and her beautiful work.  I had the honor to meet her.  This is a picture of me, Joan, and Becca.

 I was excited to visit the Heartfelt Creations booth to meet Linda Bontrager and Emma Lou Beechy.  I only have this one picture but many were taken of all of us.  This is is picture of Linda, me, and Joan standing in front of the beautiful July release display.  You could spend hours looking at all the gorgeous projects created by the design team.

This is a picture of  Angelica Turner (http://bellisimavida.blogspot.com/) and me. She was working in the Heartfelt Creations booth.  We served on the same design team and I was so happy to have the opportunity to meet her.  

Joan, Cathy, and I ended our stay in Chicago having lunch with Bette.  I went back to Joan's house so we could finalized the projects for Joan's workshop next month, then came home yesterday.  I had a fabulous time.

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