A Touch of Grace

I’m back!  What a whirlwind trip it was too!  I took my camera, my laptop, and my card reader thinking I would be blogging every day from Anaheim.  Little did I know how hectic and exhausting it was going to be!  I woke up last Saturday morning at 3:15 a.m. and flew to Anaheim.  I checked into the hotel and headed to the convention center to set up.  

The excitement of CHA was infectious, the show kicked off with these bagpipe players.

To add to the excitement Paris Hilton made an appearance.   Now for some this was incredibly exciting; so exciting that the masses filled into our booth and the booth beside us.  Fans were actually standing up on the displays in the booth beside ours and falling through the curtains into our booth, knocking down our displays.  We were blocked in our booth by the crowd for three hours.  Once Paris and her crowd left, we put our poor little booth back together again.  Unfortunately the damage was done to our curtains and we had problems with them the remainder of the show.

ETA:  I’ve received questions about why Paris Hilton would be at a craft and hobby show.  From what I understand a company paid for the use of her name on a product they are retailing.  I saw scrapbook albums and jewelry kits for little girls.  Paris came Sunday afternoon for photo ops and autographs.

Despite starting off with such a disastrous event for our booth, we had a wonderful time at CHA.  I met up with many friends and met new ones.  Here I am with Carolyn King (Cammie) and Carole Burrage (Tru Car Ma) at the My Favorite Things booth.

Sunday evening I was able to sneak away for dinner with the “dirty girls”.  What an event! It was so exciting to finally meet so many of the friends I’ve made at SCS.

Standing - Lisa Johnson; seated - Jenn Balcer and Natasha Trupp.

Jami Sibley and Michelle Giraud

Taylor VanBruggen and Lori Craig

Carole Burrage and Sharon Harnist

Sherrie Siemens and Jami Sibley (Taylor in the background)

Laurie Schmidlin and Carolyn King

Daven, Cindy Lawrence, and Tosha Leyendekker

Amy Sheffer and Carole Burrage

Lori Craig and Val Stangle

Me and Emily Giovanni.  Emily is the sweetest ever, totally precious!  I’ve decided that since I don’t have any daughters I’m going to adopt her.  Which will make me an instant grandmother as Emily has three adorable little boys.  Yikes, I’d better tell the hubby our family’s growing.   And Emily will need a sister, so I’ve decided I’m going to adopt Natasha as well.  Both these girls are totally adorable and were so much fun!

I taught a water color class at CHA and will be back tomorrow to post a tutorial of the picture we painted.