CHA report - Day 3

Sorry I was not able to post yesterday. My wireless connection in the hotel room was sketchy at best and last night it wouldn't work at all.
Then this morning, I thought I would blog from the airport, but I found out I had to pay $7.95 per day for a connection at LAX, so I said "forget it".

So I'm home now.... and let's see what I can remember, LOL!!

Let's start with Queen & Company. Tons of new brads, sequins, jewels, felt ribbon, etc in fun color schemes. Here's a sample of the "Bold Sequins":
These will start shipping in March. We'll keep you up to date.

Next, I must tell you about this faboulous line of breathtaking papers from France. The company is called Rouge de Garance and their papers have been a huge hit in France, but until now, not available in the USA. I purchased their entire paper line (except for the background papers). Here's a teaser images. We should have these in about 2 weeks!! I will put all the images on the website this weekend.

For the Brits out there, I met Alan & Barry, famous on UK television for their craft shows. They had some fabulous clear stamps and peel off stickers in matching "step by step" geometric designs. I purchased 8 different ones (they had many more) to test the market. The stamps can be used on their own (like "outlines" stamps) but can also be coupled with the matching peel off stickers to add a metallic touch.

Speaking of metallic, I stopped at the We-R-Memory Keepers booth (mainly to purchase the Crop-A-Dile... which I did) and bought their entire new line of "metallic" papers, embellishements, etc. I can't remember the exact name of the line, and I don't have it in front of me, but it's very nice. Probably won't be here till March as well.

Maya Road was a booth were I spent a lot of time (and money) buying up most of their new chipboard books, chipboard shapes, ribbons and ribbon slides. Great designs!! Can't wait to get those on my shelves!!!

7 Gypsies also had their usual fantastic selection of collage type items. Tons of great stuff coming, including some new "expressions" stamps in oval shapes, new papers, stickers, and much more.

Going back on something I mentioned Monday: the Bind-it-All binding machine... I must say, I went back to their booth and ordered 2 more items: the chipboard book covers, and their book paper cutter. I didn't quite understand the cutter at first,but after seeing it in action, I had to have it. It will accurately cut pages for your little books in a jiffy. I'll explain more over the weekend in a special feature on this product. I'll also be offering a fantastic drawing for great prizes with special order packages. More on this later.

Towards the end of the day, I stopped at Dreamweaver's booth where they had lots of new stencils and 12 new colors of Memories Mists. They will be available in mid-March.

One last thing before I go to bed... and I'll post more this weekend. While in the new exhibitors area, I spotted a digital die cut machine under production. It won't be ready til July or so... but it is what we have all been waiting for. This little machine will cut shapes from 1" to 5" (adjustable in 1/2" increments). The cartridges will hold an alphabet and several shapes all on a standard SD type memory card. The machine will be about $150 and the cartridges about $50... but THE most exciting thing is it will have a cable interface and software to make your OWN cartridges (from true type fonts and any design you want) from your PC or Mac. Yes! Mac!!! Mac users won't be left out of this!!!

Oh.... one more thing.... those of you who have been asking me about a UK product called the "bookatrix", I finally found it. Right now, they have 8 templates, but are looking for a US distributor. They won't sell to US companies until they find a US distributor. They said within 2 month, they should be all set up. These template boards are great.... It's hard to tell from the picture below what they do, so I'll give you more details if you don't already know about them.... More this weekend.

Oh.... yet one more thing. I found some great 3-D cutting papers from Germany. These are different from the Dutch ones as they are embossed and have gold printed accents. This means they are easier to use as you just cut and stack them... no need to do the shaping part. I also found the perfect little spring action scissors for cutting the intricate designs. I purchased about 40 patterns in this line. Each sheet will be about $2 and give you 2 or more projects per sheet. I was very impressed with the quality of these.

Well, that's enough for tonight.... I'm pooped and need to get to sleep.

I'll post more this weekend after I go through my notes.

-Fran

Tweet

CHA report - Day 2

The first thing I did today was go back to the LuminArte booth to get the names of the colors of the new Radiant Rain mists and daubers.
-Mists will come in 12 scrumptious colors: Coral Berry, Irish Mist, Fern, Sky Blue, Cranberry, Guartamalan Green, Periwinkle, Lemondrop, Key Lime, Jasper Red, Pink Grapefruit and Golden Bamboo. Price for the Mists will be $4.99 ea.
-Daubers will come in 12 delightful shades: Mallard Green, Sunburst, Snapdragon, Olive Vine, Hot Cinammon, Pink Azalea, Teal Ziricon, Magestic Blue, Wine & Roses, Spiced Pumpkin, Nutmeg and Yellow Rose. Price for the Daubers will be $5.99 ea.
(and of course, I will offer a special for orders of all of them!! )


Now.... I must tell you about the most exciting product I saw today. A wonderful new BINDING SYSTEM!!! Better than anything I've seen before.
This binder makes very professional books at a reasonable price.
First, I'll tell you about the machine. It punches through 10 sheets of paper at a time with ease, or through chipboard! You can cut any size paper (by moving the paper and aligning with previous holes).
The binding is wire combs. The same machine is used to put the combs on. And the price is only $59.99!!
The combs come in 5 thicknesses and 5 colors. Such fun!!
The picture below illustrates how it works and what the binding looks like.

Next, I stopped at Tsukineko's booth. They have 2 new colors of Brilliance inks which will be out in April.... as well as 2 older colors no available in Dew Drops (lime and gamma green).

Tsukineko also said their GLUE PAD is finally finally coming. Yes, I know we have all been waiting well over a year for this, but it will finally be available in April/May. The pad will come WITH a reinker, and extra reinkers will be available. It will be different from the current glue pad by Stewart Superior in that you won't need to heat the ink to activate it. We ordered 150 of them and will start taking pre-orders soon. I will do that through the newsgroup... so stay tuned there.

That's not all folks....

Basic Grey is gracing us with 4 new beautiful lines at the end of February. Of course, I ordered them all! I will be putting them on my website mid-February.

Other fabulous paper lines I picked up today were from Autumn Leaves, Paper Adventures, Fancy Pants, Karen Foster, etc...

Speaking of Autumn Leaves, they have 20 new clear stamps!! I ordered them all of course! Look for a new book featuring clear stamps as well. This whole line is suppposed to come out in March.

Switching back to stamping.... Tim Holtz and Ranger are coming out with 12 new colors of the Distress embossing powders to match the 12 distress inks that came out last year. Look for those in late March.

Ranger also re-designed the whole Adirondack/Seabrights/Seashell line. The Seabrights and Seashells inks will be "sort of" discontinued..... but not really. They will be re-packaged into a whole series to match the Adirondack daubers line. So everything will be like the Adirondack daubers: 12 earth tones, 12 brights, 12 pastels. The current 10 seabrights and 10 seashells will be re-named and 2 colors each added, so all the names will match the Adirondack daubers. The CURRENT Adirondack inks have 24 colors.... so those will all remain, which means there will be more earthones than the other ranges... It's going to be a bit confusing at first, but nice and more contiguous when it's all in place. Also, the embossing powders in this line will be expanded. The pads themselves will be redesigned so they are NOT a hinged box as now, but a top & bottom and stackable.

Tim Holtz is coming out with great carrying cases for inks, powders, color washes, etc. Nice tins with compartments for storing all your Tim Holtz stuff neat and organized.

PUNCHES --- are you punch crazy? OK, Punch Bunch is coming out with several new punch shapes. I'll keep you posted on those soon..... Fiskars has new "oval" border punches, much like their border and circle ones.... but they make ovals. And I will be stopping at McGill's booth tomorrow to order their new punches.

Dutch paper craft lovers, I have lots for you too:

-Dozens of new Peel Off stickers from Starform, Mark Richards, and more

-Pergamano supplies. I will now be carrying basic Pergamano supplies including books, tools, vellum and starter kits. I will also be able to special order ANY Pergamano products you wish (paints, books, patterns, shading tools, tints, etc)

-New stencils & books, of course. I can't recall all the lines I ordered, but there are a lot of new ones.

-New 3-D cutting papers..... at least 40 new ones: flowers, animals, holiday, and more. And 2 new books FILLED with cutting papers at a GREAT value: $15 for over 20 sheets of papers, every sheet different, so you get a ton of variety at huge savings.

There was more, but I can't remember it all.... I'll have to wait til I get home and unpack/sort it all to fill you in.

I wish I had more pictures for you, but my digital camera ran out of juice today and I didn't pack that charger. DUH!!

More tomorrow!!

-Fran

Tweet

CHA new products - Day 1

Woooooh, I'm tired!!
Day 1 at CHA and my feet are already hurtin'

So what great new things did I see?

Let's start with a great new product from the LuminarArte people (makers of the fantastic Twinkling H2O's paints): Radiant Rain Mists and Daubers. 12 colors in each line (24 total items). Beautiful shimmery colors, great for backgrounds and using directly on stamps. A must have.
I will have more info on this soon.... as well as an opportunity to order the whole set at a great price.

Next, Prima had of course tons of new flowers.... and papers.... and bling type stickers. I especially loved the big mesh flowers pictured below:
There were 12 colors and 4 styles per color... but I only purchased 1 style per color to test these out. They also had other great new flowers which I will add to the website when they come in.

This next photo is of the new exciting tool by Karen Foster: the Scraparatus
It's kinda hard to tell just from a picture, but basically, it's a little tiny die cutter, eyelet setter and pounder. The tool has different tips you put on. One is a pounder type tool which you use with tiny dies, or to flatten things. Another tip is for setting eyelets, another for making the little eyelet hole, etc. Very neat!! The little dies are too cute!! The starter kit come with 2 little dies (a flower and a tag), with other little die kits sold separately.

From Karen Foster, I also picked up their ENTIRE new line of papers, stickers, brads, embellishments, etc.... so look for many many new Karen Foster products.

From HEIDI SWAPP -- a TON of new things too. Great new masks, fantastic new larger ghost shapes, beautiful ribbons at $1 per little 3 foot spool, oh gosh... wait til you see it all.

SEI had 2 beautiful new lines: Morning Meadow (very soft and pastel) and Citrus (bright bright bright). You will flip for these.

Next, Crafter's Workshop is at it again with fantastic templates for doodling. I can't remember how many different ones they had, but needless to say, I got them all. :-) I also got their new line of papers.

Of course, that's not all. I also picked up Imaginesce's new lines of ... well, everything: papers, flowers, brads, you name its. My favorites are the new curdoroy brads!!! Warm!

Let's not forget the new Daisy D's lines... those should be available around March (which is pretty standard for basically almost everything we purchased at the show)

Oh... 2 more quick things:
-I found the BEST vellum adhesive from Glue Arts (not Glue Dots).... this adhesive is TRULY transparent on vellum and transparencies, and strong!!!!
-Around the Block had a gazillion great new things... ordered it all of course. My fave is the "tape writer kit" which is a lot like the old office label makers.... with fun colors of tape!!!!

Time to hit the sack. I will bring you a few more pictures tomorrow evening.

Hugs,
-Fran

Tweet

On my way to CHA

I'm on my way to CHA!

CHA is the Craft & Hobby Association's big convention where all the companies release their new products. This show happens twice a year: January and July.

So I'm at the airport waiting for my flight to Los Angeles. Hopefully, I will have access to the internet from my hotel room, and I can post about all the new stuff I am finding at the show.

Right now, my flight is delayed. (JOY!!)...... So I'm wasting time..... LOL!

See ya guys soon!
-Fran

Tweet

Winter Wonderland

I wish everyone the happiest holiday season.

Here's a pic of one of our trees this morning. It's cold!!! No what you see is NOT snow, it is freezing fog. It's been like this for 3 days straight now. The thing is we are not used to this here in the Rogue Valley. It's quite unusual for us to have cold weather like this. But is sure is pretty.

Too bad there is no heat in the warehouse.

Tweet

EK Extravaganza

I just got back from 2 fun-filled days in Las Vegas at the "EK Extravaganza". This is an event put on by EK Success where we take classes making projects, learn about the new products they have coming out, place our orders and generally have some fun.

EK Success has lots of exciting new product coming out in the next few months:

December: a new lightbox called the Merry Glo-Round (I think that's the name, LOL), which is a lightbox that rotates so you can move your work to more easily see what you are doing without have to reposition everything. Price is $49.99. I'll have more details on my website within the next few days.
There are also lots of new stickers, accordion albums, baby items, etc

For January, they are introducing new punches. Four of them are pop-up punches (paw print, teddy bear, present, and rose..... two more punches are the Retro Flower in a medium size and a medium size support ribbon (punch it out of any color to coordinate with the cause).

Also in January, we are looking at many many new stickers including Phrase Café epoxies, metal signs, lots of new beautiful Jolee's, great papers in bright colors, a line of cap & gown dimensional embellishments including tassels in many school colors, and the cutest baby gift packs consisting of a newborn size jumper that baby can wear for real packed with a miniature size matching replica so you can scrap baby's picture with the matching embellishment!

In March, EK is releasing some GREAT new tools. I am really excited about the March release. We got to try a few of the new tools and also were able to see others demoed.
First is the Cutterfly, which basically looks like a Swiss army knife, but instead of "manly tools", it folds out to unveil scissors, a paper piercing tool, tiny tweezers, a file for distressing, etc.
Next is the Circle Scissors Plus, which is used to both DRAW and CUT circles of any size. The tool is very easy to use. It has a blade which adjusts with a screw type mechanism so you control the exact size of your circle. Or, you can replace the blade with a unit that holds ANY pen/pencil/marker like a drill holds a drill bit, and you can draw circles. A neat idea is to draw a circle with a marker, then cut your circle slightly bigger for a faux matting effect without the bulk.
But that's not all, they also have a cute little tool called the Piercing bug. This is SOOO fun. Comes as a set of both piercing bugs. One has a wheel that makes a single row of holes, and the other is a double row. The holes are tiny, just big enough for doing paper embroidery or placing a brad. So you can simply make a line of evenly spaced holes by rolling the tool along your paper, then you can stitch using the holes and your stitching will be straight.

What, you want more? OK, also in March, the most exiting tool I have seen in years: The 1-2-3-D Paper Crafter. OMG, this is neat!!! It's a set of templates/mats to create basically any size/shape of box you can imagine. It will come with an instruction booklet AND a DVD. Some of the boxes they had on display were made from old greeting cards, pictures, calander pages, and of course patterned paper. The boxes ranged from your normal square and rectangles (in many sizes, totally adjustable) to mini purses, a "shoe" box (shaped like a shoe), pillow boxes, reverse pillow boxes, octagon boxes, and cards that open to pop-up paper cutting. The possibilities with this tool are endless, and the price point is great at only $39.99. I think this will be a must have tool for every paper crafter.

Of course, in March we will also be seeing more new papers, more new stickers, and some wonderful chipboard coin albums, gift bags and boxes, and more.
(hint: if you love Muppets, stay tuned!!!!!)

Happy Crafting!

-Fran

Tweet

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Happy Turkey Day everyone!

We're gearing up for a busy busy season. This week, we uploaded all kinds of cool gift ideas to the site. See www.franticstamper.com/gift.htm. We're also awaiting some exciting new products.
As usual, I've been so gosh darn busy that I've not taken the time to update this blog in a while. Maybe some day I will get the hang of doing it every morning, LOL! We shall see.

Thought I would share another card with you. This one was made with one of my stamp which you can find at www.franticstamper.com/stamps.htm. The stamp is #138-02P.

Enjoy!!!
-Fran

Tweet

Fun weekend (Oct 14)

Spent a fun little weekend in Bend, Oregon recently. Here are a few pictures of a project we did. I'll post a few more pictures later (the other 2 tins, and some other items we made)

There were 5 of us there: Char (black shirt/Red hair), Aleta (in the black & white shirt), Jo (in the dark gray shirt), Cindy (in blue) and myself.


Gotta get back to work now!

Hugs,
-Fran

Tweet

Long time no write

I haven't been very good at updating this blog..... so a quick note today.

We're again SUPER SUPER busy here at Frantic Stamper. Last week, the Carol Duval TV show re-ran an old program showing projects using a Silhouette Heart punch which we stock. We had over 150 orders for it, and of course not enough of the product to ship out to everyone... but that has sure kept us hopping!!!

Then, this Monday, the 12 new colors of Twinkling H2O's arrived... Needless to say, I'm up to my eyeballs in Twinkling H2O orders. :-)

There are so many new products arriving almost daily. I find every minute of spare time (spare time? what's that?) adding stuff to the site, e-mailing vendors for images (some are NOT very responsive). I resolve NOT to buy anything where the vendor won't provide website images!!!!! That's my NEW rule!!! LOL!!!

This weekend, I'm off to a little stamping gathering in Bend (Eastern Oregon) with 4 friends from the Stamper's Life yahoo list. A much needed rest for sure!!!

See ya when I get back! (I'm taking my digital camera with me so I can take pics and post them here)

Hugs always,
-Fran

Tweet

Back to work... busy busy busy!

It's been 10 days since my last blog entry.... sigh.... Sorry about that.
We had a wonderful scrapbooking weekend. Cindy and I made 12 pages and a few cards. I'll upload them here in the days to come, and probably also upload a few to the two peas gallery. Someday I might even have time to make a gallery on my site. LOL!!

So it was back to work Monday. Lots of orders to take care of. :-) It's a good thing, but it doesn't leave much time for fun stuff like uploading our creations! Well, that's what weekends are for, right?

Below is a scan of a card I made a year ago during a card making weekend in Washington with my friend Kathy (owner of Rubberstamp Avenue) and my friend Barbara whose house we stayed at. The card uses a paper from Provo Craft as the background. The column is one of my stamps (see www.franticstamper.com/stamps.htm). The "Explore" sticker is from the Junkitz Tim Holtz series (www.franticstamper.com/timholtz.htm). I first applied the sticker to gold cardstock and trimmed it close, then matted it with black. The round tags are Lalique tags found at www.franticstamper.com/collage.htm. The tags don't come with letters on them... those are rub ons. Oh, and the little tag that says "the" on it is actually a brad by Provo Craft (www.franticstamper.com/brads-provo.htm) on which I first sanded to take most of the paint off, then used a rub on over top.

Tweet