I attended the Stamp Scrap Art Tour (http://www.stampscraparttour.com/) in Rockford, Illinois on March 14, 2009. There were 20 different vendors of stamping, scrapbooking, and card-making supplies. This was the first large show I have attended, and I was greatly pleased. I spent about 4 hours at the tour, and could have easily spent the entire day. There were many make-n-take projects as well as technique demonstrations. The vendors were highly knowledgeable and very friendly.
My main purpose in attending was to meet Wendy Wyman, who owns and is the artist for Repeat Impressions (http://www.repeatimpressions.com/), which is based in Freeport, Maine, and for whom I design cards as a member of her design team. She was busy demonstrating how her "flip stamps" could be used to make really fun interactive cards when I arrived at her booth. She took a few minutes to talk to me and tell me how rubber stamps are made. I was pleased to see several of the cards I had designed on the display boards. It was a pleasure to meet the lady behind all the great stamps.
The booth for Rubber Cottage (http://www.rubbercottage.com/) was very busy. They have beautiful animal and scenic stamps. I bought stamps of a fawn and a bird's nest. There were some other stamps I wanted, but I only had a limited amount of money to spend, and most of it was spent at the Just for Fun booth.
At the Just for Fun (http://www.jffstamps.com/) booth, I watched a demonstration of how to use their faux postage stamp and template to create cards that looked like postage. The demonstrator also explained how to use the same technique to recycle old greeting cards or to add a twist to a photograph. This concept really appealed to me, and I had to buy a faux postage stamp, template, and the decorative postage stamp scissors. I made cards using the stamp and template for my card club and everyone was wild about them. I also bought several unmounted stamps. I have visited their website since my return home, and I have a very long wish list!!
Several people were crowded around the demonstration area at the Stamp On It (http://www.stamponit.net/) booth. The demonstrator there was showing shoppers how to use the Cuttlebug die cut machine. The great thing is, a lot of the dies she was using will work in other die cut machines. She used embossing folders, Spellbinders, and even a brass template for dry embossing. She explained all the various layers you need to build to create a good embossed image when using each of these various methods. She certainly made it look easy and I will be pulling out all those dry embossing templates to try!
The folks at Tessler Stamps/Stencils Co. (http://www.tesslerstamps.com/) were also demonstrating dry embossing using a light box. I really enjoyed seeing the demonstration on using embossing paste. A good tip is to tape your template on the sides and on the top when putting your paste on. To remove the embossing template after you have applied the paste, remove the tape from the sides, and use the piece of tape on the top like a hinge, so you don't have to worry about smearing the embossing paste.
Darcie's Country Folk (http://www.darcie.com/) have some very cute stamps. I sat down to do a make-n-take using shrinky dinks printed with a clip art image from one of Darcie's CDs. This was a really fun technique and I will have to visit the web site to order some shrinky dinks paper.
Sweet Impressions (http://www.sweetstamps.com/) stamps are very romantic and pretty. The demonstration at this booth was embossing on vellum. The stamps on display were mainly unmounted, but I ordered some mounted ones from their website. The stamps are very nice quality.
Stamp La Jolla (http://www.stamplajolla.com/) had a fun make-n-take using twinkling H2Os and sugar dust. They had several beautiful floral designs, and I really like their Christian bookmark stamps.
There were several drawings for $100 throughout the day. It was exciting to hear the cheers when someone's number was drawn. Two huge baskets filled with products were also raffled off.
I had a terrific time at the Stamp Scrap Art Tour and would highly recommend that anyone who has the opportunity to attend should plan to spend the day...and lots of money!! Be sure to check out their website (http://www.stampscraparttour.com/) to see where their tour will be taking them next.
