First up, you can find my highlights in My CHA Winter 2012 Favorites on my website The Nally Notes. How does this differ from the Hot Picks list that I’ll be posting soon? The Hot Picks list is intended to be a predictor of what the market in general is going to love, and what I heard buzz and excitement about at the show. My favorites list is simply an expression of my own taste – my personal wishlist of what I know that I want to play with that was on display at that show.

May and Melissa had an even harder time than I did narrowing down what they liked. They needed entire categories on their sites to show off what they thought about what they saw! You can find their pieces by browsing through the articles in the categories on their website:

• May: http://mayflaum.com/category/cha-project/
• Melissa: http://www.scrappyjedi.com/search/label/cha%20winter%202012

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Studio Calico | Abroad

“Abroad” is filled with great useful patterned papers, but they go above and beyond with garlands, fabrips, letter stickers, and shaped stickers that utilize map print. They also have die cuts and wood veneers of each state (USA), stamps, and more. The blues, greens, and neutral colors will be so versatile and would mix well with other brands as well as perfectly coordinate with existing Studio Calico products.

Tim Coffey for K&Co | Travel 2012

Focusing on tropical seaside paradise, this Tim Coffey collection is heavy on creams and brown, accented with coral, blues, and green. Postage stamps, sea life, shells, and palm trees are heavily featured in this line. Whether a day at the beach or a vacation to somewhere oceanside, this line will be fantastic for all things nautical. It manages to have a vintage flair but not over do it.

Janet Hopkins for Bazzill | Wayfarer

Janet Hopkins has released a new line of twelve papers (also available in a paper pad in 12×12 and 6×6 size) and a sticker sheet called Wayfarer. The line mixes trendy design elements with classic travel motifs and fairly neutral colors.

Webster’s Pages | Palm Beach

Whether you’re heading to sunny Florida or any tropical destination, this new line from Webster’s Pages will be amazing for your travel pages. Some of the patterns could be used for non-beach projects if the subject was wearing something that coordinated with the coral, blues, and greens in this line. I especially love the coordinating cameos being offered, which are so unique and beautifully themed to this line that I can’t wait to try them out.

Glitz Design | Happy Travels

Filled with color, florals, and plenty of airplanes, Happy Travels stood out from the crowd as being a travel line that is a bit unusual. A lot of the elements stood out and would work on their own, and many of the papers could easily work for layouts that had nothing to do with traveling. I really like the purple compass paper and the stickers and embellishments as well.

Heidi Swapp | No Limits

Listed as coming soon to Scrapbook.com, no limits was one of the lines that Heidi Swapp released in her new line of products through Pink Paislee. It features map-heavy designs and really great accents like dimensional stickers in Heidi’s signature font and great paper trim (both shown above). I like the general feel of this line, as well as how easily it could be used on general pages as well.

Tim Holtz Idea-ology | Destinations

Released in both a paper pad and stickers, Destinations is the new travel themed product from Tim Holtz. Many of his embellishments, die cuts, and stamps (both new and past) also coordinate with these offerings. I have worked extensively with this product to create CHA show samples (for Tim Holtz) featuring this line, and I have a layout to share with you here to show the line at work.

This line does offer some USA-themed parts, but overall is very flexible. I especially liked the tiny white and kraft stickers that are useful in both travel or general themed layouts.

There is definitely a map-heavy trend going on, something I like because it has a general explore feel to it without being too specific. Neutrals blues and greens rule, the addition of coral in several lines doesn’t surprise me as that is an emerging trendy color that we’ve been noticing. (Note: watch for Melissa’s article on that coming soon!)

Another emerging trend is the use of cameras – from Amy Tangerine’s new album covered with cameras to Echo Park’s paper filled with vintage inspired cameras, and die cuts, stickers, and more from other companies. Whether it’s travel specific or just used randomly, the camera is a very popular image these days.

There are other travel lines already out now including the Tropical Travelogue by Graphic 45 (already in stores), and I believe we will continue to see travel, journey, and other themed product that continues to balance between being useful for vacation scrapbooking and being able to be used for other themes and subjects as well.

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The photo above is from the Crate Paper booth, a company that is known for their amazingly detailed and beautiful offerings, and they’ve added some new designs into their mix this show as well.

Here are four new fantastic neutral button sets. Clockwise from top left we have Wendy Vecchi Studio 490 for Blossom Bucket, We R Memory Keepers, Jillibean Soup, and Basic Grey. I really like the unique textures and designs of each set, as well as the fact that they are neutral so they will work with any colors.

Now let’s look up close at a line that is filled with a lot of notions and button embellishments: French General for Jolee’s Boutique from EK Success. I really like that the line is organized by color, and how useful these pieces will be with the French General papers, or with any other brand as well.

Here is a close up shot of the new Dear Lizzy Neapolatin line buttons for American Crafts – I really like the wood buttons and I think it brings a fun texture to the offering.

October Afternoon has some buttons that are solid color, but done in such fantastic colors and with some great floral detail as well which will make them useful for all kinds of projects – and they’ll work with many other brands of papers as well.

Speaking of color, here are some more fun new choices: (left to right, above) Teresa Collins, Doodlebug, and Fancy Pants. All three mix great colors and a good variety of sizes as well in their offerings.

One of the cutest lines on the show floor – and some of the most unique buttons – are from Rhonna Farrer’s “Follow Your Heart” line for My Minds Eye shown above. I really like the trendy patterns and unique shapes used.

We are seeing buttons mixed in with other shapes and embellishments as well. Above is a new dimensional embellishment that in addition to birds also features adhesive-backed buttons with stitching.

Finally, let’s take a look at Buttons Galore & More [photos by Melissa Stinson]  - a long time manufacturer of buttons (and a Scrapbook Update sponsor). They have really great solid and basic buttons in a wide variety of styles. They also have some unique sets and shaped buttons as well.

Overall with a continued focus on vintage, rustic, and whimsical styles in paper crafting products that buttons go so very well with, I believe they will continue to be a popular item. There are some really interesting designs and types becoming available from painted to wood to other materials as well.

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In the Dear Lizzy line at American Crafts, Mason jars can be found on her paper, stickers, and a stamp as well as in the booth decor.

In Wendy Vecchi’s Studio 490 line for Stamper’s Anonymous, she has a Mason jar stamp and Art Part (chipboard-like material) available.

Here you can see the Art Part jar and stamp (which is the perfect size to stamp on top of it) in use together. The jar is layered in two pieces for dimension, and the back piece is cut out in the middle so that you can actually tuck things into your jar. I love this detail!

Vecchi also has a jar embellishment in her new line with Blossom Bucket as well. It is flat on the back so it can be adhered to any project easily, and it has a hole in the top that allows you to tuck in flower stems (or anything else you’d like) to fill it.

Crate Paper’s new Pretty Party line has a cute mason jar in the chipboard embellishment sheet.

Last but not least, let’s take a look at Jillibean Soup and their offerings.

This cute wreath made from Mason jar lids was displayed in their booth showing off some new papers. They also have paper featuring jars – many with cute tops and sayings on them.

Their Coconut Lime Soup line also has a coordinating stamp set (available through Unity Stamp Co.). Here is a project sample from the booth showing the stamps in action:

Overall I like the idea of Mason jars in crafting. It adds to the homemade, handcrafted movement that is so strong right now and works perfectly with the current trends of vintage, country chic, quilted elements, stitching, and more. I believe when the summer show comes around we may see even more of this shape in paper crafting lines and booth displays.

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The most exciting tags for me, are the Pink Paislee printed shipping tags. The printed style that they do can be accomplished at home with a plain shipping tag and digital kits, but it is time-consuming and difficult to get perfect printing all the way to the edges. These are beautifully done, and I can not wait to get them in my hands and create with them.

Their Indigo Bleu, Prairie Hill, and Spring Jubilee lines all offer these tags (6 per package) that perfectly coordinate with their papers and other embellishments. Left alone, or with the addition of inks, glitter, mist, or dimensional accents these tags could be so much fun on a variety of projects.

In paper form, Echo Park has a fantastic shipping tag design in their “Note to Self” line that begs to be cut apart, misted on, or used as a background for anything from a travel to everyday moments page.

If you are looking for smaller tags, American Crafts has great options with two of their celebrity designer lines. Here is a photo of the tags from Amy Tan’s Sketchbook line. I really like the scalloped top and how these could be just decorative or used as journaling tags.

The Dear Lizzy Neapolitan line is filled with soft colors and pretty accents, making these tags the perfect accent to complement them.

If you’re looking for something hand stitched and very unique, check out these tags from Studio Calico. These are one of my favorites of their releases (which were all fantastic!) – I can see so many ways to make use of these from stamping sentiments on them to hand writing journaling or using them as a layer in an embellishment cluster.

Next I want to mention the tags from Pebbles. They are kraft shipping tags – be still my heart! I love the decorative accents on these, and the size is perfect for embellishing.

Martha Stewart Crafts also has some great tags all decked out with baker’s twine and a country stitched look that will be perfect for spring and summer crafting.

If you are more into decorating your own tags, there are plenty of options for you as well. Core’dinations has some excellent new blank tags, and Ranger and Jillibean Soup have been producing blank tags for some time now that are great quality as well.

Any way you look at it – 2012 looks to be a year where I will be putting a tag on even more projects!

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