I have to say, I still enjoyed the show, but it has gotten a whole lot smaller. There is one less…read moreroom of vendors on the second floor and the whole room in the middle on the first floor is no longer. Some of the long time vendors are not there and there are a couple of new ones. Also, down to just 2 choices for food vendors. Dave's Coffee Cakes is still up on the second floor and still offering samples ~YUM. Parking is still free but people park so haphazardly that it can be almost impossible to get into your car and out of your space when you are finished and want to leave.

From the owner: Promoters of award-winning arts & crafts shows. Each show is brimming with row after row of…read morehandcrafted, one-of-a-kind home decor & gifts. Entertainment, food & drink & lots of family fun.

I've used them several times, they are always very helpful. All of our projects turned our…read morefantastic.

As I read through the other reviews I see that I'm not the first to run across Ms. Maryann's…read more(owner) nasty attitude. I had been saving up a visit to this art store as a treat to myself, because as an artist, to finally find an art store near home (La Grange), well, let's just say I was excited to find a local business with which to spend my money. With Blicks more than 15 miles away, I thought I'd hit the jackpot. WRONG. I walk in and was accosted by the owner. Maryann: "What's up"? Can you imagine my face? Imagine, shock, amazement...stopped in my tracks. Who greets a customer like this? Furthermore, do I know you? That you feel you can dismissively ask me, "what's up"? As if I'm interrupting you. OK, you know I'm thinking happy, happy--joy, joy when I arrived and she just BLEW THAT FEELING the moment I walked in the door! Me: (trying to recover and remember why I came) I'm looking for some art paper. Maryann: Bristol board? Me: Yes. But in tan or grey or brown. Maryann: That's not Bristol board. Me: (Thinking....ok.....so, what do you have?) The whole time, I'm still standing by the door because basically, she's working on framing (because I guess that's her bread and butter). And her back is to me. So I try again to explain what I want because she literally hasn't welcomed me or invited me to browse her store. And maybe I'm still a little in shock, so my feet are stuck. LOL But I'm looking around and I see mostly FRAMES. About 1/5 of the store is art supplies. When she finally decides to show me what paper she has, its in a cube, low on the floor. Each bundle wrapped in some old yellowed plastic with handwritten prices. So she points to the floor and says, this is what I have you can look through it. And she walks away. OK......So I get down on my knees and start looking. First trying to lift each packet of 24x28 paper, then deciding that's not going to work, and I don't want to ruin any paper. So, I bring out each packet, look at it, stack it beside me and go to the next one. Next thing I know, she's back again, standing 4 feet away asking, "Can I help you"? (asked in a way that I knew she meant the exact opposite) I look up at her thinking, wtf? But I say, "in what way"? She hesitates and then.... Maryann: Well, I'm pretty sure I don't have what you want. I'm thinking, wait a minute, what? Who says that to a customer? So, needless to say, I'm DONE with this whole scene, so I start putting the stuff back. Maryann: I'll put it back. Me: No I'll do it. Maryann: No, because you're putting it in wrong, the prices have to face out. I almost just threw the paper willy-nilly across the floor, but I didn't. I turned the blasted paper around so the prices faced out. So basically, she just came out from whatever the hell she was doing (instead of serving her ONE customer) to interfere with me going through her old ass paper because she didn't want the task of having to return it to its bin! When I was done, I started to say, "Wow, I'm really disappointed in my experience here". But I didn't get to finish because Miss Maryann said, "Well, I don't get a lot of requests for brown paper". That was it, I was out! OMG, this woman and her attitude! It's absolutely no surprise to me that her store was absolutely EMPTY. Typically my fellow creatives are friendly, curious and some may be introverted, but they're polite. Not this one. ARTISTS stay away from this hole in the wall. Pull up your big girl panties or jockeys and drive out to Blick's, Michaels or even Joann's Fabrics where customers are #1. Concordia University Chicago art department, this place is a big NO!

This Michaels has good staff, they are always very nice and attentive. and pickup is fast here too.read more

Stopped in to grab quite a few picture frames. Went to pay and line was 20 customers deep and not…read moremoving with one very slow cashier. Almost walked out which i saw 2 customers leave. After waiting 15 minutes with no movement I look and whoolha. 3 wide open self checkout stations. Got done paying and announced to the people in line who immediately started using them. Asked an employee why they don't let people know. He ignored me. Could care less.

Yay to more stationery stores out in the burbs! I came here for Stationery Store Day for the first…read moretime and I wish I had visited sooner! It's a very neat and clean shop. Stationery and stickers and other journaling goodies all around. There's even a space for events and I've seen some crafting events advertised there so it's good that it's a welcoming place! I got some bonus stickers with my purchase and I haven't figured out where to put them but I love stickers so much!

This is an awesome cozy stationary store. They got a great selection of notebooks of different…read moresizes everything is really high quality and very fairly priced. Would shop here again! Great service as well.

Whether you are a hobbyist or full-time professional Midwest Magic has all your needs. The latest…read moreand greatest effects are always there to be seen. Tim, the shops owner, has a vast knowledge of all things Magic. If you're anywhere near the area be sure to stop here in person otherwise you can shop online. Highly recommend!

They may have a lot of products but man does this place have some horrible customer service. Very…read moredisorganized, the owner doesn't seem to know where his stuff is and blames it on his staff. Never seen anyone else working there but whatever. I call and ask if they have a specific magic trick. The guy says they have it, so I drive on over. When I get there, he can't find it so he passes me a "similar" trick and says it's better. I decide to trust the guy and buy a couple more things. I try working the trick at home and realize it's super angle sensitive and the written instructions didn't help much. I decide to go back and get the Instructional DVD. I go back in and the guy spends half an hour with this other guy without asking if I need help. The other guy says to the owner that he can go ahead and assist the other gentleman. (Me) and the owner makes some offhand comment "oh he's not a gentleman" and proceeds to make other lame crappy jokes. Once he's finally done and tries to help me find the dvd, he can't find it, even though it's listed on their site. So I tell him how the written instructions aren't helpful. He basically tells me to go look online (which I've already done). There's nowhere else I could find it. So I ask about their return policy. "There isn't any" he says. Well I wish I knew that before I trusted this guy. So I'm about to leave and suddenly the guy finds it. I'm glad I didn't go there for nothing but then-- Here's the kicker. The guy decides to ILLEGALLY rip the DVD. He opens up the plastic, takes out the DVD and proceeds to rip it. I'm thinking-- how can this guy do that? Once it's done he gives me the DVD back and proceeds to play his ripped copy and walks to the back. So after all this I'm kind of annoyed and want to leave so I walk to the back and tell him I have to get going. He prices me out and I ask if he can give me a break on the price, since he now has a copy. This guy gets pissed off, snatched it out of my hand and says "Nah you don't need it" and puts it back. Well I'm not trying to waste an hour and a half so I tell him fine, I'll still buy it at full price. Which is ridiculous because he literally opened the packaging of the DVD and illegally ripped it. I purchase it and leave. This guy is shady and kind of a major jerk. I'm glad I didn't spend a ton of money here. Which I would have done in the future if he wasn't so rude. Not coming back. Save yourself some time and money and go elsewhere. Magic Inc is much better and so are some online sites.

I found Silhouettes by Erik (3rd Generation Silhouette Artist) at an event hosted by La La Land in…read moreElmhurst. I had also seen that there was a similar event hosted by another one of my favorite kid stores--Psycho Baby in Chicago. I remember sitting for a silhouette portrait when I was 5 years old and that picture hung in my parents house for years (sadly, I don't know what happened to it). So I thought a silhouette portrait of my son, would be a great gift to the grandparents! When I called to schedule my time, La La Land said it would only take 5 minutes. I said, Um, my son is 15 mos old, he doesn't know how to sit still yet. She assured me it would only take 5 minutes. Really? 5 minutes? I went ahead and scheduled it. Armed with toys, a bottle of juice and his favorite stuffed animal, I thought I'd have to entertain the Bubs during the whole time to be able to get this done. Boy was I wrong. Erik had it set up so the kids sit on a stool and watch a DVD (Finding Elmo on this particular day), that way he has clear view of his profile. And then he cut out his silhouette on black paper. WHAT? yes, cut out the silhouette FREE HAND while I made sure the bubs didn't wander off the stool to play with La La Land's toys. They were right, It took about 5-10 minutes from beginning to end. Although the heads of the little boy portraits are similar (pictures on his FB page), he really captured the shape of the Bubs nose and lips and the new cowlick that has developed since a recent hair cut. I purchased a few frames from Erik to make the present complete. With the frames and the silhouettes, these gifts are not cheap. Dropped almost a Benjamin for 3 silhouettes and 2 frames. But I'd do it again in a heartbeat to get a unique portrait and/or gift. His business card says he works at children's boutiques, preschools, special events, parties and weddings. This would be a great to have at a future birthday party for the bubs. Very talented. No place to add this on the business page, but you can find him on Facebook--facebook.com/eriksilhouettes

If you are into crafts this is your store. Check out the framing area in the rear of the store…read more They offer many options and I found the unique one for my project!

When it comes to framing I usually think that Michael's has the market kind of cornered but it's…read moretime to try some other (non-big name) shops after my recent experience. I needed some very simple mating for two prints (really nothing fancy, just basic) and had them made. Much to my dismay, upon getting them home, one fit and the other didn't. I returned to the store to have the issue fixed. The guy was nice about it and even agreed to mount and insert into the (very cheap) frames I already had given the mistake. But then things took a turn for the worse... A week went by and I heard nothing. Returning to the store, I happened to be in the area, I chatted with the framing department and, ultimately, the manager (?) - escalation on their side, not mine - and he was not very pleasant. In fact, he was down right combative and in-my-face about the fact that the work was not done and that I should simply wait for a call. Long story short, I did get a call and ultimately picked up my pieces - they look great by the way! So I'll chalk this one up to a stressful time of year and (other... :) ) frustrating customers.

Great selection and courteous customer service! They are really well staffed for a weekend…read more They have awesome sales, you can do many crafts for low cost. We went for a specific item which they were out of stock but we found it at another location. Special Shout to Denise... we had a full blown toddler tantrum. A customer was so rude and said shut up to my granddaughters crying. Denise quickly apologized and said we should not be embarrassed because this is a typical age for a toddler. It only lasted 3 minutes and she put herself to sleep right after. Thank you Denise for being so kind.

We were planning to decorate for Halloween and decided to check out this store. It's packed with…read morealmost everything you could possibly need! It's a one-stop shop where you can find all the decorations you're looking for. So convenient and well-stocked!

There are some really cute things in this store. If you need fancy paper, this is the place to be…read more But, if you also need a llama shape duster, come right now. They have cat magnets, cat sticky notes, llamas, unicorns, soft plush, toys, children's stuff, beauty stuff, kitchen stuff...all kinds of stuff. ....| \ _ , , , - - , , _ , .../ , ` . - ' ` ' . _ \ - ; ; ; , _ ..| , a - ) ) _ . ; . ( ` - ` - ' - ' ' - - - ' ' ( _ / . _ ) - ' ( _ \ _ ) 2019

I've always been a bit fan of stationery and have shopped at Paper Source both in person and…read moreonline. When I saw the Oakbrook Center mall directory, I was stoked to see Paper Source and that it was open until 9pm on a Monday evening. I naturally had to come in to check out the selection. It's dangerously addicting and it was hard to control myself from wanting to take the store with me. I came in wanting to see what I can get last minute for others but ended up spoiling myself -- self care, right. I found a cute journal that's good for up to 3 years, and it's a daily question you answer about self care which I think is truly necessary in these trying times. I can use some daily affirmations, and then I found these cute narwhal pens so I had to get them too. The staff were friendly and available as needed. I love that I wasn't upsold anything, I wasn't followed around, and I was given the space to do my thing. When I had questions the two ladies were more than happy to assist me, though they couldn't find an item I was looking for, I still appreciate their efforts and how they worked together. It's one of the better experiences I've had in person at Paper Source. I also wasn't pressured to sign up for anything. I do have to say that the Paper Source location I've been to in Chicago's Lincoln Park neighborhood does have a bigger selection than this one. However, the brand and this location is still pretty consistent, it just doesn't have everything and if they do it's in smaller quantities. I do recommend this location to anyone in the area looking for stationery items, greeting cards etc.

I have used Barrel Maker for a variety of things and they are always the bees knees. The customer…read moreservice is incredible, they are fast, and the products are always high quality. Can't recommend them enough!

Food could have been better. Food was cold.No taste! Bathroom should be checked for cleanliness.read more