Check In Day Report follows:
What a day today! We have had SUCH a fun time - I mean seriously, how often do you get to leave a snowy place, head into a warm climate with stampers, swapping, new catalogs, exciting new announcements, and MORE?! I'm here with Angela, one of my downline, and it's her first time to ANY convention of any type! Watching her walk around giddy as we meet the 'famous players' actually almost had me on my knees several times... don't believe me? let me share...
First, you have to know that Ange is a total 'blog-stalker' (ok, so am I, but this story is about HER, not me!) ;) - that means she has about 15 blogs that she visits every day - people whose work she respects and admires - ok, not just admires, but idolizes, adores, and, let's just get down to it - she worships the stamping ground that they walk on... ahem. Her favourite of favourites is Patty Bennett, who has a pretty darn fine blog, if I do say so myself. The first day, she just about split her pants in the Momento Mall as she hid behind my back and hissed to me, "it's PATTY.. PATTY BENNETT! oh my gosh - she's right there in real life! What do I do????" I calmly told her that I had met Patty at Founders Circle, and she was really nice - just go up and talk to her - swap with her, you know! "WHAT?! SWAP with her?? What if she says no?!" she said to me, shocked at the suggestion.
Well, of course now the gauntlet was down - off I shoved her, with instructions to tell Patty that she stalked her blog, and she was her number one adoring fan. Sure enough, Patty was awesome, Angela was happy, and came back to report that "she really IS nice - she's just lovely!" (although she still forced me to execute the swap on her behalf afterwards!) LOL
The story doesn't end there though - after getting our Lovely Loot Bags while we made our way back to the hotel, Angela stops in her tracks, in the middle of the *street* (she's always paranoid that I take too long to cross them!), and says 'Oh NO!' while standing like a deer in the headlights. Worried, I stopped and asked her if she forgot her purse or something! But no - she is staring ahead of me, at a figure hurrying along towards us on her way to the Conference. "That's, that's, SHELLI GARDNER! IT'S HER!' She half crumpled to her knees, and starting giggling like a little girl, catching Shelli's attention. In typical, graceful Shelli fashion, Shelli gave her a smile, as though people always break down into fits when they see her, and as Ange said to her 'I'm sorry, I just went into shock a bit when I saw YOU out here on the street!', Shelli responded with 'I KNOW, and I'm late again!' - with an apologetic smile, she rushed off.
That's one of the cool parts of convention - YES it's cool to get the bags, the gifts, the freebies, the CATALOG, the sneak peeks and more, but in some ways what's cooler is meeting these people who you only read about in real person, and find out that they are people too. It's about seeing someone as successful and as Shelli and it being a reminder of the potential each one of us carries within. For a moment I think we all get humbled by the magnitude of these 'celebrities'' personalities, but also by their own 'realness' and humanity. If that's not inspiring, what is?!
Ok - in other notes - today was awesome - we got the new catalogs, and dare I even BREATHE any of it to you?! OMG - we're talking AMAZING accessories pages - as in, the best I've ever seen! SO MANY OPTIONS! And so many new products!!! WOW! AND, there are some DSP surprises in store for you as well, as well as amazing new stampsets. I don't want to wreck the surprise for you, but rest assured - THIS IS GOING TO BE GOOD! Make sure you sign up for one of my Open Houses on January 24th (I'm holding two now, so everyone can be more comfortable) - morning OR afternoon, and you can now RSVP online! Just go to my blog to sign up.
We also went to this AMAZING tapas restaurant - me, Ange, and my SAM, Sam. :) Fantastic food, good people, and lots of great conversation that went all over the map! So much fun. What a great day!
More soon! I can't wait to show you more samples - the samples I am getting are just awesome!! Off to bed now - it's already 1:30am!!!
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