So I am back from Craftcation 2015 and getting back into real life (why this post is so late!). Craftcation was really amazing! Fun crafts, great business classes and so many awesome people! I am going to do a quick (yeah right Jeni) recap of my long weekend!
I left really early Thursday morning for Sea Tac. First time taking Uber which was great! I accidently woke up Miss O kissing her goodbye and left Daddy with a sobbing 5 year old – oops! A lot of waiting when you travel by airplane these days – but I did take this pic of the sunrise over the airport. All pics were taken with my iphone 5S, since I didn’t want to lug the big SLR. So after a long day of travel – plane to Burbank – train (with a 2+ hour wait) to Ventura, I finally made it to Craftcation 2015!
I literally walked into the hotel and went straight to my first class – and I am glad I didn’t skip it! It was a Washi Tape Party with Alton Dulaney, sponsored by Scotch! And holy Scotch tape Batman, they gave us a lot of tape.
This was one of the projects we worked on, a cute spa party invitation. Check out that washi tape dispenser – so awesome!! After class, I got checked into the hotel and freshened up for the opening dinner that night.
Here are the fabulous Delilah Snell and Nicole Stevenson of Dear Handmade Life – the creators and organizers of the amazing Craftcation conference. The dinner was tiki themed complete with a paper volcano in the corner of the room! The food and drinks were yummy!
And of course the table decorations were adorable! They even treated us to hula dancers, who were awesome! The highlight of the dinner for me was to get…
the Abby Glassenberg to sign my Stuffed Animals book! I bumped into her at the hotel before dinner and introduced myself, so fun to finally meet one of my sewing idols! The next morning my day started off with another craft celebrity…
the utterly adorable Amy Tan(gerine)! She was teaching an embroidery (on paper) class that was a lot of fun. So many fun things to do with a needle and thread (crochet thread in this case). I made this cute card during the class.
And we got to take home some Amy Tangerine products to play with later!
Of course I had to dress up my name tag with the washi tape and thread I got! It is a crafty creative conference after all!
But of course what I was really there for was the amazing business classes! This is a picture of Abby Glassenberg teaching a class on email newsletter marketing (I highly recommend signing up for Abby’s newsletter). Such good information and of course I put a sign up on my website that night! The newsletter is in the works, but sign up to make sure you get my first edition!!
Learning at the beach, what could be better! Here is Ventura at dusk, I was walking back to the hotel after picking up my dinner of fabulous fish and chips at Beach House Fish on the pier. Over the course of the conference, I took business courses/panels on How you run your business, Email Marketing with Abby Glassenberg, Work/Life Balance (working with kids), Ecommerce class with Shopify, How to build a better blog with Tara Swiger, Power of Rejection with Tiffany Han, SEO with Sé Reed Media. And there were so many more that I wanted to take!
My last crafty class was a sewing class – yay! I got to make a scrunchie scarf on a very nice Bernina sewing machine. The instructor was Jenelle from Trashn2Tees – she was a kick and ordered mimosas for the 9am class!
On the last morning of Craftcation, I got to get a little fresh air and check out the surfers. The view really was beautiful!
And finally I was on my way back home, feeling refreshed and ready to see my family! It was an amazing experience where I learned a ton for my business and met some new friends! I can’t wait to do it again next year!
P.S. Don’t forget to sign up for my newsletter! I promise it will be fun!
