* * * * * THREE - THE END * * * * *

The saga continutes . . . .

SATURDAY (7/19/08)
7:00 – 8:00 Breakfast, Earhart Hall
I already told you I wasn’t doing THAT again… ate a scrumptious breakfast ($10, it ought to be, right?) at the Holiday Inn. Cindylynne asked to PLEASE let her sleep as she wanted to sleep on…. It was ok by me, this is a fun trip after all. I took the free Trolly from hotel to Purdue – arrived in time for last half of Tim McCreight’s Session. Trolly takes a bit longer to arrive then if we had driven over and parked in the school’s garage.

9:00 – 10:00 Tim McCreight Session - He gave a great talk about design and how it has been used through the ages.

10:00 – 11:00 Jabbered away in the hallway and went to talk to the Vendors again

11:00 – 12:00 Seminars, we had our choice of:
Vera Lightstone, “Expressive Faces & Hands”
Ed & Martha Biggers, “Techniques for Glass”
Hattie Sanderson, “Developing the Artist Within”

I picked Hattie’s as I had seen the others and also wanted to be sure to keep one of the best for last. Kinda like eating the desserts after your meal… Oh boy was I ever thrilled. I guess Hattie is now one of my favorite teachers in the Whole Wide World. She is a born speaker, teacher and leader. Her art is exciting. For the first time -ever- I understood more about mental exercises to jump start creativity. Golly. She gave ideas on how to do this as a group as well. From how to use your sketch book to the steps to really making a piece right step-by-step from idea to finished piece, she told it all to us. Alas, again no stinkin’ handout. I can’t write that fast, people…. So disappointing. But I got a lot written down, and she did offer for us to come up and run through the slides again, but I had no time as I needed to be somewhere else at 12:30…. Sharp!


12:30 – 12:50 My special 1-2-1 Interview with Don Fredlich.
At registration we were given the opportunity to sign up for 20 minutes with a Guru. Since I had a booth selling my Personalized Name Stamps from 1:30 – 3:30, I needed an early time if could even do this at all. I was happy to get Don Fredlich, our featured speaker for the convention. He is former President of SNAG and has done fantastic art pieces as well. http://web.mac.com/friedlich/iWeb/www.dfriedlich.com/Welcome.html

OK, I’m a woos I know it now. I love to make art – people are buying my pieces so others must like what I do - yet I can’t seem to get the intestinal fortitude I need to get my Portfolio together and approach a real life Gallery. Yes, I have some fused glass pieces at a new gallery in a small town here in Texas and I’ve had my things in Cindylynne’s store, Blue Coyote Jewelry, but that’s not what I’m talking about. After talking to me and looking at some of my pieces, Don told me, some artists either do one or the other - - - “Ready, Aim, Fire” and others - “Ready, Aim, Aim, Aim, Aim, Aim - - - - - “ get the picture? He said it was time for me to “Fire”. He also advised that I get some help with the Name Stamps as it is taking up WAAAAY too much time giving everyone so many selections. No wonder nobody was offering these name stamps for sale before now. :-D They are a lot of work.

1:30 – 3:30 Show ‘ Sell on 3rd Floor of the Stewart Building
Yes, you’re right, I wasn’t able to eat lunch. Aaarugh, should have brought some peanut butter crackers, but just didn’t know where to get them.

This was probably the most fun I’ve had in a very long while. I have always loved the part of my former life which included working a booth. I am a Certified Professional Demonstrator (CPD) and Certified Professional Teacher (CPT) with CHA, Craft and Hobby Association when I was a rubber stamp artist. I loved the travel and the teaching of ink and paper arts. I felt like I was at a wholesale convention once again…. It was also delightful to meet many of the people that I’ve sold a name stamp to – putting a name with a face was great! AND I met many, many, many more who were interested in having one of my little bitty stamps. Downside: the lighting where I was located was so bad nobody could see much. We moved the table, but it didn’t help much. Also I never got to see anyone else’s things. Bummer. I had wanted to see too. Oh well, I’ll plan better next time somehow. Maybe I’ll get someone to relieve me for 20 minutes or so. I printed up 150 flyers and didn’t have enough for everyone – how cool is that? I put away my booth and made it back in time for the Charms For Charity drawings at 4:00.

4:00 – 4:50 Charms For Charity
What a great outpouring of love, compassion and coming together! Holly Gage, Carol Hamilton, Sarah Triton and many, many others really gave it their all. This all started with an idea that Sarah had to honor our deceased friend, Robin Whittemore who passed away. Robin wasn’t able to go to a conference because she was headed for more chemo treatments – she really wanted to go so badly. The picture on your left is of Robin. http://www.fightforherlife.org/ so I told her I’d exchange with her – she agreed and said she could do a few more. I asked her who, she told me 5 more names and then everyone sent to me and I sent them all out. I had some of my jewelry published in “Bead Trends” magazine in the Jan/Feb 2008 issue, so I asked the publisher http://beadtrendsmag.com/beadtrends.html if they’d like this story. They did and it is now published in there. I know many of you have more stories of Robin, but the drawing of the hand-made with love bracelets with the funds going to The Morrow Foundation and The American Cancer Society is extra special to me and now you know why.

The picture of the lady in the funny hat is of Sarah Triton. Since she lives in Florida I guess the lobster hat really suits her!! LOL


4:50 – 5:05 LAST Vendor Shopping – not much time at all!!
I went like wildfire to finish up my shopping for the BronzClay with Rio Grande as well as get some leaded enamels from Schlaifer Enamels.
Some Vendor new things I saw and LOVED - - - PMC Supply has a great new item. “Hatties maglettes” A great way to make your own silver magnetic catches. No, really – I’m not kidding! Go see what I mean: http://www.pmcsupply.com/maglettes


And I bought one of the Ring Makers from Earl Roberts at the PMC Connection. This is a Japanese way to make a ring with their system. I can’t explain it, but go to http://www.pmcconnection.com/ . They will have them available to sell after August 11.

5:30 – 6:30 Cocktail Party
Very cool – very nice. You could purchase a cocktail or get a free Coca-Cola or 7-Up type drink. I ate cheese and carrots and food never tasted so good. Yum. I talked a lot with so many great people, one of which was Vera Kaminski of West Grove, Pennsylvania. Her charm fascinated me. She took U.S. Mint shredded paper currency and copper, gold plated copper and metal clay nuggets and formed the charm. But wait! She also crocheted the bead with shredded bills using only ten dollar bills from the 60’s and 70’s. Her “cash pearl” beads used 20 strips from the same area of the bill. Good grief! What a brilliant, lovely lady – I loved talking to her. And I love having one of her fabulous beads.

We took a minute to grab a picture with the famous Tim McCreight. What a great guy!

5:30 – 8:00 Dinner, Earhart Hall
Not for me, thank you. I ate cheese, celery and grapes and enjoyed talking and talking until it was time to leave at 7:00.

9:00 pm – Cindylynne and I ordered room service and had a delicious meal of meatloaf, mashed potatoes and fresh snapped green beans. Unfortunately it was too late to eat that much so I really wished I could take the other half home – but I could not. I just enjoyed myself anyway. Cindylynne and I talked about our family when we were growing up and had a most excellent time really getting to know each other. We have a lot-lot-lot of similarities unbeknownst to us before.

SUNDAY (7/20/08)
7:00 – 8:30 Breakfast, Earhart Hall
I had a McDonald’s breakfast sandwich and coffee – Cindylynne opted for Chi Latte at Starbucks.

9:00 – 10:30 Closing Observations / Critique
A very good time for people to share their feelings (if they were brave enough to do so) and many positive thoughts and feelings were said. Tim had a panel of gurus to share their feelings about how the conference went, then opened it up for the rest of us. I tell you, some people really wax eloquent. I am simply unable to do that. However, I enjoyed hearing all of what was said. There were some great ideas for 2010 shared.

10:30 kisses and hugs all around.

BUT WAIT!!! There’s more …

11:00 to about 2:00 we saw many of the attendees at Von’s Beads and Comics Shop. I learned how to use a long hook to get beads down from way, way up high on the wall. I bought some rectangular lava beads and some pink coral as well as some souvenirs for my 6 grandchildren. I like that store a lot.

CL and I had dinner at Steak ‘n Shake then spent the rest of the day packing up in the hotel room and enjoying the peace and quiet. If I remember right, she took a nap and I caught up on my e-mails. What a lot of you don’t know (hopefully I can share this) is that just a few weeks ago Cindylynne suffered a series of strokes and really NEEDS to take frequent naps to regain her strength. She is fine as long as she takes care of herself and when her body says rest, she does.


MONDAY (7/21/08)
Ate breakfast at IHOP, and then drove to the airport which was a 1-1/2 hour drive or so. Cindylynne rented a little red convertible, but for the life of us we couldn’t figure out how to get the dang top down. Oh well, she flipped her eyelids at the Budget Rent A Car guy and he upgraded her rental to this car so she didn’t have to pay extra for it being a convertible. And –yes- we did read the book on how to do it, but we just couldn’t. Bummer.

At the Indianapolis Airport, we checked baggage, and then sat around and people watched. Bought t-shirts that say PURDUE and I’ll embroider BFA on the sleeve. Remember? “Best Friends Always”. I do digitizing of corporate embroidery logos for my real job so I can do this easily.

Her trip started at 2:30ish and she was home at D/FW airport by 4:00ish - non-stop. Not me. I took the red-eye, around the world route for a less expensive ticket. I went to Minneapolis (hey, wrong way!!!) and then 3 hour layover there, then on to D/FW. I arrived at D/FW at 10:00 pm. Ugh… well, I would do it all over again I loved my trip to much!

Thank you Tim McCreight, Jeannette Landenwitch, Cindylynne Brazzel and all the others who made this possible for me. You all rock!!

Time to end this saga. Good day and, good night to all.