Creative Estates was awesome!!

I had such a great time and met super awesome creative people at Creative Estates! First I'll walk you through my time spent there and then I'll tell you what I learned.

I was pretty nervous Thursday when I walked through the Inspirador doors to register for the conference. I was very relieved to immediately meet a very nice and welcoming group of girls. Our welcome reception was at El Zocalo a couple of hours later so I headed over early to have dinner and chat with more attendees. I had a lot of fun!!

I was really excited about all the fun stuff I found in the box received when I registered. Sorry for the TERRIBLE picture!

Friday morning I met some girls at the hotel in the morning and walked to the conference with them. I was excited to hear about how four women turned a hobby into a thriving business from the first panel of speakers: Shey from Shey B, Erin from The Vintage Pearl, Ashley from Lil Blue Boo, and Kim from The Tomkat Studio. I feel so lucky to have heard all these awesome talented women speak together!!

Later I attended a craft workshop and learned about the Lifestyle Crafts Letterpress. Kami from No Biggie showed me why I surely need one! I'm sad to report I didn't win one from the conference but later today I'll share a link to a great giveaway from a great new friend.


During the letterpress presentation I met a really nice girl, Katie from Sweet Rose Studio.
She's a photographer and we don't live too far away from each other. I'm already on the lookout for someone to do our holiday pictures since sadly Jessica (from this blog) moved out of state.

Unfortunately I didn't buy a ticket to Friday evening's Girls Night Out event early enough when I decided to attend this conference. I would have loved to go but I'm already excited about the next Girls Night Out rumored to happen this summer!

Saturday morning I listened to great speakers talk about balancing a small business and motherhood. It was great! The fantastic speakers were Becky Higgins, Megan from Brassy Apple, Melanie from Above All Fabrics, and Becki from Whippy Cake.


I didn't realize how terrible my hair looked until I had my picture taken with Ashley from Lil Blue Boo! She was so nice!
In addition to the bad hair, minutes before I took this picture I realized I had spilt almost an entire water bottle in my purse and my camera wouldn't work. Luckily my phone didn't do a terrible job at documenting this incredible experience for me.

I took one more picture before actually deciding to redo my hair in the bathroom. I met Rebecca from Freckles Crafts and Sheila from Ordy & Joon when I registered Thursday evening. They were awesome!!

Holly from 504Main was also in the initial group of girls I met. She is hysterically funny, super duper talented, and awesome for spending so much time with me!

I recognized Alison from Oopsey Daisy Thursday evening but never made it to her table to speak with her. I was able to take a picture and chat with her for a little while Saturday. She is so sweet!! I've posted about her before and have tried some of her projects....remember my version of her transportation book?

After lunch I listened to another great set of speakers talk about letting your personality shine through on your blog. The speakers were Char from Crap I've Made, Stephanie from The Daily Blarg, and Shelley from House of Smiths. They were all hysterically funny!!

Another super fun and creative girl I met was Jen from Scissors & Spatulas. We talked a lot about motherhood among many other things. I really like her!!

I was lucky to get introduced to Bev from Flamingo Toes literally seconds after registering Thursday night. She instantly made me feel comfortable being there. Huge thanks for that because I was really really nervous about attending!!
She does a lot of anthropology styled necklace tutorials on her blog. I had a lot of fun in the last craft workshop because Bev taught us how to make one of her necklaces. She put the kits together...

...and we turned them into a pretty necklace.

I went home shortly after dinner and the last of the raffles. I didn't win anything - pretty much because I'm the unluckiest person in raffles ever - but I feel absolutely honored to have met such great women. I feel completely inspired to do something incredible. I'll let you know when I decide what that incredible thing is.

Yesterday morning I had a short list of things I had already learned -
1) I need a silhouette
2) I need a letterpress
3) We need a blog makeover
4) I need more money to spend at the handmade market!
5) I need an active Twitter account

As I mentioned I didn't win a silhouette or letterpress at the conference but all attendees have a sweet discount code if we're interested in buying them. I'm not too worried about the letterpress because I'm planning on winning one in the super awesome giveaway I'll share with you later.

As for the blog makeover, this will come with time and I have yet to call the other half to this blog, Jessica, to discuss this. We will be chatting soon!

Unless I was going to stumble upon money on the sidewalk on my way to the conference Saturday morning there was no way for me to acquire more money to spend at the market before the end of the conference. But I did purchase some really pretty headbands from Vintage Rose Wraps yesterday afternoon. It was a great purchase that really helped with my bad hairdo mentioned earlier.

I ended up starting a Twitter account Friday night. I followed a few of the girls I had met at the conference and a few other attendees I really admire. I followed Kim from The Tomkat Studio. If you are local and you don't know of her, you just might be living in a cave. She has inspired so many of us and is incredibly nice in person. I woke up Saturday morning and checked my new Twitter account. I was so excited to see this:

Kim from Tomkat tweeted me!!! Yes, me! I was pretty excited. Unfortunately I didn't get the chance to speak with her before she left early Saturday but I saw one of her staff members and laughed with her about potentially posting the tweet on my blog. I wasn't really going to post it but I had to share it because I want you to know how sweet she is. Hearing her speak was great because she really is just as nice in person as she appears to be on her blog and in all the other places you've seen her work.

So what did I learn? I'm awesome, creative, and capable of doing anything. At least that's how I felt when I left the conference. I also met countless inspiring women that I am excited to continue building relationships with!