Convention in 5 days!!!

The preparing is done! Boxes of varying items keep arriving at my house. ( I will be driving to convention so will also be hauling some things.) I received the convention brochures on Friday, some stickers for the goodie bags and some other surprises that I am not willing to share at this moment.

Susan is really the busiest one right now. She is printing and collating all the badges and technique class tickets, along with shipping our booth and some of the materials. She too will be driving this year and will be hauling some of the usual things we have at convention.

We are still recruiting last minute attendees. Bonnie has been hard at work talking to people and really showing them the value of convention. Many have decided to come and this will make for such a great group!!!

See you on Friday!

More convention plans the countdown continues

...So much to tell, it has been a few days, I will try to keep the timeline pure but there may be some incongruities.

We always give out bags with the convention brochure, and this year some really cool goodies in them. The bags were donated to us by non other than Heidi and Vera Bradley. SO COOL right!? Well yes and no. Yes the bags rock! Heidi and Vera Bradley rock! BUT they seem to have a need to multiply. First Heidi ordered them incorrectly and the shipping department was going to send me 400 cases of bags(10,000 bags) instead of 400 bags. We fixed that little fiasco then the 400 bags arrived. Whew! Then three days later 400 bags arrived. Now I have 800 Vera Bradley bags in my garage. We'll have to figure that out later.

Three supplier exhibitors signed up at the last minute just before we printed the brochures. Aftosa, Gibson Holders and Digital Ceramic Printers. Really great to have them at the convention this year! Drop by and say "Hi"

The convention Brochure was completed last week along with the signage and Arch for the convention hall. The brochure looks great and has some great coupons from the exhibitors in it. Really "A" one offers. look for them when you get registered. Thanks to all the suppliers that advertised, it really helps with the cost of printing the Brochures.

Getting a DJ for the auction was a little harder than last year. Denise, our CCSA Secretary, had a bead on a really good DJ that worked her sister's wedding. He was booked. Turns out many were booked. I finally found one that had thought he was going to be in Montana and hadn't been booking but as it turns out he is returning sooner. Booked and done. Thanks Joel!

Susan, my assistant, and Bonnie, membership relations, have been working to get all the volunteers coordinated. The schedule looks great! Big thanks to all of the people that volunteered, you are treasured.

Susan is currently getting all the Badges and Signs together, as well as, getting the CCSA booth ready to ship.

Bonnie will be running the auction this year and has the schedule and volunteers ready to go. In addition to being a great cause it is going to be really fun. Loosen your purse strings, you won't be able to resist bidding. (He said in a hypnotic way... you want to bid, you want to bid many times, it brings you joy and peace to bid over and over...biiiiiiiid biiiiiiiiidd biiiiiiiid.)

Lastly our little blessing in disguise. The Grand Sierra Resort had given us a great room rate of $99.00 well it seemed great during the summer when the rates at the hotel were in the $250 range some weeks but this week they changed the rate to $59.00 for the same rooms we are getting. OH and $89.00 for upgraded rooms. I have to say I have been watching the rates to see if this was going to happen because I know that giant hotels change their rates constantly to try and fill rooms. My heart fell through the bottom of my boots when I saw $59.00 on the screen.

A little background, because I know you are thinking "This is great! Everyone gets a cheaper room!" and on the surface you are correct. However, as an association throwing a convention you must book the venue years ahead of time and you must guarantee them a certain amount of rooms. In return for this guarantee they will not charge you for the exhibit space, class rooms and ballrooms. If you don't meet your minimum this is called "room attrition" and it can be likened to convention apocalypse. It could cost the organization thousands upon thousands of dollars if the minimums are not met. Not fun. So when I saw the $59.00 room rate I thought two things: The first one I can't repeat on screen, paper or verbally so don't ask. Second: This is going to work in our favor, it has to. I called the GSR and talked to "Yvonne" (names changed to protect the innocent.) Yvonne was very sympathetic and though the contract did state that they would only honor prices a month from the event date she would see what was possible to help us out. After some jockeying she was able to secure that if we had attendees reserve under the lesser room rate we would get credit towards our room block. FANTASTIC! This is a win win for us though I think they are going to take a little bit of a hit at the GSR. Do me a favor and buy some extra drinks with the money you saved. Thanks Grand Sierra Resort!

Enough for now. More soon. Can't wait to see you there!!!

Good deeds and punishment there of.

You have finally finished painting the entire 200 word quote, from a movie you have never heard of, onto the forehead of a penguin bank because that is the brides favorite animal and she wanted it to look like the penguin was thinking that quote. You are quite proud of yourself and now possibly permanently nearsighted but you are also very excited to see her expression when you reveal this precious piece. When she arrives to pick up the masterpiece, she looks at it, shrugs and says. "It'll have to do." Then proceeds to walk out. Not the crying tears of joy, hugfest you were expecting? Thought not.

Be not dejected or pushed out of shape. Good deeds are really for you. Though she was unappreciative and rude your deed stands alone as something special and rare. You did something that most people won't do. You put yourself out there, did something unique and beneficial to the world around you. You cared. Doesn't matter what she thinks. In this case you have accomplished exactly what you set out to do. You can stand proud with the knowledge that you will continue to care and work your magic in the face of bad attitudes and possible hangovers from the bachelorette parties. Well done!