BABE report

Bead people are SO MUCH FUN! I've discovered it over and over again as I travel to new places from coast to coast and it makes me happy. We share passion for color and texture and beautiful things. We have a joie de vivre that shows in our faces and interactions. We have a common language. A special "handshake" (consisting of going straight to the jewelry one is wearing and exclaiming upon it.) It's no wonder I adore bead shows so much!

And the BABE show in Oakland, California was no exception. I was able to hang out with some of my most favorite people on Earth - fellow bead teachers that live all across the country. I made new friends as well. And who knew how awesome the food was in Oakland??!! I had some of the most tasty meals I've ever encountered! It's hard for this Texas girl to admit the best Mexican food I have ever eaten was at Tamarindo in Oakland!

But let me tell you - this show was also not my finest organizational moment! I forgot: the tablecloth, the boxes that I use to make my riser, the credit card machine, my hair dryer with the diffuser (essential for a curly haired girl), and the display for my 2mm Swarovski crystals. AGH!!!! So I borrowed a tablecloth, used some aluminum pans from a store across the street to make a faux riser, hand wrote all the credit card transactions, and air dried my hair. The 2mm crystals stayed in my bag instead of being sold. I know...you are all thinking "Packing list!" Yeah. I know.

Monday I spent sadly saying farewell to my hotel roomie, Barb Switzer, who was the best roomie ever, and then driving across the bay to Redwood City where I will be hanging out another week. Tuesday brings my first filming day for my online video classes with Beaducation. Eeek! I'd better go get some beauty sleep!

I will leave you with a variety of photos from this weekend's show...

Lavinia Touchton, Jill Wiseman, and Peggy Goldblatt. Some of my favorite students turned friends!

Tracy Stanley, Jill Wiseman, and Janice Berkebile adopting "The Pose"

Nikia Angel caught me working hard!

Beaducators gather together! Tracy Stanley, Jill Wiseman, Kate Richbourg, Dallas Lovett, Barb Switzer, Colin Mahler, Janice Berkebile, and Lisa Claxton

The annual technology meltdown

At least once a year you get one of these blog posts, don't you? The sad, frenzied madwoman, trying to cobble together a host of printers and faxes and scanners and whatnot to get her danged job done! Where's my IT Help Desk when I need it??

This time, it's still partially an after effect of the flooring redo. We had to unhook everything and rehook it up and we moved the printer to a farther away spot which necessitated a longer cord because I haven't stopped to figure out how to wirelessly connect it yet. So I finally got the longer cord and all should be well with the world, right? But no! We're out of magenta toner on our monster Dell printer. No problem. I skip off (drive) to Cartridge World and get a magenta cartridge. I've used them before in a pinch, and while it's not an official Dell cartridge, it worked and was $75 cheaper. Naturally, I let it sit there for days before I really needed it. Which was today.

Last night Mom and I both worked to get that new cartridge in the printer to no avail. It simply doesn't fit in the slot. I tried again this morning just to make sure. Hasn't shrunk overnight. So do I return it and get another one? What if I waste my time and it still doesn't fit? They are the ONLY place in Austin to get a toner cartridge on the shelf for this printer. Everything else is delivery only. Which doesn't help me TONIGHT.

Okay, I can work around this for the moment, right? My urgent need today is to get my Bead Fest Santa Fe Booth Rental Contract printed out, filled out, scanned into the computer, and then faxed. Because the deadline is today to keep my same booth spot. Because this is ME and I waited until the deadline day. You've been following along and this is expected, right??

Luckily I just bought a second printer for the house! The new desk setup in the Bead Room has a cheapie ($25 and I ain't kidding) inkjet. Go to Bead Room and print out contract. Fill out contract the old fashioned way. With pen. Move back to the Office to scan into computer so I can fax through email. No old fashioned fax in our household - we don't have any phone lines. All cell phones. Put contract page 1 on the scanner. Hit Scan on the software. Error! Can't communicate with the scanner. Look at scanner. Silly Jilly! Scanner not turned on! Turn scanner on. Restart software so it can "communicate" with the scanner this time. Hit scan button. Error! Can't communicate with the scanner. Waaaa?? Follow long and complicated cord snowball to discover scanner cord not plugged into computer. Plug into computer. Restart software again. Success this time!!

So it has now taken me 45 min (plus another 15 to write this post) to do something that should have taken 5 min. and I still don't have a working main printer.

Technology? Bite me.

A little of this, a little of that

I think I've mentioned before that while I used to be a great multi-tasker, age is taking it's toll, and I now function best doing one thing at a time. I don't actually hate it. I do think my focus is much better that way, and I don't make as many mistakes.

BUT! When I have a bazillion things to do, it's hard for me to switch around from project to project, because I would actually like to finish things sometimes. I had started working on getting the new bead cabinet all stocked up, and beads ordered, and on bead room organization of those beads (all one task) but I'm still not finished.

And it's killing me! Because I have to put it aside now as I'm getting closer and closer to the twin deadlines of leaving for the BABE (Bay Area Bead Extravaganza) show on Thursday, and finishing the preparations for the Beaducation classes video shoot which will happen while I'm out on the West Coast the week following BABE.

The boxes of kits for BABE will get shipped on Monday. I still need to burn some CDs to complete the kits for a number of designs. That will be Sunday's work.

And I'm also reviewing and tweaking the instructions for the 3 Beaducation classes, and making the samples for the video shoot. It's kind of like Groundhog Day. You make a sample up to a certain spot where you know you're going to want to do a demo for the video, and then stop and package it up. Then you make the sample again and go past that demo spot to the next demo spot. And stop and package it up and start all over again. For example the project I'm working on tonight I decided I need 6 different samples. I may be over-preparing, but I want everything to go super smoothly!