hey bloggers! i'm finally home....and very happy to be. what an amazing European adventure it was. we were gone for 2 weeks of trade events, workshops, and education for ranger. i went with alain (from ranger), and mario as well as met up with several others in the industry along the way. it was lots of work, very tiring at times, but always a good time. as you can imagine, Internet access was limited for me and to be honest so was the time... i did however manage to clip a few videos throughout the journey so i put together this little montage to share with all of you. this is my first attempt at imovie with my new macbook so it's far from oscar material. here's a little recap of my travels:
travel day: mario and i set out from prescott to drive to the phoenix airport early in the morning to fly to newark, nj. to meet up with alain from ranger to connect on a flight to london that evening. when we arrived in phoenix we discovered our connecting flight to london was canceled so we had to busily re-book another flight to get there on time since we also had a connecting flight in london to amsterdam which was our final destination. (this is never a good way to start any trip!). nevertheless we all 3 got onto another flight, made our connection, and arrived in amsterdam.
day 1: once we arrived in amsterdam to make our trip even more exciting all of our luggage was lost, yep all 3 pieces were not on our flight so we had to spend 6 hours in amsterdam waiting for the next flight to arrive in the hopes our luggage was on it. so we spent the day (a little tired) walking around amsterdam but me made the best of it. we walked around the shops, ate pancakes, and took in the sights - talk about sights! we headed back to the airport to get our missing luggage (yeah!) and hit the road for our 1 1/2 hour drive to our first stop in holland.
day 2-4: the morning we were happy to meet up with some friends in the industry (margie and gail from making memories) who were attending the same trade event. we carpooled into the trade event where we spent the next 3 days demoing and teaching. i also got to see some other industry friends and the event was great. the last day i taught a mini ranger education day for several of their education specialists.
day 5: we flew out of amsterdam to leeds to meet up with our friend dy from art from the heart. we landed to snowy weather, but by some weird miracle, it stopped and the skies cleared. this was definitely a sign to me to get outside for a while, so what to do??? shopping fo course! we all hit the streets of leeds for 5 hours of the most incredible shopping - talk about retail therapy.
day 6: i got to spend the day with the most creative, kind, and generous people while i demoed at art from the heart. i don't normally do an entire day of demos, but dy is such a great friend and a HUGE supporter of ranger products that she had loads of people waiting to see a demo or two. dy and i each demoed the day away to groups of her customers that drove from far and wide to get there, unfortunately the weather was not as kind this day and it snowed like mad! thanks to all of you who braved the elements to come and watch the demos and shop, shop, shop! looking forward to the next trip there!
day 7-10: we drove about 2 hours down to kettering where i spent the next day teaching a couple of retailer workshops, and then on to meridan where we checked into our favorite pub. it's so cool to stay in pubs in the UK - definitely one of my favorite things about the journey. you'll have to see for yourself just how cool this pub is. there we met up with suze weinberg who had just flown in for the stitches trade event that weekend. the following morning we were up bright and early to go and set up for classes. suze and i taught 3 workshops on melt art and the new alcohol ink products from ranger. the students were great and the day just flew by. the next 2 days were spent demoing at stitches (which is a UK version of CHA) and meeting up with more industry friends - what a blast. of course there were so many fun dinners with friends, a few drinks in the pub, and lots of laughs along the way.
day 11: we headed out early for our 2 hour drive into london to meet up with craft friend and QVC celeb dawn bibby where suze and i each had a spot in her 2 hour craft show on QVC-UK. we had a few hours of prep before we went on air and were busy setting up demo spots and finishing up on-air samples (talk about tv magic!). the segments went great with several sold out kits and heart racing excitement only live television can bring. it's always great to hang out with dawn, and of course we had the BEST host on QVC, catherine, who was simply perfect! after qvc we headed into the center of london to drop suze off to meet up with lbcrafts as suze was staying a while longer in the UK.
day 12: we hit the streets of london to do some sight seeing and last minute shopping before our return flight home to the US. our flight was on-time and we made it out of london no problem. we arrived in newark by 7pm wednesday night we we said our farewells to alain. mario and i stayed at the airport hotel for our 6am flight to phoenix the following morning!
whew! so there you have it - my euro adventures (the condensed version). so now it's back to work and still catching up from CHA. hope you enjoy the video and thanks again for all of the kind "miss you" emails and comments. of course no homecoming would be complete without a giveaway right? i have some welcome home prizes to give away that includes some great idea-ology and ranger products to 3 lucky winners! so all you have to do is post a comment on today's post and i'll draw the names on monday. have a great weekend everyone - off to unpack the suitcases...t!m
Glad to see you made it back home. What a great adventure you had. That sounds fantastic. Would be so fun to see the UK CHA. How nice you had just gone to the US one. I enjoy your blog so much. Thanks for sharing.
Posted by: scrpmnga | February 20, 2009 at 01:12 PM
Glad you are home safely and thanks so much for the video! It was so awesome of you to think of us and keep us involved in your trip! (Oh, and pick me, pick me! lol)
Posted by: Lissa in Ohio | February 20, 2009 at 01:13 PM
Welcome home Tim! I sure missed ya. It's just not the same without a little something from your blog every couple of days. Thanks for the video it was very entertaining. Loved the pub. Have a great weekend. Rho
Posted by: Rhonda Deremer | February 20, 2009 at 01:17 PM
Welcome back! Sounds like a great trip, shame about the luggage going missing. That happened to me too on a trip in Europe.
Posted by: Jaana | February 20, 2009 at 01:17 PM
I'm glad you are home safe and sound. I have missed reading your blog while you were away!
Posted by: Tricia | February 20, 2009 at 01:18 PM
What an amazing adventure! So glad you're home and back to blogging! YAY!
Posted by: Tracey | February 20, 2009 at 01:18 PM
great video! Sounds like a fabulous trip, glad you guys made it home safely.
Posted by: Anne Alley | February 20, 2009 at 01:20 PM
Glad to see you are back. sounds like an amazing trip.
Posted by: Sandra Shelton | February 20, 2009 at 01:21 PM
Hi Tim. Been waiting for you to come home so I could hear all about Tim and Mario's Excellent Adventures. Sounds like a blast but BUSY. Off to check out your movie....ad the Oscar goes to ?????
Welcome back.
Regina
Posted by: Regina | February 20, 2009 at 01:21 PM
Nice coverage of your trip tim We sure did miss you while you were gone! Perhaps you should keep your trips to a mmm...say a 2 day max! lol! Glad you had fun and are back safe! stella:-)
Posted by: stella F | February 20, 2009 at 01:23 PM