I am still on cloud nine a week after I have been to Stampin’Up’s very first convention here in Australia. It was held at the the beautiful Darling Harbour Sydney. What an amazing place that is. I flew over with fellow demonstrator Louise and we had a great flight. Then off to the Ibis @ Darling Harbour. My very first impressions of my twin share room was that it was tiny, and almost likened to a Kennel. However it ended up being rather great and I had wonderful company from my roomie Kerry. I tell ya she was the one chatting till the wee hours of the morning. If I am as amazing and as funny (as well as good looking) as she is at 50 I will be amazed!

Kerry and Myself at the Awards dinner

The Next morning we had a look around Sydney and caught the monorail to Paddy’s markets and wandered through some of the amazing shops. Then we all headed to the convention centre for registrations. I was greeted by Stirling Gardner ( hubby of CEO of Stampin’Up) so that was very novel. We all recieved great convention bags with all our goodies and stamp sets inside.

 Then we headed off to mingle and do what all demonstrators love to do SWAPS!!! I had managed to throw together 90 swaps thanks to my wonderful hubby who helped me till 12pm the night before I flew out to Sydney. Who would have thought that Rod would be able to master the double sided tape, tying ribbons and cutting out flowers!!! Well he did a marvelous job! So we all scrambled around to get swaps off each other. I managed to get some absolute darling cards of fsome very talented ladies. I was really happy with the swaps I recieved apart from the ATC’s which I think have no use or value at all.

 We then began the afternoon session with a fantastic intro by no other than Shelli Gardner herself! It was so sureal to see her up there on the stage! Especially when all we see is the glamerous pictures of her and her family on the inside covers of the Idea book and catalogue each year. They then had a couple of amazing stampers from the SU teams do some demonstrations for us. They had us ooooing and ahhhhing all afternoon. Just when you think you know all there is to know about stamping they come and blow us away with fantastic ideas and techniques!

 That evening I had the pleasure of dining with my friend and fellow demonstrator Robyn Lawton from Brisbane and some of her crew. It was so nice to spend time in person with each other when you only communicate via email. That was a great laugh and a delicous curry as well.

Myself and Robyn out for dinner

Saturday was a HUGE day!  Had an early morning breakfast at Gloria Jeans. Met Stephanie Pike and Nicki Tidbold at the food hall eating doughnuts for breakfast which had me agasped ! Not to mention the Coke and Rebull Nicki was pushing down too!

Nicki and Stephanie

We had more sessions in the morning where we actually got to stamp. Then in the afternoon we broke into groups of 4 for different group activities. I got to spend the afternoon with Stephanie Pike, who I am also friends with from Brisbane. It was just so nice to also be with her as we have become good friends via the email and phone. I found the perfect pair of shoes that I have been looking for too….they were on HER feet! She has even offered to send me a pair from Brisbane (how sweet).

 I had one of the most abarrassing moment though that afternoon when I was coming out of the ladies toilets! I said to the person coming into the toilet as I was leaving that I thought they had the wrong toilets….got a dirty look, so I said it again ..”you have the wrong toilets!”… Only then did I finally realise that it WAS a female, not a male, even though she looked just like a bloke. Definitely one of those moments where you want to dig a whole and climb into it!

 Oh back to convention… After the amazing day and learning so much more about the Stampin’Up products and what they can do. I headed back to the hotel. Much to my dismay I had nothing to wear to the Awards Dinner! It was meant to be formal and I had nothing in my suitcase, which I only realised after I had gotten out of the shower with wet hair. So I threw on my jeans and jacket, and borrowed my roomies shoes and ran all the way down the road to the shops. Running blindly through all the dress shops which were very much like Temp and Valley Girl. I was about to give up when I ran down the other end of the mall and found one last shop which was about to close! Tried on a couple of dresses and manage to find one that I thought I could pull off.  So $40 later I had myself a new dress and something to wear to the awards dinner!

By the time I had got back to the hotel I was knackered and everyone else was ready to head to the dinner. So I high tailed it to my room and did the quickest make-up and blow wave of my life. When we got to the dinner we were all amazed at how the room had been decorated with linen tablecloths, chair covers and the gorgeous bouquets of flowers on every table. They even had a brass band playing! It was like a fairy tale.The meals was just delicious also and the company even better, as lots of laughs were to be had around the table.

Then onto the awards later in the evening. Shelly presented all the awards and there were a couple of different categories. One for selling over $30,000 of product, one for Recruiting, one for earning the Incentive trip and then the top 25 demonstrators of the year.

I recieved an award for recruiting 5 demonstrators in the year. And out of the 25 top demonstrators I ranked in at number 15! What a suprise that was! I got to go up on stage twice and be congratulated by Shelli Gardner. Then I also got a pin and a single red rose from Shelli as well. When I went up the second time Shelli said to me on stage that she LOVED my dress……Now can you believe that? The dress that I had bought at a dingy store only half an hour before the dinner Shelli liked. This had me laughing as she is sooooo stylish! SO I had to tell her the funny story about finding it at the very last minute!

All in all the Convention was a truly wonderful experience! I made new friends, learnt new techniques,  and had many laughs. I was so blessed to be able to attend this year and hopefully will be able to go to the next one in April ‘08!

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