Fly The Coop Retreat
April 2013
Months of planning finally came together. The Hens' Den had it's first retreat. This would never happened had it not been for a dear friend, Tangie Hyatt. I want to thank you so much Tangie for all the hard work and the hours you spent on the preparation and planning. Tangie has her own group to run, it is call Hot Mess Scrappers, Ink and she took the time to help me with getting this retreat off the ground. Many of her Hot Mess Gals came to the retreat and it was such a delight to meet them and spend a couple of days hanging out.
We had the retreat at a the beautiful Dancing Bear Lodge which is located at Mt. Rainier Washington.
Tangie and I arrived the day before to get the tables set up and all the goodies ready to go for all the scrappers.
Tables are set in place and covered. Tangie and I had to move a lot of very heavy furniture to get the cropping room set up and ready. That was no easy task and later on, we would take advantage of a benefit at the lodge that would come in very handy. Here are some of the cute details that she thought of.
Each cropper had a bottle of water that she made a tag holder for. In each holder were some Crystal Light flavors. Next, she made wraps called "chicken feed" and inside were bags of pop corn. What a CUTE idea. "Chicken feed"...lol. Then were the name places for each one of the croppers. Little details that were so cute. At the end of the day, we treated ourselves to a steak dinner and some nice wine and then we hit the HOT TUB. Oh Man!! That felt so good. I really wish I had one of those at home.
The next morning, we put the finishing touches to finish off the welcome. Each of the croppers got a goodie bag full of stuff. T-Shirts that said "I flew the coop" 2013, tap runners and goober removers, 6 x 6 pad of Graphic 45 French County collection, ink stamps from Prima Marketing and this was just the beginning. This is what they found when they arrived:
Hi Sondra!
"COFFEE TIME" - NEED THAT "GO" JUICE
Set up finished
Picture of the make-in-take sample- nothing fancy but better than a 12 x 12 layout make-in-take!!
Used the pool table to hold some of the goodies- that wine box in the middle of the picture was a surprise give for Tangie and it held a very nice bottle of Tequila - she did not know that this was hers and she kept drooling all over it. hehehehehe - SURPRISE!!
Store goodies for sale, just in case someone forgot to bring something. WOW!!! You should have seen the "stuff" they all came in with. LOL... this was not even needed.
So.... The first order of business was that when they got there they had to cover their "chicken" that was in their bags. This chicken would be their mascot for the weekend and if they got caught without it, they had to do the chicken dance....LATER (hehehe). So the first one to arrive and get set up was Mary and she set to work on her chicken .
I have to try this ball, sounds like a great thing to sit on
The rest of the group arrived and set up and went to work on their "Mascot" -
The birth of a chicken - lol
Here are some of the pictures with their Mommies'
Terry and Maryam
Sondra and Jackie
Jodi
Kori
Here is the parade of all the beautiful chickens;
They are all so darn cute!!!! I loved how everyone put their own style and personality into their mascot for the weekend. Just down right adorable!!! More on them later.
Dinner- and the first "Chicken Dance" - Yes.. we had 2 of the ladies forget their mascot so they had to perform at dinner... It was a hoot!.
Grilled Hamburger's and salad in a jar
Chicken Dance!
Jackie "do-in the dance"
Terry "do-in the dance"
(Sondra was not impressed with her "Mom's" dancing)
Breakfast the next morning
We had waffles and coffee and fruit..so yummy and healthy (except the waffles)
Make in Take
Loved that they made them more than I had set out for them to be.
Sponsor Work Shop
We played with some wonderful and fun products
Everyone loved the texture, color and easy of use with the Walnut Ink sprays, Goose bumps and Fire Works products! Goose bumps were everyone's favorites!!!!!
Contest
We had everyone vote on all the mascots and here are our winners.
Jackie took first place:
Sondra took 2nd place:
Joanne took 3rd Place:
Each one got to take home the Imagine Crafts goodies - This was so much fun!!!!
It is Sunday morning and time to leave. After a long 2 days of keeping everything on pace, having fun and all the hard work, it was time to pack up and put things back as they were before we got there on Thursday. It was hard to say goodbye and there were close moments when emotions almost showed themselves, but we prevailed and gave a huge sigh of relief that the event went off without huge set backs and that everyone had a grand time.
I give my final hug to Tangie before I leave and lock the door. She did amazing. I appreciate her so much!!.
As I get in my truck, I see that someone gave me a little goodbye and token for me to keep. I laughed so hard. When did they have time to do this and where was I? Someone snuck in my truck! ROFLMAO. Here is what I found hanging from my visor:
Thank all of you so much for a wonderful event!
