Settle in, this is a loooooonnnnng post, seriously order lunch in you'll be here a while. I hope you read it all though, so much good info. Today I'm giving my full wrap up of Superhero Academy Craft Weekend, in addition I'll also be talking about a few moments of clarity for me that occurred to me during and after the weekend. Don't worry I won't get too philosophical :) I pulled out my camera to take some pictures at the very beginning, then never took it out again. I got a couple with my cell phone and was sent a couple that some friends took but that's it. Don't worry though it will still be a full and complete wrap up! I think I got caught up in all the fun it just never occurred to me to take out my camera...guess that's why I'm not a scrapbooker. Michelle had 28 people in attendance, I wasn't sure how she was going to fit 28 people in the room but she did! Here's my spot right at the end of the table. Each group (there were 4) had a different city assignment, we were in Gotham City home of Batman. That's all my stuff on the floor and I still had more in the car!
Here's a closer look at the table. There's a schedule, a notepad and pencil. The fry boxes, door prize slip and a tri-fold card that we had to write down our superhero name for the weekend. I was the Glitter Crusader! Fun!!! The fry boxes were put in one of those Starbucks bottles. Michelle, Dan and my parents drank a lot of those coffee drinks prior to the weekend to have enough jars :) I don't drink coffee :/ It wasn't long until the tables were full of crafting supplies of every variety! 
We took some 'city' pictures. Here's all the ladies who helped hold down Gotham City, we were the best one you know ;) Back row, Barbara, Kellie, Nikkie, Kim, me. Front row Angela and Pam. Aren't our matching t-shirts cute!? One of our activities for Friday night was to make our superhero t-shirt for the weekend. Everyone's is customized with their own initial, then we ironed them on our shirts. So cute!
You need some good fuel when you're working as hard as we do :) Don't worry there's some healthy food in there....somewhere......but calories don't count at craft weekends so it doesn't matter ;)
Saturday night everyone in my city had left me, I was working all alone. There were still plenty of people in the room, just not from Gotham. They probably all had some superhero emergency to get to. Our tables look very different from that first picture, before everyone 'moved in'.
Somehow I ended up drawing a crowd on Saturday morning when I was working on a card.....here comes the philosophical part of the post, it's in 3 parts...ready?.....1) I know that my cards that I make during craft weekends are often 'over the top' or more elaborate then your everyday card, however I'm no more talented or crafty then anyone else in that room. My brain just works a little differently. When you look at a circle punch, it may be just a circle, when I look at it I see any number of things it could be. It certainly doesn't mean that I'm more creative then anyone else. Also I CASE so much, I may 'step it up' but 80% of the time, it's not my original idea. I do try to link to those blogs that inspire my projects, you'll see that next week. 2) The cards and projects I make at craft weekend take a loooonnnngggg time, I worked on one project on Saturday for almost 8 hours. One. Project. While my patience with children (and sometimes adults) sometimes doesn't last as long as it should, my patience with tiny punch art is apparently endless (probably because the paper doesn't argue and talk back). Which brings me back to my first point. Not everyone is willing to spend 8 hours on one project, that doesn't mean they can't do it, just that they choose to use their time more productively. 3 and final) The projects I come home with are pretty amazing and I love them so much, there's very few that I've ever even parted with in the years that I've attended these weekends. I truly believe that the reason that these kinds of projects even happen is because of the environment I'm in. Could I make them at home.....maybe.....but I think part of the fun at these weekends is the atmosphere. No one is rushed, unless you're rushing yourself, everyone is working on something different. You could walk around the room and see dozens and dozens of different crafty things happening with everyone, not everyone scrapbooks, not everyone even works with paper. Just walking around the room may inspire something that you'll make later. Everyone is so creative in their own way, and when there's that many people around you doing something you love and something they love then it's so easy to be inspired and create. I'm only able to make the projects I make because of everyone around me. Those of you who attended the weekend and are rolling your eyes right now-STOP IT! I really believe this. Here ends this part of the post, let's continue to some more fun stuff!
I've learned that you need to pack an extra, empty bag because you come home with so much more stuff then you left with because Michelle plans every detail, every activity so wonderfully! She gives us gifts and is so very generous with everything! While I do make some stuff for her and help her out, she doesn't share a lot with me, I had no idea what the bags were for! The Wonder Woman bag had a whole Project Life album in it! I'll get to the Batman one later. Here's everything I came home with that I didn't leave with. It fills up my desk!
She gave us one of Stampin' Up!'s staplers during 'weapons training'. By the way if you don't have the stapler you need it. It's a great stapler! It's actually the only stapler we own in our home. The morning gifts on Saturday and Sunday were Black Bakers Twine and an Adhesive Eraser. New this year Michelle gave us the option to participate in a 'Card Candy' Swap. If you're not familiar with what card candy is, they're premade embellishments that you peel off the backing they're on and attach to any premade card or scrapbook page. They're embellishments and stamped images ready to go. I posted the ones I made for the swap here. So I came home with 19 different sets of card candy. Michelle also included some notecards and envelopes to go with our card candy at the swap. 
There's so much here, I wish I could individually photograph them all, they're all so fun!!! New this year too, Michelle gave everyone a laminated place mat (standing up in the back). This was so you could place it over your projects while you eat and you don't get food or mess up what you're working on while you eat. So fun!!!!
I mentioned and showed you on Wednesday that Michelle gave her downline an assignment and asked them to make projects using the (retired) Gift Card Enclosures. Here's what I made on this post. Here's what the rest of her downline made. See those feet down in the bottom corner, those are Megan's waiting for the cookie in the first one!
The adorable Cookie Monster one was made by Cyndi. So cute! I'm sure the cookie was yummy, I didn't even get a piece of it. As soon as I gave the 'ok' that I was done with the pictures it was gone. The packaging is soooo adorable though!!! Vickie did the next one, it had chocolate and a tea mix in it and some Superhero Glam Accessories, do you see what she did, she took some of our star sequins and glued them onto some bobby pins. OMG I love this!!! 
Nikkie also did some punch art and made a box very similar to the one I made for the tissues. Her adorable little watermelon slice it tooo cute!!!! Also filled with candy! Finally Hope made the adorable little bath set. There were Lavender bath salts and a little scrubber, LOVE IT!! Her box was super cute and simple too, she just folded up the petals along the score lines and tied them together. So cute!!! We received all of these and the tissue box I made at our Superhero Graduation (I even got a diploma!) on Sunday. Michelle gave out the Batman bags so we had something to keep our gifts in. As you can see, I had a great time. We laughed a lot! I think more than any other weekend. It was so much fun. Michelle puts so much work and time into every weekend, you can see that clearly by every creative detail she comes up with. I mentioned before that she had 28 people there, that's amazing and a true testament to how incredibly popular these weekends have become. I honestly don't know how she does it all! Even with the minimal help I provide her she's an incredible planner. Her next weekend is already nearly full, if it isn't already. She told me earlier this week she was down the final spots. I can't say enough good things about these weekends. Not only are they fun, and I think pretty productive, but they're also the perfect weekend getaway. If you want more info on her upcoming weekends you can check out her blog here. If you've read all the way to the bottom, thank you. This post got a little wordy. I'll be back on Monday to start to share the projects I made at the weekend.
Thanks for looking, see you soon!!!!!
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