ALT Design Summit

The last week has been a whirlwind that started out as a thought but then made a reality after the gracious Caitlin Creer offered to host me at her home as we ventured to ALT Design Summit. Scrambling, I phoned for a plane ticket and made arrangements for my little minis...not always an easy feat. Good thing for nice sisters (Hi Liza and Whitney). Anyway I have to note that every single time I walked into the above space I felt welcomed and so happy to be in such clean, pretty and well thought out space. Caitlin has mad designing skills.

Overall I feel very satisfied about making the decision to go to ALT because I made some very nice friends and felt inpspired. In fact as I sat in the plane to go home I messaged one of those new friends that really should have been an old friend. Text as follows:

"Mara it was really was so great to connect like we did with such ease. I like you mucho. Pls. stay in touch.

Do you still feel good about all of your thrifty purchases? I'm about to board my plane and I can't stop thinking about flight attendants gone bad...I'm holding on tight to all of my electronics."

Yes there is a story to the above text. In fact, that Mara girl has many life stories that you may want to follow along with over on A Blog About Love. Anyway the thing that I loved most most about ALT was connecting with other people. Sure there was some real treats when it came to people watching and sure there was inspiration and things to learn but the best was just observing that everyone has a story. I even got to learn about a few of them. We all are kind of in this together and we all have so much to share. Of course one of the stories that everyone fell in love with was that of Ben Silbermann, the founder of Pinterest. I think it is safe to say that his passion was inspiring.

ALT was a great and uplifting event to be involved in and I'd go again.

A few notables:

Imitate your spiritual master (Gretchen Rubin).

My heel broke off within the first hour. I had to faux walk so that I'd look like my normal self. Good thing for extra long pants.

Lots of buns, red lips and sequins.

A fun thrift tour with Jaimee, Sarah and Samantha in my car. At the end the most magical snowflakes erupted. There was some great treasures found.

Was reminded that one of the keys to happiness was to get enough sleep. Funny thing though I was most happy sitting up with friends at wee hours of the morning.

Some of the most fashionable girls at ALT told me they loved my squash blossom necklace and that made me feel good.

The reactions people gave when I told them I have five kids...twins and triplets in 2.5 years.

Jenny said 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration.

Sitting in the corner of the loud Gibson Girl Lounge with Jenny and Mara but feeling like we were the only ones in there because we were so wrapped up into our conversation.

Thinking I was sure glad I didn't have to speak on a certain panel after the spirited and passionate Jasmine Star. She was inspiring.

I need to become a little more technologically savvy. Note to self: Learn more about videography.

One of the best ways to be happy is to serve others (Gretchen Rubin)

There is lots of great blogging stock that comes from Arizona. I had no idea until ALT.

Discovering Caitlin's beautiful Salt Lake City neighborhood. Had a great dinner at Trio.

I was really excited to meet the very kind Rachel from Black Eiffel and Jen from Rambling Renovators. Well actually there were many more that I should add to that list but I'm afraid I might miss somebody.

Stop talking about it and just do it. (Ben Silbermann)

If you are interested in more recaps of Alt then go here for the links.

More pictures of the events can be found here.

{Below photo credits go to Justin Hackworth, b.a.d. photography & Moss & Isaac}