I know I posted some photos on my blog last week from my trip to Waco and the Magnolia House. But my time was limited and I wanted to really share my experiences with you now that I am home and have more time. I arrived in Waco on Monday night and rather than head straight to my hotel I just had to drive by the Silos! My GPS said the detour was only 1.3 miles so it was well worth it. As I drove up 4th street I saw the silos right away. They were bigger than I expected and the land area was huge. Magnolia Market was closing so all I did was take this picture from my car.
The store has a front and back room and you can see in the photos all of the cool vintage tables and containers used to display everything. I literally wandered around for an hour before I put anything in my bag. I guess I wanted to just take it all in. It was mesmerizing. And that "industrial farmhouse" look is just gorgeous. In the back room Joanna Gaines' new rug and paint lines are also on display! After shopping I headed outside to the food trucks for lunch. I decided to forego my diet and eat from Cheddar Box, the adorable grilled cheese food truck. I ordered the fresh pumpkin, gouda and sage grilled sandwich and it was delicious. Certainly not the food you would expect from a food truck. It was amazing. After lunch we headed down the street to a cute Vintage shopping store called The Findery. It's a two-story brick building with loads of merchandise. Don't laugh, but I spent the entire time imagining how I would convert it in to an art studio downstairs and an apartment upstairs. Just dreaming ...
More insider scoop on the Magnolia Market and Silos tomorrow. The Bakery and Garden Store are to die for!
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I promised to share photos of this incredible home and here they are. Fortunately we were smart enough to take photos before brought in our luggage so you can see the fabulous job Chip and Joanna Gaines did remodeling this home. I love the shiplap and her new furniture line and the great rugs and the open shelves in the kitchen. The black and white floor in the bathroom is my favorite thing in the house. I wish I had a bathroom in need of a renovation where I could install this tile!
The house has five bedrooms, a family room, dining room, kitchen, mud/laundry room, two bathrooms and a coffee room. It's just so darn cute and well done. I can't even begin to explain how much I love this house! The house is quite a tourist spot as people have been outside the front gate taking photos and peeking at the house every day, all day long. It's just a great testament to the amazing quality of the remodeling job Chip and Joanna have done on their houses. Good thing I am coming back very soon! There are eight artists sitting in here with me at the Magnolia B&B House that are probably a bit tired of talking about their "brand". It's such an important part of any business and it is something we have spent a lot of time talking about the last two days.
In fact, tomorrow morning these eight artists will each have an entirely new "brand". We have spent hours and hours working on this and I cannot wait to see the results. I am so excited for each of these artists and the process they have gone through to develop and re-define their brands. Soon they will have a new look, a targeted audience, a new message and a new website. This is simply amazing. Wow. The Magnolia Market and Silos are incredible. The entire project is so well planned and thought out. It's amazing!
The area is right in the middle of downtown Waco and it's so much larger than I anticipated. It's well suited for families and offers good shopping, food, entertainment and a great place to spend a few hours. They have the large Magnolia store, the Garden Store, the Bakery and the food trucks. They even have an outdoor wooden tent that has a huge sale with lots of items 40% off. So yes, I did do some shopping already. This afternoon and evening we had a great time talking about marketing our art. We did some role playing and getting to know who we are. Tomorrow morning we will spend a lot of time re-defining our brands. I think there just might be eight new artists emerging from Waco by the end of the week! Can't wait! I am never late to the airport. If you ask my husband he will tell you that I am neurotic about being early to the airport. It's simple, I don't like stress. And getting late to the airport is not something I do. Until yesterday.
I calculated my drive time to LAX based on the hundreds of trips I had already made to LAX. This year. Ok. That's an exaggeration. But I have driven to and from LAX eight times in the last month so that should count for something. I had an 8:20am flight so if figured if I left at 6:00am then I would get to the airport by 7:00 which would allow an hour and twenty minutes to get on my flight. Piece of cake. First mistake? When I went to bed on Sunday night it was starting to rain. Since people in Los Angeles forget how to drive in the rain I should have moved my departure time up at least fifteen minutes. Second mistake? I thought about calling uber but I was afraid the driver wouldn't have a fast pass and thus not be able to drive in the car pool lane. Third mistake? I think I should have just driven faster. The drive took nearly two hours which was double the time I had calculated. Needless to say, I got to the check in counter with 20 minutes to spare but I knew I had missed the luggage check-in deadline. And the ten 127-page Marketing Boot Camp binders need a lot of luggage space. Fortunately the story gets better. I was put on standby for the next flight and made it. I also got the last seat in Dallas for the flight to Waco. I am much later than I expected but I am here! I always try to fly to my workshops at least a day early to allow for weather and airline delays. Fortunately this was the first time I was delayed because of my error. But the Boot Camp doesn't start until tomorrow and I ended up only arriving about four hours later. I still have plenty of time tomorrow to get all of my morning errands done. I am cooking breakfast and lunch so I have a bit of shopping to do. I can't wait! I am so excited! I leave Monday morning for Waco and my Marketing Boot Camp! This is the first of many Boot Camps to come (I promise!) and the first two are scheduled in Waco, TX at the Fixer Upper Magnolia Bed & Breakfast house.
We have a full agenda planned and we will be spending an evening at the Silo's and shopping time at some of the great places seen on the Fixer Upper show! The most important time will be spent in our brainstorming meetings in the house. It's geared 100% for the nine artists that are attending the bootcamp. Stay tuned for lots of photos and updates this week! Leslie I thought it might be fun to share this great photo I took today at Marina Park in Ventura. I know it's hard to find good photos to paint so this one is available to anyone who wants to use it as an inspiration for a painting! I would love to see any finished paintings created from this. So let me know if you use it!
Happy painting. Oh Sunny Day Oil, 11" x 14" Available I am so damn lucky. I just spent the last three and a half days teaching an awesome oil painting palette knife workshop! I am blessed to be able to spend time with amazing artists at the beach! We have laughed and had so much fun! How can this possibly be considered work?
The personalities and jokes have kept us laughing 24/7 and the painting time has been very focused but so much fun! This painting was my demo from yesterday. I just love painting umbrellas. They are so fun to paint with a palette knife! This morning we went to the antique flea market. Only Ventura has a mid-week flea market. I love it! I found two more antique glass jars for my sea glass. Looks like I can continue hunting for sea glass. Ha! Only five more days until I am in Waco! Magnolia B&B here we come! It's done! And printed. I was lamenting earlier in the week that my Marketing Boot Camp notebook was 125 pages. So I spent every night this week trying to make it shorter. I am so happy that it is finished, printed and bound. Only problem? It's 127 pages! Oh well. I think it's worth it.
I cannot believe a week from today I will be at the Magnolia Bed & Breakfast in Waco Texas at my first Art Marketing Boot Camp! This has been a dream of mine for a very long time and I am so excited. I will be back to Waco in November for another Boot Camp and then I will host three more next year ... in a different location. But it will be just as fun and awesome, I promise! Thanks so much for all of your comments about my marketing handbook. I am sorry but the notebook is not for sale. It will only be available for the attendees of my boot camps. Someday I will write a marketing book but I am probably a few years away from finishing that project! Some of you may remember I am on a huge quest to find the perfect organizational system. I am looking for the best way to organize appointments, weekly to-do's and long term projects. I think I need a combination system that has an online calendar plus a system where I can write lists and cross off tasks. I was SO excited to receive my new daily planner from Moleskin this week. I guess it was too good to be true! I started entering all of my appointments and to-do's only to realize that when I turned the page at the end of October both November and December were missing. The good news is I found them between July and August 2016. Needless to say I am waiting for my new replacement planner. Ugh ... "Basking in the Sun" Oil, 12" x 12" Available. Somehow today didn't seem like just an ordinary day. It started with a beautiful walk on the beach (with lots of seaglass!) and then I started Day one of my palette knife workshop at 9:00,. We painted two paintings (which took all day). Then I ran upstairs and cooked a nice dinner for the group. The menu consisted of salmon with an avocado lime salsa, barbecued flank steak with soy-maple sauce, lemon risotto and a great salad.
I then spent two hours doing the final proof of my Marketing Boot Camp binder. And now I am doing the last task of the day ... my blog post. I guess it was just an ordinary day. Did I mention I can barely keep my eyes open? Gotta go. Night might, |
Leslie
Mom. Wife. Artist. Marketer. Teacher. Radio Show Host. Archives
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