Heading home.

Sitting at the Salt Lake City airport. I seem to spend lots of time here, waiting, hanging out, relaxing a bit.

My "job" would be so different without teaching events. Being face to face with people who have the same passion for photos, papers, stories and all the fun stuff really keeps me inspired. I love what I do. I love scrapbooking...and I love meeting other women.

Each time I go it is a completely different experience. At this event I spent a bunch of time with Tracy White. Just me and her. So, so nice to have this chance to just hang out. Essentially, she is my "boss" in one way or another...but we have also become good friends. This morning in the airport I was showing her my color class presentation (we always teach at the same time so we never get to experience the others class) on my computer and she always brings up things that stretch me, make me think about things in a different way, challenging me to be a better teacher, to capture what it is I do into words and concepts. I really value that part of our relationship.

We talk a lot about design. And about life. And how to encourage women to tell their stories.

And we like to shop. I made it to Urban Arts & Crafts a total of three times over the course of the event. Tracy and Kristi Sikora-Blankenship and I wandered down there before classes on Friday morning. We kept talking about how cool it was that we were getting out of the hotel. In the past, when I teach in the afternoon, I spend my morning prepping, resting, adjusting my class, etc. This leaves very little time to get out and explore the city. The three of us had so much fun on Friday morning that we made plans to do something on Saturday morning as well.

Saturday morning we met up with Marianne and Elsie and the five of us caught a bus to the Plaza. Nothing better than riding public transportation for another flavor of city life...sat next to Bobby. Bobby was on the hunt for a job. He was missing a couple teeth, had on the shortest shorts I have seen on a man in awhile. Bobby and I chatted it up about looking for work, the beauty of coffee, the problem with employers wanting him to cut his long hair etc. On top of my conversation with Bobby, the back doors directly across from where we were sitting on the bus kept opening when we would go around a corner. Elsie was on one side of me, Bobby on the other. Each time the doors would open Bobby would say that the ghost wanted to get off. He then put his arm around me so he could catch me in case I started to fall out the door when it opened again. Bobby got off at 40th. Totally wish I had taken his picture now.

The Plaza is a very cool shopping area with lots of shops like Anthroplogie, JCrew, etc. Good stores. Stores that are nice to browse through and soak up the inspiration of the merchandising. The colors were all about fall - those awesome chunky sweaters and darker colors. And we got to start the morning off with coffee at Starbucks. But we really went to the Plaza on a mission to check out a store called Paper Source. Holy cow it was a happy place. Amazing hanging paper choices. We all found a little something-something there.

My color class is now retired. It had a good run. Thanks to those of you who said hi and for your kindness. Kansas City was cool. The people were so friendly and charming. I loved seeing how everyone was cheering last night at the closing ceremonies. So much cheering and excitement. Good, good event.

Looking forward to getting home.