All About Haven 2015!

Where do I begin?!!

Seriously, this past weekend’s Haven conference in Atlanta was a truly invigorating & inspirational event – 3 nights & 2 FULL days of straight awesomeness! Long days and late nights, but I am already looking forward to next year… #haven2016 anyone?!

For those of you who aren’t familiar, Haven is an annual design & DIY bloggers conference. I mentioned here that Ted surprised me with a ticket to Haven for my birthday this past February and I couldn’t be more grateful to him for helping me take the plunge. If it weren’t for him, I probably wouldn’t have pulled the trigger on the trip. Not that I didn’t want to go, but I’m pretty sure, at the time, I didn’t think I was “ready” or a good enough blogger to attend. I surely couldn’t have been more wrong.

Thursday evening was the Welcome reception, but just before-hand, the lovely Haven chairs hosted a Newbie party for all of the first-timers. We went through a few icebreakers, exchanged business cards and got to know one another. All over cocktails, of course. I learned I definitely was not the newest blogger there. Many others had also been blogging for a year or slightly more and there were even several people who hadn’t even started their blog yet! A mixed bag, for sure. Here is a shot from the welcome party with a few awesome girls I got to know!

Evolution of Style, The Tale of an Ugly House and Ankarsrum Blog

After the reception, I found myself at dinner with 4 amazing women – all super talented and just as fun & charming as they appear on their blogs. I sort of felt like “pinch me” all weekend! Meeting them all in real life!
Cheers to new friends! 11Magnolia Lane, Dixie Delights & The Pink Clutch

Friday kicked off with a hilarious motivational speaker, Jon Acuff, then off to sessions and sponsor booths before the evening festivities.
Deb from Seeking Lavender Lane was the cutest & sweetest! We made our way around chatting with sponsors and then got to jump in a fun shoot with 2 of the Haven co-chairs, Chris from Just a Girl Blog & Sarah from Thrifty Décor Chick at the Kirklands booth!
Pre-dinner selfie stick shenanigans. Making good use out of all that swag we lucky Haven Mavens received from our sponsors!!
Thanks for capturing this fun moment, Suburban Bitches!
Then we headed out for another fabulous dinner!

Saturday, sadly was the last day, but also the most eye-opening. There were a tremendous amount of takeaways from each session I attended with plenty of notes to still sort through 🙂 but 2 stood out to me and were more than just eye-opening. They really moved me. One was about moving from a Brand to a Business and how to get down to the basics. Identifying who you are and what you are about should really be the basis of your brand. Embracing your unique qualities will set you apart and also allow your true voice to shine through to your readers. Being authentic will keep readers around far longer than pretty pictures. Sitting down to reflect on how I want to represent myself and then owning it is one of the top items on my post-Haven to-do list. The list is long. really long.

At another session, Karianne from Thistlewood Farms, spoke about recognizing your value & worth. Building the confidence to approach a brand for sponsorship and learning to recognize we are valuable resources and can be instrumental in helping them grow their brand.

She was so fantastic!

One final meal with m’girls (Heather – Southern State of Mind, Amanda – Dixie Delights & Paige – The Pink Clutch) a late night dance party and then we were off to Savannah in the morning! [I’ll be recapping our extended vacay sometime next week, so stay tuned!]
My sweet & sassy southern gals. #loveyall

Haven was more than just info, fresh ideas and tips & tricks. It was connecting with the most helpful, uplifting & innovative people across the our industry. I clearly didn’t include each & every detail of my experience, but hopefully I was able to summarize my highlights & takeaways with a few pics to go along. I’m going to take what I learned and try to apply it day-by-day without getting overwhelmed. try is the keyword. My hope is that I’m able to slowly start incorporating new ideas into my posts, photography, etc. and that you’ll start to see me and my brand transform into something great. something I can continue to be proud of as I work to make it the best representation of ME!

Mandy from Vintage Revivals sums it up best. Incredible closing speech.
I mean it when I say I’m already counting down to next year’s conference. Seriously #alreadycravinanotherhaven
And one…the old school way.

*Although I don’t have a picture with them, I was lucky enough to meet Kimm from Reinvented & Jeanie from Create and Babble on Wednesday night as they sort of took me under their wing – inviting me to show up the next morning to help stuff swag bags and then asked to meet for drinks before the welcome party the first night. They told me they remembered how it felt to be new to Haven and while it is an incredible experience, it can be extremely intimidating at first! I owe these girls a huge thank you for making me feel so comfortable before it even began! So thank you!

So now that it is back to real life, things keep on a movin’. Tomorrow, we’ll be celebrating my first-born’s 3rd birthday tomorrow [I can’t believe its been a full year since I wrote that post?!] Our celebrations will pretty much be non-stop for 3 days! Although I’m definitely NOT yet recovered from the trip, here we go! #whatsnew
And I’m dying to get new posts published after I’ve been crafting up fresh ideas in my head, they will all just have to wait. Its party time!!