I'm Alive--Pictures from St Thomas

Oh hello everyone. What can I say--Bad Blogger! In case anyone still reads I thought it is certainly high time I dropped you all a line and said that I'm still here.

The St. Thomas trip was, well, how do I describe it? GRUELING. No, it was NOT a vacation. Well, Mister got some R&R, but not me. In brief: 5 events in 4 days, all of which needed florals, one of which was really 3 events in one, so if you want to be picky, it was like 7 or 8 events all together. Let's see...so many adventures. My flowers got there before me. Which meant they sat in a hot post office for a full day before they could be rescued. Once I arrived, my assistant and I spent at least half a day conditioning, hydrating and generally trying to salvage all of our flowers. Oh, and the flower prep room we were supposed to have was not available, so we were in the ballroom with the rest of the event staff, which was fine, but it meant that eventually we had to move. Move, that is, like 30 buckets of flowers, several work tables, tarps, tools, etc., to another location. Oh, then, the air conditioning broke. Yeah, that was fun. So we had to move AGAIN back to the ballroom, until the a/c was fixed. (Are you getting a feeling for what it was like yet?) Okay, then, the second half of the 1st day we were in meetings and site visits with the whole event crew and the production staff, then meetings with the Client. Day 2: make arrangements for lobby, reception area and pool deck party. Install lobby and reception area arrangements. I think I got to bed around midnight? Day 3: Start on arrangements for 'executive dinner', install pool party. I think we got in a couple of hours at the beach that day. Day 4: finish executive dinner arrangements, start arrangements for Awards Party, drive off-site to set up Executive Dinner, come back, eat dinner, stay up till midnight helping put on table cloths and seat covers for Awards Dinner. Shall I go on? It went on like that all week, culminating on the last party/event on Saturday, which was the BIG GALA PARTY that was really 3 parties in one at a venue that was (really cool) off-site from the hotel. We spent the entire day setting up that party(ies), and then, we had to stay until the party was over (midnight, again) and break it all down. By my last day there (Sunday) I was so exhausted. The owner of the event company treated us all to a snorkeling trip Sunday morning and I was so exhausted I stayed ON THE BOAT. There I was, in the Caribbean, with a chance to swim with the fish, and the HUGE TURTLES and I was so exhausted I stayed on the boat. At least I got a couple of hours in the sun.

But, it was a successful trip. I did what I was hired to do, despite some less than ideal conditions and situations. My (awesome) assistant and I certainly had our hands full, and we had to do a bit of McGueyvering to get everything accomplished with not 100% of our floral product being viable, but we did it. By the last party, I was like, "I hope nobody looks too closely at the flowers--eek!" We were pretty much talking to the flowers and begging them to just hang on for one more day!! Oh, the hilarity. I definitely learned some lessons for next time--and I guess the client was happy because they are already talking about next year. In Beijing. Lord help me.

Oh, and p.s. I NEVER want to leave my baby for that long EVER AGAIN! Don't know what I'll do if I DO go to Beijing next year. But, Mister will be staying behind for that one, so I guess if I go at least Handsome Man will have one of us. I know he was super well loved and spoiled and doted on while he was with Grandma/Grandpa, but oy! my heart just hurt leaving him like that.

When I returned home, I didn't slow down. I got back late late on Monday and the next day was back to work. I had 3 events (yes, what was I thinking?) that following weekend. And, then, last weekend, I had two events.

Needless to say, I'm exhausted and still trying to catch my breath, so I haven't been much in the mood for blogging, but I've been checking in on my buds out there. I hope you haven't all forgotten about me.

Here's some pix from the trip!

The Mardi Gras themed party:
My goofy husband dancing with a samba dancer at the Rio/Carnival themed party:


















Another floral installation at 'Havana Blue' Restaurant that we did. These were actually HUGE and we did two of them.


















There were many more events and flowers and such, but honestly I didn't take a lot of pictures I was so dang busy!!