Faerie Enchantment

Ranger U Oct.3-5, 2008 in Tinton Falls, NJ!
On Friday Oct.3, a new adventure began when I left my house at 7am to head on over to South Jersey to the Ranger Warehouse, where a weekend of artful magic was waiting to be unveiled.
As I trecked through the Northern Country side, flying past vast farms covered in pumpkins and tri-colored leaves, Tewksbury Victorians and Illuminating beams of sunlight, I kept thinking, wow, I'm going to be learning and creating for three straight days, pinch me, now that's Artful Heaven.
As soon as I arrived, the other students were one by one floating through the door, as was Suze and my first new friends: Leandra Franich and Linda Brown, both from the UK, My Fatherland. So after a bit of chatting, we walked through the Ranger Classroom and found an end seat, where we were joined by more eager to learn students, from Massachusettes.
After some Dunkin Donuts (my fave coffee)and donuts, we were led to the warehouse were a jumbo, I mean jumbo box filled with supplies, carefully bagged and label for each class segment, awaited us, these would be what we used all weekend and could leave with at the end of our class. Then we were spli into 2 groups and given a tour of the facility and shown how the products we would be using were made, Alan and Tim took us on our tour. Lets just say when I saw the glitter, I was in a world of pure imagination, like Willie Wonka, and we all know just how much I love glitter.
When we went back to the class room it was time to begin, Suze Weinberg started off the first half of the classes on Friday, showing us a multitude of Beeswax, Utee and Melting Pot techniques and projects, each more amazing then the next. Here is the first picture I took at Ranger U with The Fabulous Suze Weinberg http://suzeweinberg.typepad.com/suzeblogz/
and Linda Brown (The Owner of LB Crafts, located in the UK),
http://www.lbcrafts.com/
In this picture you can see us all hard at work, learning techniques!


In all these pictures you can see our first finished projects we did at Ranger, with Suze, all framed and matted. The one is a group shot of all of us outside with our projects and the other is a picture of Jayne and Me with our Frames! When Suze was done teaching, Claudine Hellmuth took center stage and show us her style and a variety of techniques with her new product line in a rich creamy color palette. After our first day of class everyone was invited to a dinner party, barbeque style at Ranger were we all mingled with each other, staff, owners and designers, it was an amazing time, to sit back, eat, drink and relax with one and other.
Here is a Picture of the Tim Holtz http://timholtz.typepad.com/my_weblog/ and Me at the first night party! Tim is what can I say, brilliant! Followed by a picture of Jackie Mclaughlin my new buddy and Me! Jackie is a super talented artist and designer who has been featured in many books and written one herself, such a talent and super nice person, so glad she lives in NJ! Jackie is a talent and part of the Ranger Family.

I can't forget my new pal from Ohio Aimee Fleck
http://www.aimeeinohio.blogspot.com/ Aimee is amazing and super cool, lots of talent! So glad we became friends!

After the party I drove back home and went straight to bed, woke up and left the house again at 7am for another fantastic day at Ranger U. On Saturday we opened the day with more dunkin donuts, love that stuff and Tim Holtz, who showed us a plethora of techniques over the next 2 days, loads of amazing distress, using alcohol inks and other Ranger products in a whole new way. Halfway through the day we broke for lunch with amazing pizza, so good and more chat time with new and old friends. Here is a picture of Claudine Hellmuth http://claudinehellmuth.blogspot.com/and Me, at lunch. She is super sweet and introduced so many great techniques in Friday's Class!

Here is a picture of Bonnie and Me, Okay, can I just wonderful and so amazing is the words I can use to describe: Bonnie from Ranger, such a sweet person, so glad we became friends, just amazing!
After Saturday's Class, Suze took Leandra, Linda and I over to shop just outside of Red Bank, where an Anthropology Shop was, now anyone who knows me, knows I have a love affair with A. Glitter, B. Anthropology, Oh and Glenny Too! LOL! I can never leave Anthropology without something, and of course I didn't, tried on a cutesy pink and grey frilly tank top over my Thick layered Turtle neck, looked quite lovely, LOL, I think I scared Linda when I did that! LOL!, Actually I scared myself, but it looks perfect when worn the normal way, as a tank top...Afterwards we headed to Jackson to an amazing Sushi Lounge where Suze's Hubby Lenny and My Glenny met us all. It was soooo good here are some highlights from there:


Suze is super amazing, so warm and generous, she goes out of her way to make you feel at home and after her dinner treat which was so wonderful she led us back to her gorgeous house, my fave place, where Leandra showed us first hand her utee bead project which Suze's has labeled: The Leandra Technique. This bead when done looks like dicroic glass, fused, its breathtaking. Leandra Franich is simply what can I say Ultra talented, she is the owner of Paper Artsy in the UK http://www.paperartsy.co.uk/ The most brilliant and un-believable Rubber Stamp Site, she even donated Stamp packs to all the Ranger U students, how wonderful is that.



After making us drool over these beads, Leandra and Linda went back to the hotel, My Glenny drove home Can I say I just love my Glenny, and Suze and I each retired to bed, to prepare for the longest day of all: Sunday 9am-9pm at Ranger, but before I went to bed, I was given a very special gift which is now close to me in my studio sending me loads of magic and inspiration, by Suze, it made me smile all night. Here I am holding it
The funny thing, I love this artist too, have a small book of hers and some other items, how cool is that.


Now its Sunday, our last day, here is a picture of our table, posing for the camera, followed by some silliness, a picture of Leandra wearing her plastic gloves and bling Bling, too funny, had to take a picture! I call it Leandra's Artful Bling!

During this Plastic glove time, I made this tag learning another great technique, how cool is this background and the stamp

Again we broke for lunch for one last time before class ended, here is a fab picture of Linda Hahola, Jeanne Wines-Reed and Me, and guess what, I took the picture myself, I'm a pro at the stretched arm picture. LOL. Linda and Jeanne are incredibly talented and wonderful people, their warm vibes and true self showed straight through, they were such a pleasure to meet and become friends with, Linda lives near me, so excited and Jeanne is out in Utah, I'm coming out to Utah Jeanne! Utah watch out, here I come, LOL! Jeanne is one of the authors behind: Digital scrapbooking for dummies, such an essential book to have in your library!
Let's not forget the amazing, Mario, and the amazing Patti who ran around all day, the whole weekend for us, they were wonderful, getting us supplies and things we needed.
Say Cheese Teresa, here is a cute pic I took of Miss Teresa Natividad from Ranger, she is super nice and sweet, such a pleasure to meet, did I forget Talented too! Last night some of the gals made all the students and teachers newspaper hats, which we secretly painted at lunch and hid til the end of the day to surprise: Suze, Tim and Claudine, at the Certificate Ceremonies, it was too cute. Here are some of us wearing our hats. One is my table group and the other with Janet Hopkins http://www.janetjopkins.typepad.com/ from Heidi Swapp, who also donated stamp masks for us to use in our techniques, did I mention I destroyed mine with a heat tool, which melted part of it, LOL! I'll be ordering some soon!




Here is Jackie modeling her Blinging paper hat with Patti looking on! LOL!

After out class group photo, we brooke for dinner for an hour, Leandra, Linda, Suze, Lenny and Me headed for Applebees, The Notorious L's as Suze's calls us, ordered these Peach Apple Sangrias, look at the size of them, LOL. Dinner was now even more of a blast, come on, we had Sangria, LOL, Thank You Leandra and Linda for Dinner, super nice!


By the way, we each got a piece of this chocolate from one of the international girls, I had to take a picture of it, before I ate the castle! LOL!.
The Forum was a success and answered many questions that everyone had, a litter after 9pm many of us left and said our goodbyes, gave our warm wishes and said our thank you, while some of us headed for the Lobby Party at The Marriott, yes I went! LOL!.
Here is a great pic of Mike aka Jack and Curio Cat, which I took, LOL, it should read, Pardon me, would you like some wine! LOL!, too funny! Here is a pic of our after party crew:
The After PartY:
Jackie Mclaughlin, Mike Putman, Aimee Fleck, Tanya Watts: http://www.pretty-things.net/ super nice and from the great land of Belgium, Diane Radischat from Seattle (she lives near Eddie Vetter, shall I say More)http://www.awindowseat.typepad.com/, Sue Clifford from Spain (artyfacts), Jeanne Wines-Reed, Lindy Andersen (super nice) from Norway, NYC Rules with Julie Fei-Fan Balzer sooo talented: http://www.balzerdesigns.typepad.com/
I took sooo many pictures, too many to post in a single blog post or in the whole blog, so I posted some different ones on my flickr site and the rest of the highlights all into a Picasa Album which you can click on and see the rest of the adventure!
Hope you enjoyed my highlights of this incredible event!
Magic and Joy!
Lisa!