If it's worth doing (this post delayed by Blogger maintenance)

If its worth doing, its worth doing well......... has always been my personal motto.  I am an all or nothing kind gal.  So it will come as no surprise that when planning an event I go all out. I painstakingly go over the details several times (I know some people call this OCD..... but what do they know).

So when I go to bed the night before a conference I am pretty sure I know every person attending, who still  needs to pay, who has pending workshop change requests etc... My business partner Joyce has all the details around the presenters, volunteers and catering under control.  We roll in at 6:30am (which means a 5:30am wake up call - Lindsay has been paid help at this conference for a few years now but when I told her the wake up time she quipped "I didn't know humans could wake up that early"...... oh the sweet irony.....this from the child who was up for 6am for the first 10 years of her life.....) and we are pretty well set up within the hour.

Both Joyce and I have our own routines in the early morning and we go to it without much ado. I am behind the Registration Desk setting up computers and printers and the boxes of namebadges and she is marshaling volunteers and setting them to tasks.  It's like a dance, we each know our steps and we get the day up and running with hardly a word to each other.  We usually sit down and catch up once the delegates are in their first workshop.  We catch up on the mini crises we have both had to manage and vent a bit about the ridiculous presenter or delegate we had to deal with......and we review how it all went.

Yesterday was a breeze, and it was the second biggest conference we have done in 9 years, over 200 people to register, feed, direct etc.

Only one un-registered delegate showed up (if you don't count the 2 from Kamloops who called me from the airport because they forgot to register.....they were blowing me kisses as they left today....ha ha) which is truly a record and only 7 people were no-shows (and they had all paid so no problem!!). Joyce had one presenter who arrived with a Mac but no adapter for the LCD, and one who came without a laptop at all but experience has taught us to always have back-up equipment so we made a couple switches and were up and running with no delays.  There was plenty of food for all and almost every workshop was a hit (out of 17 on offer that is pretty good). 

So many people thanked us for the great conference and we saw lots of people we only see once a year at this event so it was a great day.  It makes the aching legs worth the effort. 

So to Lindsay who's young legs and calm, poised manner make her an AV whizz and charming hostess - thank you Sweetheart!!  It is so fun to do this day with you.

Joyce, my dear friend, you were as awesome as ever...... never flustered, always on top of everything, so well prepared.  I love this event dance we do..... lets keep dancing ok!