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| the thames from the tate modern- a 2 minute walk from our fabulous hotel, citizen m |
here i sit in the greensboro sheraton in north carolina having just got off a plane (here for
high point market, 'natch), blogging about the
last time i got off a plane (just a little further east), for
blog tour london, and frankly, since i got back 3 weeks ago, this is my first chance to sit down and talk about it. i might have posted sooner, but even though i arrived home 3 weeks ago, my laptop took took a more leisurely route home and arrived 9 days later (hey, at least it arrived!). so between that, and the demnds of my business, i am just super behind on EVERYTHING.
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| i am TERRIFIED of heights, but the london eye was on my agenda as a "must do" while in london. |
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| white knuckling it on the eye- it was pretty cool, and i'm sort of proud of myself for doing something that scares the bejesus out of me. downside, it lasted 20 minutes which was about 10 minutes too long so i was pretty happy when we made it to terra firma again. |
i think some people wondered if i was EVER going to post about london (i'm sure that crossed the minds of my hosts,
modenus, and their generous sponsors, who graciously have said not a word about my silence), but now that we have laptop in hand and have somewhat caught up on work, we can finally start to post about our amazing london trip.
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| big ben at sunset from the eye. i went the first HOUR i was in london, and couldn't stop grinning about how stupid crazy good it all was. |
and teh trip was amazing, from start to finish. the city, as i'm sure many of you know, is spectacular, and
modenus, our sponsors and the amazing group of designers/social media peeps i was a part of couldn't have been more delightful. i gots lots to share, as well lots of sponsors to thank, so like the trip itself, we will mix the business with the pleasure and jumble it all up in our posts. frankly, i couldn't do anything but "mix it up" as the trip was so jammed packed with fun and design goodness, that i'm having a little trouble remembering what happened
when,
where and with
whom. also, to be perfectly frank, i was so sleep deprived the entire trip, that i couldn't reconstruct a cohesive timeline if i tried. things get a little blurry when you're tired.
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| the blog tour gang, chatting, drinking, eating and tweeting over tapas and spanish red. a truly magical evening and one of the many highlights of the trip. i loved spending time with these people! |
jet lag threw me for a loop in london because of the opposite time schedule; every night no matter how tired i was, my body told me it was daytime and i should be up doing stuff, and during the day, no matter how excited i was about the day's amazing events, my body keep screaming at me "go to bed you fool- you need to be asleep!" but i wasn't going to miss anything, so i did my best to ignore it; sometimes that wasn't easy...
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| blog tour sponsor, and so to bed, purveyors of amazing beds and mattresses. |
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| leather wrapped steel? nope- all metal, faux painted to look like leather- one of "and so to bed's' chic line of headboards. |
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| kinda fancy, right? |
it REALLY wasn't easy to ignore my body's need to get horizontal when we visited the showroom of one of our sponsors, "
and so to bed"- an entire showroom devoted to beds and mattresses! they threw us the most amazing tea party (a tea party with lots of champagne- gotta love that), but frankly, all i did in their showroom was test drive mattresses...
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| this comfy set up was calling my name! |
and my GOODNESS they make a comfortable mattress! i won't lie (pardon the pun) i may have been pretending to sleep on their comfy product, but the pretend wasn't so pretend- i MAY have taken a cat nap or two. just for seconds but it helped!
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| mattress testing |
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| all erin and i needed was a bowl of popcorn... |
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| yup, passed out- only for a minute, but yes, though people thought i was mugging for the camera, i actually nodded off briefly- a pretty good testimonial for the beds, dontchathink? |
i think i wasn't the only one enjoying a snooze as soon we were all draped over the relaxing beds like wet noodles!
it even devolved into a slumber party at one point...
not even this
cute little lady could perk me up for more than a minute, my environment was so relaxing...
in addition to the "and so to bed" showroom, i also fell asleep on the tube at one point...
thank goodness, again i only nodded off for a brief second so i didn't end up at teh end of the line (my inner 12 year old's favorite stop, "cockfosters".
hehehehe. i know- grow up, christian!
)
back at the hotel, the chic
citizen m, i spent my evenings not sleeping due to my damn circadian rythm disturbance (their wall to wall beds were awesome, so not fault of citizen m!). while laying sleeplessly in bed staring at the groovy color changing glass shower enclosure, i thought about
another blog tour london sponsor,
mr. steam, and if wondered if that sleek glass enclosure had mr. steam's product inside, would it relax me enough to finally sleep?
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| love the mood lighting of the shower enclosure at citizen m, but why aren't you mcsteamy? |
martha, VP at
mr. steam, and her delightful partner susan, traveled with us for the tour and their enthusiasm for the
mr. steam product was pretty infectious. they explained mr. steam's holistic approach to good health via
steam therapy and left me really dreaming of a good steam almost daily. now that i'm home, i look at my regular, antiquated, shower everyday and think "
what's wrong with you- GIVE ME SOME STEAM, DAMMIT!' but it just sits there, spraying out stupid old regular water. the
mr. steam website says wouldn't be crazy to retrofit one at home (they start at about $1500) but of course, my bath remodel isn't happening anytime soon, so for now, i'll just have to recommend the product to clients! (one of the great things about meeting manufacturers face to face like this is the chance to truly share their personal commitment to their product and it's infectious; i might not have specified the benefits of a steam shower to my clients
before, but i sure will now- i'm a believer!)
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| i'm in need to some steam therapy to cancel out the jet lag- AGAIN |
last, the low point of my jet lag is ironically now one of my favorite moments of the trip, even though i don't really remember it. thank goodness my design partner in crime,
jill seidner captured the moment for posterity: one morning when i felt the ill effects from sleep deprivation particularly badly, i found a sofa in an unused corner of the chelsea design centre and after begging jill to watch over me to make sure i wasn't arrested for vagrancy, i took a 20 min power nap. that power nap enabled me to keep going with our busy blog tour day, and to jill's credit, she didn't abandon me and flee from embarrassment while i snored like a champ. now that's what friends are for!
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| looking homeless, m21 style! (photo by jill) |
more later about london,
high point market, some fab LA events- all sorts of good stuff- but first i need to get some z's. nighty-night, y'all!
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| as always, thank you to our generous blog tour sponsors. |
