Recap | The Simple Plan

It has been a priority to attend at least two educational & networking workshops for Pearls Events each year. Last year, I attended both Eventology & Engage! 09. This year, I will attend Eventology soon, and last week, I had the opportunity to head to Washington, D.C., to attend The Simple Plan.

My wedding planner friend, Lindsey, of Lindsey Nartker Designs in Detroit, and I hit the road Sunday morning, and made it to DC in under 10 hours, despite the crazy rain. We checked into our room at The Ritz Carlton (Thanks Eren, for the hookup!) and even after 10 hours in the car chatting, couldn't shut up and just go to sleep.

Monday we navigated our way to Cafe Deluxe via the DC Metro, and worked on our business plans with Sage Wedding Pros and Kate Parker. Since I graduated college in 2003, wrote my business plan for Pearls Events in 2007, and here it is 2010, my plan was outdated. After the full day, most of the class went out for dinner (and delicious margaritas!) across the street.

Tuesday we worked on the financial side of our businesses with Wendy of Aspire to Plan. We focused on accounting with Quickbooks, our profit/loss statements, and knowing our numbers. I will tell you, that I am not really great at this side of my business, so this part was extremely helpful. We had dinner with a few of the locals at 2 Amys Pizza before heading back to our hotel room for the night.

Wednesday we hit the road after a leisure breakfast, on a mission to visit the Fiestaware Factory. A late start, an 18-mile detour, plus traffic through Pittsburgh, put us there too late, so we headed home instead - our little road trip cut short by poor trip planning indeed!

Sadly, the only snapshot I took was of Lindsey in front of the fireplace(!) at a Dairy Queen on our way. No joke. I would post it, but she may kill me! I know that there were professional shots taken by A Britton Photography, which I plan to add to this post when available.