A Grace-Filled Classroom: Teachers in Vegas!

Oh, my gosh, y'all!... the TpT conference was AMAZING! (Did the y'all throw you off? I picked it up from all the Texans I met... haha... Californians don't say it but it seems to have stuck!)

I am overjoyed and exhausted from this year's amazing TpT conference! I wasn't able to attend last year so I made sure that I went this year and boy was it the best decision ever. There was so much to learn and I got to finally meet such amazing TpT sellers!

If you have ever bought or sold anything from Teachers Pay Teachers, you know want an amazing company it is... some of the things I learned are valuable for everyone to know regardless of being a buyer or a seller. But I will apologize to buyers, this post is geared more towards sellers.

Never fret! I do have an easy giveaway at the end of my blog post!

Make sure you read to the end where I will be having a

TpT gift certificate giveaway for 2 lucky winners!

Wednesday night I got to go to the Cool Kids Meet put on by Kayse of Teaching on Less and Shelli of Literary Shelli! My roommate Reddishann of Reddish Brown Crayon and I got to sit with two TpT staff members, Alex and Elliot. It was Elliot's first day on the job, y'all! He had just gotten hired on Tuesday and was ready to jump right in on Wednesday. How cool is he? We also got to meet Amy! She as sweet in person as she is the forums.

During the Blogger Meet-Up we got to meet many of, what I like to call, the A-List bloggers. The amazing Deanna Jump, Amy Lemon and Krista Wallden! These ladies are such an inspiration and I will admit I was a little star struck with them.

My favorite seller that I met was Amie of Glitter Meets Glue. She was amazing to talk to! She had a fun giveaway going on during the conference! If you yelled "glitter-swag" when she was nearby, she handed you a flash drive with clipart that hasn't been released yet! Isn't that ridiculously generous and fun! Another thing I loved about Amie was that she was so easy to talk to. Reddishann and I talked with her for about 10 minutes and were able to learn from her.

Of course, the whole reason for going to the conference was to learn from amazing sellers and let me just say I learned so much!

Here are a few things I learned that I would like to share with you all:

Erin Cobb of Lovin' Lit gave great advice. She suggested making a weekly schedule and creating hours for yourself. (Just the way a business works.) She recommended creating deadlines and keeping myself accountable.
Use pinterest wisely! Teachers like to see pictures not just product covers.
Find your niche... better yet... let your niche find you. How ? Create what you like and what you are good at. Instead, start with what you love and what you are good at and let them overlap. Whatever you do, don't copy the latest trend just because it's a trend.
Continue with the 80/20 rule. 80% of your dedicated time to creating, 20% of the time to promoting. If you spend too much time promoting and not enough time creating, there may not be too much to promote.

Another highlight of the conference was winning $30 of clipart for Educlips during Jessica Ivey's session! I love Educlips... now I just need to decide what I would like to buy... so many great choices to pick from!

I will say the most inspirational moment came during the Keynote address when Paul said, "The people in this room will have the biggest impact on education the world has ever seen." It made me realize that what we do as sellers and bloggers carries so much value. I am a part of something bigger than myself. I part of something that is making a difference in education.

Lasty, the best part of the weekend was finally getting to meet gals that I've been collaborating with for awhile! It's so weird to know people so well and consider them friends but have never met them in person... haha. I was over the moon to finally get to hang out with some pretty cool gals that I admire and am so honored to call my friends! In the left picture, I am with Reddishann of Reddish Brown Crayon and Marcie of Sunny and Bright in First Grade. In the right picture, I am with Julie of A First for Everything, Reddishann, and Amy of Amy Labrasciano.

All I can say is that I had an amazing weekend! It could not have turned out better. I seriously can not wait for next year. I would highly recommend it to everyone!