Dreamhaven Update #8

I am pleased to announce that the Coupon-Fairy Booklet is now up-front and live for purchase!  Coupons for over 40 small businesses are collected together here in this booklet that can be applied to their stores for discounts, free gifts, food and more - shop & save!

It features savings for Damsel in this Dress, Oddmall Seattle, Thyme2Dream and more. :) Since participating vendors are primarily online, anyone, anywhere can use the booklet's coupons.

Proceeds are divided between the vendors, and Project Dreamhaven.  If you'd like to read more, check out the Fairyblossom website.

Which brings us to this week's Giveaway!  Sponsored by Reading with Renee from Usborne Books, we have a Fairy Enchanted set of books worth $45 - FREE for you to enter for a chance to win.  Go go go!
a Rafflecopter giveaway

Dreamhaven Update #7

I am ridiculously excited about bringing to you all a brand new event in 2015 - The Fairyblossom Festival! We have our site secured in Chehalis, WA, on June 20 - 21.  The application for vendors, volunteers, performers, campers and buying gate tickets is all online and ready to go!

We plan to have some different activities going on this coming year that I am really aflutter about; crowing of the Flower Queen and Forest Queen with a royal court, the summer games tourney with glow golf, camping!  My favorite though is the Fairy Feast and Stone Soup.

On Saturday evening, everyone is invited to contribute to our pot-luck feast where we will be brewing up Stone Soup, ala the old folktale.  We'll have a pot and kettle from Brunetta Blacksmithing, we'll have a stone, custom carved, from Stonebreaker, and we'll have delicious ingredients added by everyone!

It is a community event and totally free so bring a bowl and a veggie to throw in the pot!  There's rumour that our own local character, Witchy-poo, may even appear to do the cooking of the soup.

Part of our proceeds will be going to support the Castle Fund (that is, a fundraiser to help buy a permanent event site here in the PNW).

Along with the Coupon Fairy Booklet, it has been a lot of various little streams to help raise the money for our first major step, which is the feasibility study, and I am excited that these balls are now rolling. The booklet should be ready for it's first look over in a week or so, as the coupons from stores are coming in.

Also - today is the last day to enter Aimee Stewart's giveaway, don't miss your chance to win!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Dreamhaven Update #6

Upon returning home from Canterbury Renfaire in Silverton, Oregon, I've been fluttering around playing catch up.  The Coupon-Fairy Fundraiser is gaining more vendors and artists every day, and we've begun to put the booklet together for .pdf selling.

I took the opportunity to avail myself of services offered whilst down in Portlandia (or thereabouts), and collaborated with a friend to begin the rough outline of a map for the Castle Project.  Ideally, this will help our architect get a very good idea of what we're looking to do.  Here's the draft map....


I intend to shuffle some stuff around still but it's at least a look.

In other exciting news, I confirmed today that I can start selling some of my product at Spooked in Seattle as soon as next week - this will be a great way to generate some revenue for the Castle Project!

All that said...I bring to you this week's giveaway, courtesy of Alexandra Haley Art - get your entries in!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Dreamhaven Update #5

It has been a whirlwind week, ending with the Myth & Magic Masquerade Ball at the EMP Museum.  What a great event!  We had a live-action quest for everyone to go on and I was a the very enigmatic and mysterious fairy princess that got to help the LARPers on their way.  They gave me the answer to the riddle and I gave them the next clue.  Very fun event with amazing costumes and special guests.

Thus we begin the week of prepping for Canterbury Renaissance Faire in Silverton, OR.  Human Magical (science) supplies, packing more books and product to be mailed before I'm gone for over a week, paperwork to get off to the Red Tape of Bureaucracy chimera, food to have prepared, trailers to secure, wow - the list is incredible.

Two major tasks this week will be to apply for a loan so that I can fund the main portion of the Feasibility Study (that baby troll is pretty hungry), as well as begin a draft on the Coupon-Fairy Fundraiser.  We now have ~15 Vendors signed up, and I hope to gain some more this weekend. :)

The Troll-o-Meter has in fact been rising, and every penny of course helps offset the first of our major monetary requirements for the Castle Project.  I feel encouraged and excited to be going forward, no matter how fast or slow - every step is closer!

Hope to see everyone at Canterbury!

Dreamhaven Update #4

:**:Fairy Princess Lolly:**:, Kai the Mermaid,
Leaflock, Serena the Mermaid (left to right)

FAE Hollow had a great time and successful fundraising at Greenwood this weekend!  For the first time we were visited by two lovely sea maids: Kai & Serena the Mermaids.

The two oceanic lovelies brought a little aquatic magic to our hollow by transforming mere rocks into beautiful mermaid wishing stones for faire-goers.  We had a kinetic-sand box for play complete with sea shells and a sand castle, and some live tadpoles for the kiddos to look at.

Elsewhere in the Hollow, our silent helper (whom we call) Changeling Boy worked with the children to mine the jewels out of some glittery Dwarven Stones.  Late on Sunday afternoon, he manifested part of his fae nature as two red ears appeared on the top of his head!  We're so excited to see his magical side emerging and look forward to seeing what may come at Canterbury later on this month. :)

Changeling Boy with his newly emerged ears!

Ion the Leprechaun employed his alchemical expertise to verify that the Faere-y Coyne the children brought to us was 100% authentic coyne.  No forgeries! After a few tests, he was more than happy to trade the coyne for some tasty surprises from the magical candy apple.

For her part, Leaflock was all over the place, pixie-pinching attendees clandestinely, so that they could come make a wish on our dream tree.

We were also happy to discover that at the end of Faire, we had made $33 to donate to the Castle Fund!

Thanks to everyone who came out to see us and supported FAE Hollow!  We'll see you in a couple weeks at Canterbury!

Dreamhaven Update #3

Today was a great day despite the troll!  As you may recall from the last post, I have encountered the first big challenge of the project: financing a feasibility study.  I think of it as a baby troll.

The baby troll needs $15, 295 worth of feeding.

I spent the weekend brainstorming ideas for how to feed the baby troll, since this is an essential first step toward realizing the castle park.  It absolute must-be-done in order for the project to continue to go forth in a serious manner.

Many streams make a river of dreams.  Here is revenue stream the first:

Here's the overview - if you want full details, please message me!

Coupon-Fairy Fundraiser Program

Welcome to the Coupon-Fairy Program.  Please allow me to explain a little bit about it!  This program has been developed as a fundraising effort for “The Castle Project” (http://www.gofundme.com/97gtd8).  Follow the link to read a detailed description of the project, plan and ongoing timeline.

BACKGROUND

Late in 2013 we began to embark on our vision of building a full-scale event-center adventure park.  It is a multi-million dollar project, on a 3-4 year timeline.  Although the primary funding will be obtained via private investors, every possible stream of revenue facilitates the project achieving reality.

Our first milestone (which I have affectionately dubbed the “Baby Troll”) that we are striving to reach is to raise $15,295 to cover the expense of hiring an architectural firm to assemble a feasibility study.  A feasibility study, in this context, is a collection of the schematics and documents that are presented to general contractors to get bids on what the project will actually cost to build.  This information is critically necessary to formulating a fully developed business plan.  No business plan, no private funding.

PURPOSE OF COUPON FAIRY PROGRAM

--To fundraise a minimum of $15,000 to pay for an architectural feasibility study.

--To benefit the handmade and artisan community in the process of achieving our first major milestone.

Nobody does anything alone in this world.  It is my aim to make it beneficial for you and your business to help me and my project!

HOW YOU BENEFIT!

NO Buy-in Fees! The only cost to you is the cost (if any) of listing the product on your chosen platform

You Make Money for participating.

Your Store Name will be listed in every other participating store as a part of the Coupon-Fairy Book listing.

Free advertising, but advertising that makes you some money in the process!

(Etsyians): Your store items will be periodically added into treasuries that also include the digital booklet

Feed the Troll!

Dreamhaven Update #2

This week's line-up is rapidly becoming overwhelming, but let's not think about that for now.  Instead, meet the baby troll.  I feel as though I have met the first real hurdle in the Castle Project, and compared to what is sure to come further on down the line, I am sure this hurdle is quite small.  It FEELS huge though, and thus I have dubbed it the "BABY TROLL".

This Baby Troll's name is "Feasibility Study" - and I must overcome the Troll.  Last Friday I received the first proposal back from a prospective architect naming a price for doing a feasibility study.

A feasibility study is where the architect basically takes the whole of an idea and maps it out on paper such that it can be presented to a general contractor for bidding.

Dang. Babies are expensive. "Feasibility Study the Baby Troll" is a $15,295 baby troll!

I am sure you can imagine that, like most people, I don't have $15,000 chillaxing in my Smaug-like vaults.  This means, of course, that real hurdle numero uno is how to fund-raise fifteen large (selling wee ones to the goblin king is RIGHT out!).

So this weekend I set my mind to brainstorming (and I must thank my friends Robert P. (Silver Tide Jewelry) & Kathleen H. (Stained Glass Butterfly) for their insight and suggestions).  The idea, (and perhaps I am partial but I think it is a winner): The Etsy Coupon Book.

The Etsy Coupon Book is intended to be a digital booklet of check-out Coupons that can be redeemed with Etsy sellers in their online stores.  The coupon books will be available for purchase and the proceeds will go to the surmounting the cost of "Feasibility the Baby Troll".

Which means I'll be writing up the program tonight/tomorrow to poke potential etsyians with.  Which brings us back around to the beginning of this post...this week's line-up is rapidly becoming overwhelming!