Dreamhaven Update #11

I'm taking a moment this week to talk about Dreamhaven specifically.  There have been a lot of updates and changes over the summer as the vision refines itself and takes better focus.  I am really very excited about how it's shaping up.

Yesterday, we formally retained Coupe Architecture to begin our project design. We've narrowed our land-search areas (in order of prevalence) to Snohomish, Lewis and Grant Counties. These will be contingent (ultimately) on what our market studies bear out.

Two of the things that I am most excited to discuss are the Handmade & Farmer's Market, and the P-Patch Community Gardens.

Handmade and Farmer's Market
The market is, ostensibly, one of the first things you will see when you enter Dreamhaven.  While it is meant to have a medieval/fantasy village aesthetic, we plan to build as much as we can using green technology and permaculture techniques.

The market will have to primary types of shoppes or stalls: 1) the permanent artisan workshops, some with overhead living/storage studios and 2) daily farmers market stalls which are first come, first served to set up and vend for the day, or for the duration of your event.

The village market stalls will be intended to house a variety of artisan craftworks such as pottery, bath and body products, glass blowing, blacksmithing, jewelry, garb & cosplay clothing, etc.  These products are intended to be made primarily right on site from Dreamhaven artisans!

Pea Patch Community Gardens
These little garden patches will be available to members of the public community.  They will be welcome to tend to their garden in Dreamhaven every day, and are invited along with any other vendors/artists to sell their produce, flowers or other crops in our farmer's market stalls.

It is our goal to provide both a learning experience and a hobby, whilst encouraging community productivity.  The more we learn to sustain ourselves, even in our urban settings, the greener our world will be.

Developing our on-site gardens, pumpkin patches and orchards provides us with a unique opportunity to hold educational seminars and field trips.

I am very excited about the direction we're going and looking forward to sharing more as we go forward!

Dreamhaven Update #10

This weekend was pretty awesome.  Ion the Leprechaun and I ventured down the silver path to the Spokane Renaissance Faire, to the Gossamer Glen of Queen Mab.  We had a great time making crowns, fairy rings, and magic wands!

Among the highlights was our Human Magic (Science) show with the kidlets.  We experimented with a some Rainbow magic and an Oobleck Spell.  We also enjoyed bartering the metals (bottlecaps) for wishing stones, and good times with good friends.

Tycho and Hypatia joined us for the trip, they seemed to do pretty well in both the blueberry chariot as well as their kitteh harnesses.  The kids were able to pet and hold and play with them but as you can see, motorin' sacked sister kitten out!

Project Dreamhaven received confirmation from Coupe Architecture that work on the park design will begin with our first payment.  We're almost to $1,000 to get that ball rolling, which is very exciting. :)  We are also nearly up to 300 votes on our Chase Grant application!

It's very nice to see the coupon-booklet contributing to both vendors, and the project all at once.  We are getting a lot of new sign-ups for next year so I'm looking forward to even bigger and better!

All that said, this week's giveaway is for a selection of some pretty awesome art from Kamakru Art.  Check out her page and tell us what your favorite pieces are!

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Dreamhaven Update #9

For those of you just now joining us, Project Dreamhaven is our vision to establish a themed event venue and adventure park that operates year-round.

We've been working this year to build the funds necessary to begin the process with an architectural feasibility study (that is, the park layout and design necessary to receive bids from general contractors).

Part of our ongoing efforts to raise these funds include the Coupon-Fairy Booklet, the Fairyblossom Festival and our GoFundMe Campaign.

Added to our capital-raising efforts, we've officially applied for a $150,000 grant from Chase bank.  This grant would be used to help pay for our feasibility study and the purchase of real-estate for our event park.

We need 250 votes in order to advance to the next phase.  If you support our vision, please take a moment to go vote for me.  It is free to do so and does not require any email sign up.

Thank you so much for your support!

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!
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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!