Saturday, April 19, 2008

Educational fairs

The past weeks, I have been busy at work with educational fairs for elementary school teachers. The company I work for has a lot to offer for schools and children. One part of my job is to design creative packs for groups of children. I do this together with a team of creative ladies.
It's great fun thinking up the ideas, gathering all the materials, creating the actual product and then producing these creative packs 'ready-to-use' in the classroom. On the educational fairs, we promote them and give demonstrations too. As you meet the public that actually uses the product we design, it is fantastic to hear 'oh's' and 'ah's' as they see all the displayed models. The teachers who visit the fairs, do this in their spare time so they are the most enthusiastic of them all! How much fun is that? Great fun! The days at the fairs are long and tiring but also give a lot of energy because of the positive atmosphere. Besides, I get to see some of the countryside too since I actually have to drive to the other side of the country sometimes - mind you, Belgium is very small and it's only a 2,5 hour drive or so! :)
The model displayed above is a necklace we designed & demonstrated for Mother's day. It's made out of paper beads which are covered with little pieces of Decopatch paper and when they are dry, we put them on an organza ribbon and add little wooden beads in between them. Because of the varnish-glue that we use, they have a tiny shiny effect and it looks real chique so that's why it's called: 'chique collier' which means 'fancy necklace'.
I think a lot of mommies will be really happy getting this as a gift from their child. At least, that's what we've been told at the fair all the time... ;)