This was my first and I thought it was great. I was impressed by the donated gifts from suppliers and really surprised/warmed by all the spontaneous gift giving that went on from members - my thanks to all.
what I would change:
I never did see week three and four of the pen challenges. I search but to no avail. I saw wk. 1&2 because another poster gave me a link. I think somehow there should be easily available links for all the things turned as part of the b'day bash, pictures of the same as well as pictures of other pens that were winners in other categories.
After a couple of exchanged emails the timing was sorted out so that the east coast didn't have a few hours advantage over the central &west coast. However, that didn't include our international members. I don't know if there is an ideal 'time' o post time sensitive posts yet as we are an international organization perhaps better thinkers than I could come up with it.
As others have said elsewhere, I think the overall price to get in to some of the auctions/deals was onerous. I had to think about how I was going to pay to participate because I had seriously overspent on turning supplies over the holidays. Having said 'no more money on pens till I sell another 20' I couldn't follow through on that because I wanted to join in. Anybody on a fixed income would have found it more hard than I did.
I liked the trivia questions though sometimes I didn't enter, just because I guess. Some of the questions were too simple. I think questions that were not related to the site would be good; many of them depended on one's ability to search through the library or posts. I think questions could be related to pen turning but the answers would have to be looked for 'elsewhere' - a suppliers site, other turning site libraries etc.
[?]I was thinking about a Christmas in July fund raising. (No, I don't celebrate Christmas but that's what the holiday is for.) Maybe that way folks might have more expendable income that at December/January when presents and credit card bills will be overwhelming.
None of my comments above in any way should be seen to detract from the hard work that the organizers did. It was a lot of fun. If it was run the same way again next year I wouldn't be disappointed.
Now here comes my last note: From comments posted it would seem that Jeff has been at the helm for 4 years. It's clear that there are others that do things that need to be done....but...what happens if Jeff isn't around and some of the other key doers are not around? Is there a plan in place to train people to take over?
Thanks for reading this far [8D].