Before I begin to gush in awe over the wonderful experiences my friends and I had for three magical Stephenie Meyer Host Tour days, I just need to take a moment and thank my wonderful husband for this past year. He's the one who has supported this new hobby of mine with the utmost of enthusiasm. Sure he likes to tease me but in the end I know he loves me and he would never denounce what a blessing my news friends have become to me and also to my family. Thank you Brett for stepping up to the challenge of finishing our Front room and Kitchen Remodel so I could play Hostess to my out of state friends for The SLTA Hosts the Twilight Lexicon Weekend. Thank you for not begrudging me the opportunity of being with my friends all the while sacrificing your family's Lake Powell Vacation. I hope you enjoyed your fishing trip with your daughter, your mother, your brothers and sisters, their spouses and your nephews. Because I REALLY REALLY enjoyed mine.
Since I'm going to use this as a journal and with the one year anniversary of the
Salt Lake Twilighters Anonymous coming up on June 10th, I'd like to give a complete synopsis of my entire Twilight Groupie Stephenie Meyer Fandom experience todate.
The beginning of my adventure started around Christmastime in 2005. A good friend of mine, Shannon Hardy, recommend a book for me to read authored by a distantly related cousin to her husband otherwise known as Stephenie Meyer. Shannon called it the "best romance that's been written in a really long time... where the hero just happens to be a vampire." So on that recommendation I took her suggestion, ordered
Twilight from Amazon.com and started reading it on an airplane trip to Phoenix Arizona on January 28, 2006.
I probably wasn't the best of guests that trip because whenever I had down time I was reading. It was also very frustrating to be reading the ballet studio scene during the flight home with lots of distractions like landing. Inevitably a re-read was a must and for the first time in my life, the second read of a book was better than the first. I like to recommend everyone to read Twilight twice because the second time around you stop worrying about what's going to happen in the plot and you start paying attention to everything involving the character Edward.
It wasn't until I read Twilight for the third time that the characters finally settled down in my head and didn't take up the majority of my thoughts throughout the day. What was it about these characters who wouldn't go away after I closed the book? Soon I discovered StephenieMeyer.com and devoured everything written on that webpage. Wouldn't you know it? The author believes these characters are more real than I do!!!
Because of that website I learned that Stephenie was coming to Salt Lake on a family vacation and thought it might be fun to get some people together at a library and have a book discussion. So I sent her an email reserving my spot. Yes everyone I got an email from Stephenie Meyer back in the day when she was able to answer fan mail. It's stil unfathomable to me to remember how small the fandom was back then.
Since this was my very first author book signing I'm not really sure what my expectations were for the event. But I do know I wasn't prepared to step into a room of a 125 people as an adult minority surrounded by teenage girls dressed in Gothic styles. Apparently you miss the marketing of a YA novel when you buy it off Amazon.com. I was definitely not apart of the mass market of this book, actually if you think about it, logically the vampire girls would be the earliest of fans for Twilight. Stephenie read the first chapter from New Moon, right up to the point where Bella wakes up from her dream. Oh boy the hush in that room was powerful. Then the questions began. Of course back then there wasn't the Twilight Lexicon or Myspace or any other fansite I don't even remember if Stephenie's own FAQ's were up yet so the very basic and beginner questions were being asked. Except for mine LOL. I asked how many copies had actually been sold. Stephenie couldn't tell me that but she could tell me that 300,000 had been printed. What's the number now? over 5 million?
When it was my turn to get my book signed Stephenie thanked me for asking questions she said it sure makes it easier to be in front of so many people when she's not the only one talking. I also had the opportunity to meet Emily that day. She talked about how frustrating it is to have to read a manuscript on a computer screen instead of cuddling up in a blanket with a book. All in all it was an incredible experience for my very first book signing.
New Moon was released August 11, 2006 I remember getting my book at 5:00 pm. Brett was away on the bow hunt and Sammy was at my Mom's for a sleepover. I read non stop until 4am when I couldn't keep my eyes open any longer. Crying throughout three hundred pages of the book didn't give me strength to pull an all nighter anyway. After my nap I finished New Moon and hungered for more. Luckily Stephenie Meyer came back to Utah for her New Moon Book Signing Tour and I was able to see her in September both Friday night at Kings English and then again Saturday at Sam Weller Bookstore.
Besides the double take Stephenie Meyer gave me at the Kings English bookstore. The most memorable moment of this event was when it was my turn to get my book signed and Stephenie asked me "Do I know you?" How could I possibly tell her of course we were kindred spirits in the premortal life. Instead I shyly said no, but did mention I was at the I Love Edward Cullen reading and signing back in May. Can you believe it? Stephenie Meyer either remembers me from before this life or from a few months ago. Either way I was a total fan girl by this time and had found my favorite author.
The next major Stephenie event came in February of 2007. She was coming to BYU for a symposium on children's book and some fans got permission to throw and "I Love Edward Cullen" Party. I think I need to qualify that until now I was a quiet Twilight fan. Sure I made all my family members, my coworkers, my relief society sisters, and of course my out of state friends read Twilight, but I had never never never posted on a fansite amongst strangers before. Luckily for me my dear friend Christie caught the Twilight bug three times worse than me after I forced her into reading it. Lucky because it was Christie who subscribed to Stephenie's Myspace page and received the notification that there was going to be a party and reservations needed to be made ASAP. She called me from California and made sure I had the tickets before she booked her airline flight for that weekend so she could be here for this momentous event. I think I need to mention that Christie flew to Utah two weeks before she was moving back here to live. Oh the things we Twilight fans will do for the author we all love.
My favorite Author Stephenie Meyer and Me!
Thanks to this party I now had faces to go with names on the message boards at the Twilight Lexicon and I felt safer to venture into cyberspace and join the fandom.
May 5, 2007 Eclipse Prom and I Love Jacob Black After Prom Party
Driving ten hours to and from Phoenix with only a day inbetween is no easy feat if you've just stayed up for 36 hours straight, because you were so excited and on such a high that you couldn't relax and let your mind be at ease. The Eclipse Prom was an amazing fan girl experience. Seriously I felt like I was a Disneyland, the most magical place every, when I walked into the ASU Gymnasium and found myself surrounded by hundreds of beautiful girls in beautiful prom dresses. Not only did we get to hear and see Stephenie read the first chapter of Eclipse, we got our "PROM PICTURES" taken with actors portraying the characters Edward and Jacob.
Stephenie is so awesome to her fans to provide us "dates" to get our pictures taken with since most of us girls came stag. Remember the Provo "I Love Edward Cullen" Party? out of 75 guests the total number of teenagers was about five. Well here in Phoenix at the prom, out of the 500 who got tickets to the second prom, I was one adult out of twenty. And those adults came with their teenagers to supervise. I can't tell you all the weird looks I got from various mothers who asked me "where's your daughter" and I had to tell them I came for myself and that they should read the books because they would appreciate them more than their teenage daughters do.
The "I Love Jacob Black After Prom Party" was even more spectacular than the actual Prom. At the Prom you pretty much had three activities 1)listen to Stephenie 2)get your New Moon Special Edition signed by Stephenie and 3)Get your picture taken with the boys. At the after party which was a pajama theme we enjoyed all games and party favors Jacob/Werewolf style. We played Twilight Cranium in groups of Vampires vs Werewolves vs Humans. We ate our treats out of doggie bowls. We received adorable Doggie Bags filled with "I Love Jacob Black" Dog Tags,, La Push sand and La Push Pops, tattoos of motorcycles and a cookie shaped like a dog bone. While all of those games and gifts were fun, the real highlight of the evening came when in walks Jacob, Edward, and Stephenie. That's right the actors from the Prom came to the after party and boy could you hear my fan girl scream across the United States. Stephenie Meyer is so amazing to her fans. She just spent eight hours at two book signings in the Prom fasion and then came to the after prom party to be with her fans yet again. The organizers of the party (the same ones from Provo) outdid themselves yet again.
Did I forget to mention that I won the first prize for my entry in the Twilight Barbie Doll Contest? Because it was a Jacob Black party of course my Jacob Black/Werewolf Barbie won. I also created a Victoria, Rosalie, Alice, and Emily doll who were runners up.
June 10, 2007 The Very First Salt Lake Twilighters Anonymous Meeting
We met online and decided to meet in person so we could talk about all things Twilight and Stephenie Meyer
August 7, 2007 Eclipse Midnight Release Party at Barnes & Noble
We made our own Salt Lake Twilighters Anonymous T-shirts and on the back we either chose Edward, Jacob, or Both. Of course I had to take my Barbies along for the festivities. Out of all these women on ly three continued on into the cyberspace community known as the TWILIGHT LEXICON.
August - TGIFridays luncheon to people strange Internet people
You are going to see these women from here on out. These are the true Twilight fans who, like me, needed more than just Internet Message Boards to get their Twilight fix. After the release of Eclipse emotions could not be expressed in LOL's and OME's. We needed face to face interaction and spent the lunch hour telling our "how we joined the Twilight Fandom" stories. The SLTA has gone from Four to Fourteen in just three months.
September - Los Hermonos, Mountain Lion Cakes, Trivia, good food and lots of laughs.
Themed parties and more members. We had trivia quizzes, met the new people, and actually got kicked out of the restaurant because we were there too long and much too loud.
November/December rolled into one - Twilight Christmas Gifts
We finally got smart and someone dared to open their house up to us. We enjoyed a Twilight Themed White Elephant gift exchange, ate Edward or Jacob cookies, and giggled till our jaws hurt.
January - Capping the enrolles, Holy Crow and Getting to Know you Games at our FIRE AND ICE Party
Everything was Fire and Ice related. We played Twilight pictionary, Vampires against Werewolves. That's a picture of a burning candle atop a cold Jello Mold. We ate salad and Fire Hot Chicken Wings. We also had to bring five items in a brown paper bag that could be used to describe who we are. Can you see how big we are getting. Our homes can't fit anymore people we HAD to put a cap on the party attendees.
February - I Love Jacob Black Valentines and stories of Love
Conversation heart candies just like in New Moon and valentine name tags decorated the guests. We told our personal love story of how we fell in love. We are becoming the best of friends.
Sharon owes Twilight Teez and we invited her to join us for our SLTA meeting, she brought her business partners and designers of Bella's Bracelet with her.
We crowned them Honoary Members of the SLTA, but by the end of the evening they were full fledge members. So much for capping the enrollees. This party was a Bella's Birthday party theme becase Sharon was visiting us from Arizona for her birthday. We had pink roses, pink birthday cake, and Silver wrapping on her presents.
April - Reaching out to the Twilight Moms, new members and surprise phone calls. Apparently this party thing is old hat because not one picture was taken the entire night. I guess we were just all engrossed in the incredible phone call from ALPHIE the Creator and Owner of the
Twilight Lexicon.
May - The Host Tour three days of sheer bliss.
To be blogged about later. Seriously three fun filled days of out of state guests, two Stephenie Meyer book signings, along with various television and radio interviews cannot be squished into a small summary to go with this blog.
On a final note, I never knew I needed these friendships as much as I do until I had them. Now I know I will never be the same without them. Each member of our little group adds so much richness to my life. They each have their own unique talents and characteristics that make the sum of the whole greater than the sum of the parts. Everyone is so willing to pitch in and help with party planning, organizing, money, creativity, laughter and most importantly friendship. What an amazing group of women where not one bad seed exists. If only every elementary, junior high, and even high school girl could realize the potential and blessings that come from having such amazing friendships, a lot of heart ache could be avoided in their growing up stages of life.
Thank you members of the SLTA. Thank you for daring to join a stranger for lunch. Thank you for your love of all things Twilight and Stephenie Meyer. Thank you Twilight Lexicon for being the axis that brought us all together in the first place.
