I have the honor of leading the San Luis Obispo chapter of Rising Tide Society’s creative entrepreneur group called Tuesdays Together. We get together once a month to talk and learn about a specific topic that effects us as small business owners. During our meetings we also try to do a few fun things as well. This month we did a DIY sip and paint while we discussed SEO and Blogging. It was kind of awesome.

Heather Millenaar is a local live painter and photographer. Over the past year, she has been incorporating more painting into her business. She is amazing with a brush and it was wonderful collaborating with her on the Tuesdays Together Collaboration Shoot from earlier in this year. A couple months ago I inquired if she would ever want to lead a sip and paint for our group. Teaching painting was actually something that she had been wanting to pursue within her business and we were lucky enough to be her first class!

Heather and I selected a photo from another local landscape and wedding photographer Brady Cabe. He does some amazing Milky Way photography and we decided on the perfect image from his collection. Heather did a fantastic job teaching and leading us in how to paint such a stunning image. It was such a fun night and beyond having an amazing talented painter, our set up was pretty much DIY.

One of the things we needed were easels. As we always strive to keep cost low, I saw a nifty DIY easel set up using pizza boxes. I ran into Domino’s and asked if I could buy 21 boxes. The owner smiled and asked if it was for a school project. “Well,” I began. “It’s for a group of big people; we are a group of local creative entrepreneurs and we are making easels.” He smiled and graciously gave us 21 boxes at no cost. We love them.

A special thanks to Heather and sharing her amazing talent with us! Thank you Brady for letting us use one of your photos! Thank you to the lovely ladies at The Wedding Space for opening your doors to us! Thank you Got You Cover’d for providing tables and chairs! And thank you to everyone who came and brought wine and snacks to share!

I love this group. I love how in the past ten months we have already watched each other grow within our businesses. There is no reason to be doing this whole run your own creative business on your own. If you are interested in joining, please send me a note and head on over to our Tuesdays Together, San Luis Obispo FB page. We would love to have you! Cheers + Love.