I attended BlogHer with my friend Suzi of Pink Vanilla Cupcakes. Bright and early on Thursday we left for beautiful San Diego. The flight there was probably the only time in our 3days there that we got to sit down for any length of time. As soon as we arrived, we checked into the gorgeous Marriott Marquis and Marina. No sooner we dropped off our bags we were off and running. We were able to make it down to lunch at the Life Well Lived event put on by P&G. One of my favorite sessions happened right after when we were treated to a lesson in getting great hair on-the-go. Now, can I replicate any of the styles I saw demonstrated? NOPE. But at the end we all received a super awesome Braun Satin Hair Brush. This thing is great. And apparently worth $65.
Fast forward to the evening where we got to gamble at a Las Vegas themed happy hour, have hors d'ouerves at The Social Soiree (and get incredible swag - espeiclaly the bag!) and end the evening at 3M's Going Coconuts party at Roy's where we had the most DELISH sliders. I mean completely obsessively delicious.
Friday officially began the conference and Suzi and I started our day with Yoga. We were also signed up to do a 5k but with our Saturday morning exercise schedule..we felt it would be better for our bodies if we participated in Yoga instead. After showering and a fast breakfast, we visited the Expo to get even more swag and meet some brands, attended a session and before lunch - visited the super secret Room o'Swag for even more free stuff. We then had to hussle over to the Hard Rock Hotel for a vendor event and then back to the Marriott for an event hosted by Playskool where we got to meet some of the Seseame Street characters.
After a quick change into our evening attire, we headed over to a cocktail party hosted by SwagBucks. Suzi won a great solar charger. Nothing for me. But soon we were off to our next event where there was massages, t-shirt making, photo booths, yummy cocktails and even more swag! We ended the evening at the infamous Sparklecorn.
My best description of the party is a club in a hotel ballroom. The music was total club music and the dancing was fun. But by 11 pm we were pooped and we had a big morning the next day.
Bright and early on Saturday we were scheduled to have a workout with Bob Harper. That is trainer Bob from The Biggest Loser. I was grateful that it wasn't Jillian because I wouldn't be yelled at, but I knew how tough he would be. He did not disappoint. It was hard. Really hard. But I got through it. And Bob..well, he is much better looking in person, had a great bod, and smelled pretty good to(yes I got that close - he even touched my shoulder!). After the workout we got to have breakfast with him, Oatmeal of course and ask him questions. I got really inspired and motivated (more on that in my next post).
On our way back to the room to shower and get ready for the day, I ran into Guilianna Rancic - you know - she hosts a show on E! and is married to Bill Rancic who won the Apprentice. Anyway - she was right there as we were walking back to our room and of course since I was looking and smelling fabulous..why not stop and take a picture with her. Wouldn't you?
Later we attended another session, a focus group for HTC (where, by the way, we got HTC phones for participating), visited the swag exchange to get rid of some of my unwanted swag, and made our way over to the Queen Bee Market. Queen Bee wasn't part of BlogHer but they had a sale in a hotel right next door to the convention center and many of the vendors are ones I have previously purchased from or wanted to purchase them from. Yes I bought stuff...I wanted to buy a lot more but once I got to the register - I got buyer's jitters and put back half of the stuff I had picked out.
Our afternoon was ours and we took a walk along the water and shopped in the Seaport Village behind our hotel. It was so relaxing but boy did my feet hurt. I wished I had someone in our room to just rub my feet. I am sure Suzi felt the same way!
Our last evening had us seeing a screening of the movie The help - which by the way was incredible..see it. Now here is the only thing that really disappointed me. After the movie we were invited to a party hosted by LG where Jane Lynch would be appearing and talking about texting and driving. I was looking forward to attending but because of the length of the movie, would be arriving 45 minutes late. No where on the invite or any subsequent communications did they say that Jane Lynch would only be there at the beginning of the event so get there early. Because guess what - when we got there - it was basically over. Even though there was still an hour and 15 minutes left to the party. I was really disappointed and we basically left about 10 minutes later. If they would have said something, we would have done our evening differently.
Our final parties were 2 of the BlogHer sponsored parties - Aiming Low and CheesebergHer. Both were spectacular and fun. But CheesebergHer was by far my favorite party. The music was the kind I love - late 80's/early 90's rap - by golly they played It Takes Two by Rob Base. I was in heaven. CheesebergHer was sponsored by McDonald's so they brought in their hamburgers and french fries and we decorated McDonald's bags to wear as hats. It was goofy and fun and I loved it!
So - the million dollar question - Will I go again next year? HELL YEA!
0 comments:
Post a Comment