I can’t believe what a hard time I’m having writing about BlogHer! It’s like, I don’t want to say too little, but I don’t know how much to say, so I’m just sort of stuck! I arrived last Thursday just in time to hop on a shuttle bus to the Kirtsy/Alltop party, and while waiting for the bus, I had a chance to hug Julie and Kristen from Parent Bloggers Network, Liz from Cool Mom Picks (Kristen is CMP too), and Krisco from Crib Ceiling. I ran into Gwendomama in the lobby, she’s a PBN blogger, and my roommates were Anne and Dana who reviews at Dana Reviews. When I got to the room, I found Lori waiting for us, she has a bunch of great blogs including Cowgirl Critiques. She is so cute and she just jumped right in to all the BlogHer craziness! I was so glad she came!

On the shuttle bus, I chatted with Dana, Lori, Jennster (she just gets hotter every year), Kristie from SlackerMommy, and Corinna from A Celebration of Curves, who has cleavage like you wouldn’t believe! And then, I start chatting with the blogger sitting across from me, and she goes “Elizabeth! It’s MICHELLE LAMAR!” Michelle blogs at White Trash Mom and was one of “my” authors in the BlogHer Bookstore! I just wanted to pack her in my suitcase and bring her home, she was so sweet and fun.

Despite our shuttle bus driver having NO CLUE how to actually get to the party, we arrived at Guy Kawasaki’s house in Atherton to find all the Kirtsy ladies, plus so many other wonderful bloggers whose sites are listed on Alltop. There was a photo area where you could dress up in costumes and get your photo taken, a huge bowl of paella, fancy wine, and my favorite, plastic cups of mashed potatoes with barbecued chicken on top-yum! I was so happy to see Gabrielle from Kirtsy again, she was at the Disney event I went to in April. I met Laurie from Kirtsy at last year’s BlogHer too.

I ran into BOSSY, big smooches for her, and Stephanie from Adventures in Babywearing and Stephanie from Ladybug and her Blogging Mama, who also went to the Disney event. I talked to Kristen from Mommy Needs a Cocktail but DIDN’T get a photo with her, darn it! I hugged Casey from Moosh in Indy about half a dozen times, plus shook hands a little nervously with Eden from Fussy, Alice from Finslippy, and Melissa from Suburban Bliss. I don’t know what I was so nervous about, they are all quite lovely and friendly.

I gave a big hug to Christina from A Mommy Story, and squealed a bit when I met Wendy from Sparkplugging! After picking up buttons that read “Kirtsy, we bring bitches together” (ha!) and debating over the one that read “I heart Guy K” or the one with Guy’s face on it (I went for the face one), and grabbing a ginormous swag bag (cute red totebag from Scholastic positively STUFFED with swag) and a black tee that reads “I Write For Me”, we boarded the shuttle back to the hotel. Fortunately, that driver knew where he was going, plus rush hour was over.

We got back to the hotel just as the MomCentral “First Drink on Us” party was wrapping up, and after hugging the heck out of the adorable Abbey, I gratefully accepted a Cosmo and a totebag with three new hardback books I can’t wait to read. I also met Kara and Stacy from MomCentral, and let me tell you, they are all the nicest people you could ever want to work with. Then I bumped into Anne-Marie Nichols, who I first met at BlogHer 06 when I knew absolutely no one and asked if I could sit with her at breakfast. And here we are 2 years later!

Okay, so let’s see, where are we? That’s the second party of the night, TWO MORE parties to go! We took a cab over to Rye bar even though it was only down the street and around the corner because we hadn’t been there long enough to get the lay of the land, so to speak, so we didn’t realize just how close to the hotel it was. Rye bar was the site of the party hosted by The Experience Project, where I happily greeted Armen and Julio, who I first met last year. They are still so awesome and so enthusiastic (and rightfully so) about their website. I sipped a Cosmo, picked up a cute gift bag, snapped some photos, and then it was time for the FOURTH party of the night, the People’s Party!

Hosted by a bevy of amazing bloggers, the People’s Party was where I met Loralee from Loralee’s Looney Tunes, Leah Peah, Mr. Lady from Whiskey in my Sippy Cup, and ran into my blog pals Liz from This Full House, Shannon from PHAT Mommy, Kerry from Crunchy Carpets, Amber from Crazy Bloggin’ Canuck, and Shannon from Believer in Balance. I also met Mrs. Flinger (finally!) and found Charlene, formerly of Maya’s Mom, who now runs Shine, the parenting site for Yahoo!. AND, I found James and Zameer from BabySpot, who are like big huggable teddy bears and I am so happy to be writing their weekly newsletter! Thanks for the job, guys!

Oh, and someone, I totally cannot remember WHO, but I know she’s a relatively new blogger and it was her first BlogHerCon, bought me a drink at the party. THANK YOU, whomever you were! Turns out, four Cosmos is my limit, and after that, I needed to go to BED. Unfortunately for my roommates, I fell right asleep while they were still up, and I started TALKING IN MY SLEEP. According to Dana I said something like “no, I already did that”-ha! And then I tried to SPOON Dana, but it’s not my fault, we slept together last year too, and I’m just so darn comfortable with her! LOL Sorry sweetie!

And THAT was Thursday at BlogHer. Turns out a 41 year old out of shape mother of three CAN go to four parties in one night! Just not more than once a year. Tomorrow? I’ll recap Friday!

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HEY!! You guys, I am so sorry that I haven’t had time to post before now, but I am telling you, they keep us hopping during this conference! This is seriously the first chance I have had to sit down and blog since I got here Thursday afternoon. We have what they call an “unconference” today, which is actually a real thing, there’s a facilitator and everything, who guides everyone through deciding what topics to discuss, then we break up into groups and just do our own thing. It’s like Zen Conferencing, which I could so use right now.

My Feet are KILLING ME, for real, like I was laying in bed last night trying to fall asleep and the bottoms of my feet were throbbing. I need to go on a 52 week prepare-my-feet-now-for-next-year’s-BlogHer program or something. Or, you know, get up and walk around more in my regular life.

So anyway, thanks to a spectactular nap yesterday afternoon (OMG the Westin’s “Heavenly Beds”? They are not kidding about the Heavenly, I want to buy one and have it installed in my bedroom at home), and going to bed not drunk, I woke up at 5:45 this morning! I took a shower, dried my hair, got dressed, and went outside for a walk up to the 24 hour Walgreen’s to get some cash and some souvenirs. I hope the snowglobes I bought survive in my suitcase, I’m probably going to have to, um, “borrow” some washcloths from the hotel bathroom to wrap them in. sssh, don’t tell

I have photos, OMG do I have PHOTOS!! But the connection here is not fast enough, it takes for-EVAH to upload anything, so I promise once I get home, I’ll get them all on Flickr as fast as I can, and I leave the link to my Flickr page in a post for anyone who wants to check it out. I decided this year that everyone person I shook hands with or hugged (and I did a LOT more hugging than hand shaking, that’s for sure), I would ask if they would pose for a photo with me. And fortunately, they all said yes So I have about, oh, 200 photos of me with the most spectacular bloggers on the planet, all of whom are gorgeous and amazing and made me feel like a rockstar all weekend, which honestly, how flattering is it when someone you don’t even think knows you exist goes OMG TABLE FOR FIVE!! AAAAHHHH!!!! Pretty big boost to the ole blogging ego for me!

I’m gonna wrap it up now and go print my boarding pass, so big smooches to everybody and I promise I’ll give you all the fantastic details in a post tomorrow (but not too early since I’ll probably sleep a bit after getting home)(and spend some time loving on my kids and smooching my husband :)(and you know, unpacking the fifty pounds of stuff I’m bringing home)!!!

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well, I won’t have flowers in my hair, but on Friday night, I will be wearing this:

Have I decided yet what to wear on Thursday for my flight there? Or what to wear to the Thursday night parties? Or what to wear during the DAY? Nope.

And when do I leave? About 7:45 AM on Thursday. Am I ready? Nope.

But at least I have Friday night covered.

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I am having the weirdest BlogHer-related dreams, I had no idea my subconscious was so anxious about it. Last week, I dreamed I was checking out of the hotel and I had like 15 minutes until I had to leave, and I was trying to pack all of the sponsor gifts into my suitcase. They were spread out all over the room and the more I shoveled them into my suitcase, the more there were.

Then, I got down to the lobby, and a bunch of bloggers were there loading their bags onto one of those rolling carts, and everyone had the SAME PURSE EXCEPT FOR ME. I wish I was kidding. Oh, and I dreamed I met Mir, except she didn’t look like Mir at all, she looked like Lindsay. I guess I’m worried about not recognizing people? If you didn’t click those links just now, you really need to. Both of those blogs are brilliantly written, and could Lindsay LOOK any hotter in that photo? YOWSA.

So, last night I had a different BlogHer dream, this time I was headed to one of the cocktail parties, walking in this big crowd, and everyone else was dressed like they were in a Vogue photo shoot, and I was dressed like, well, like I usually am, which is to say, not very well. Only in the dream I started sobbing about it.

Honestly, I do this to myself every year right before the conference, and it’s so silly. I have yet to have anyone say anything to me about my clothes or my accessories, either in person or behind my back. In fact, I have never read anything anywhere that dissed someone’s appearance at BlogHer. That’s the wonderful thing about BlogHer conferences, they are for EVERYONE. Short, tall, thin, fat, abled, disabled, rich, poor, dressed to the nines, covered in dried spit-up, and the best part? No one really cares! You know what’s important at BlogHer? Either 1. being a current blogger or 2. being interested in becoming a blogger. Seriously THAT IS ALL.

Now, does that mean I’m not agonizing a little over whether to bring the new purse I bought last weekend that is kind of huge and floppy and is the color of raspberry lipstick? Or whether to bring the big flowered City Tote with the leather straps that holds a ton of stuff but doesn’t zip closed? In addition to bringing the new fabric bag that I bought from The Sewing Mom which is orange and yellow with an adorable metal sunflower charm on the zipper and is the perfect size for just my wallet, cell phone, comb, and a lip gloss? Oh yeah, I’ve given it some thought all right.

But otherwise, the anxiety over silly things that aren’t important? That can stay in my dreams, thanks.

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Okay, so I know I said I wasn’t going to go to BlogHer this summer, but it would seem that there are actually other bloggers who, well, want to hang out with me. With ME! And they have all been so kind in their emails and IMs, asking me isn’t there some way I can make it happen? I’m not going to win the BlogHer website’s contest, I already know that, because it involves writing a winning post about how I’m helping my family be more healthy this year and, well, I’m not. So, Plan B.

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I please introduce to you my ChipIn Widget:

Isn’t that a nice looking widget? But isn’t that a SCARY looking number? $1,000. One THOUSAND dollars. That is the amount I will need to pay for registration, my share of a hotel room (depending on occupancy and how many nights, I’m planning on needing $400 which is two nights if I share with one other person. It will be less if there are four of us in the room). The absolute cheapest airfare I can find on ANY airline is $450. So I’m rounding down a bit and getting an approximate amount of $1,000. YIKES!!!

So, the purpose of the ChipIn widget is this-if you should happen to be looking for an incredibly worthy cause for donation purposes, please considering donating any amount at all to my BlogHer fund. I’ll be trying to find only the most worthy of paid posts to do to make some extra money, and as the amount I have saved goes up, I’ll change the widget to reflect the actual amount I still need to raise.

And in case you’re now thinking to yourself “who does this chick think she IS, asking us to give her money for a blogging conference?”, let me plead my case like this-I went last year because I was invited to speak (free registration) and it was in Chicago (took the train, $40 round trip). While there, I made contacts with companies that I am still working with today, like MomCentral and Coburn PR and eMomsAtHome. I absolutely think that the contacts I made last year have made Table for Five and MomReviews better blogs. And every time I go, I learn more and get better at it. So you would be investing in the FUTURE OF THIS BLOG, and that’s pretty cool.

/shameless financial pleading

edited to add: I applied for a BlogHerShip today, for one of the registration/goodie bag desk positions. I would get free conference registration in exchanging for working. So keep your fingers crossed for me!

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