• Amazing People,  Blessings,  Friends,  My Friends Have Mad Skillz,  Spreading the Bloggie Love

    Community Yesterday, Today, Always.

    I’ve been thinking about “community” a lot lately. Rather, I think about it all the time but lately I’ve thought about it more than usual, probably because it was conference season and my main job is to maintain and inform the BlogHer Conference attendee community on Facebook. I spent hours upon hours (as I have for the past four years since we started the group) reassuring “newbies”, what we affectionately call our first-time attendees, that they’re going to learn/make friends/have fun/come away inspired. In part due to my involvement and in part due to our conference veterans being the best, most helpful people ever and in part due to other…

  • Friends,  My Friends Have Mad Skillz,  Travels

    I Love L.A.

    I just returned from a visit to the site of the #BlogHer16 conference in Los Angeles. I love L.A. I. LOVE. IT. Of course, my rose-colored glasses were deeply tinted on this trip, what with the “late January getaway from Chicago winter” and the “spending three and a half days with the most awesome team ever” elements. Los Angeles was a dream, and I wish I could’ve “slept” a little longer. Literally and figuratively. On the way out, I got to walk through my favorite corridor at O’Hare airport. Of course, when I was sitting at the gate in the middle of a flight delay that would last nearly two…

  • Amazing People,  Best Thing Ever,  Blessings,  Favorite Things,  Food,  Friends,  Fun in Chicago,  My Friends Have Mad Skillz,  Pretty Pictures,  Something That Could Change Your Life

    I Nearly Nailed @MomoFali In The Eye With A Gummy Bear Last Night.

    Honestly. It was close. More on that in a bit. The 2015 BlogHer Food conference is in the books, and it was awesome. I loved that it was in my hometown for many reasons, not the least of which was that a bunch of my local friends (some food bloggers, some not) were in attendance. Working a conference on my birthday when work doesn’t seem like work AND I’m surrounded by so many people I love wasn’t too shabby of a gig, I have to say. My friend Aimee Giese of Greeblehaus, who I’ve known online since 2008-ish but with whom I’ve never spent more than a minute or two…

  • Fun in Chicago

    #BlogHerFood15: I Can’t Wait!

    I have been CRAZED this week. Last week too. The week before as well. Wait…maybe I’m always crazed? Okay…I am, but the crazy factor goes up and down. Recently it’s been off the charts because not only have I been working behind the scenes with my fellow national teammates to get ready to launch the 2016 season of LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER (41 cities in the U.S. AND CANADA!), but I’ve been working like crazy behind the scenes of the BlogHer Food conference, which happens to be in Chicago this weekend. The Events and Social Teams work so very hard on every BlogHer event, and while the intensity increases as…

  • Amazing People,  Best Thing Ever,  Favorite Things,  Food,  Friends,  Fun in Chicago,  I've Got Mad Skillz,  My Friends Have Mad Skillz,  Skydeck Chicago,  Travels

    Life In The Fast Lane Surely Make You Lose Your Mind

    It just hit me on Tuesday evening, right after I dropped Liz and her middle daughter off at the airport (how much I hate goodbyes could be a whole other post, ugh), how much I had done/accomplished/enjoyed in two weeks. It made me dizzy, and perhaps piled on more exhaustion, on top of my exhaustion. It also made me smile. The last two weeks of July just might have been the busiest two weeks of my entire life, but I’m not complaining. It was a blast. First there was the BlogHer conference in NYC. I went into it exhausted; the weeks leading up to conference weekend are crazed for our…