Camp Blogaway 2012

First off, THANK YOU! Thanks for all your wonderful comments about my Blogoversary, and entering into the giveaway! Sounds like everyone is going to have a great Mother’s Day! Here is the winner of $50 to Pier 1 Imports… via random.org

#61 is: foodnfocus who said: “…and on Pinterest.”
Congrats! I will be contacting you to get your information!

NOW…This past weekend I had an opportunity to go to an amazing conference held especially just for Food Bloggers in California! It’s called Camp Blogaway.

It was an incredible experience that has most definitely changed my life for the better.

There were so many wonderful people that went to this shin-dig, and so much interesting and informative things that we learned and talked about.

Here are just a few pictures of what my fun weekend was about…

Making the drive from Arizona to California was not so bad.

Meeting my long time Food Blogging friend and twin in person = priceless!

The camp was held in the mountains at a retreat near Big Bear, CA. We were bunked in cabins and Krista from Budget Gourmet Mom was my bunk buddy. We met over a year ago through blogging, and we finally got to meet in person this weekend! It was so much fun!

Throughout the conference we had very informative sessions to better our trade. {ie: make your experience on my blog MUCH MUCH better}

This was a great session where we learned about the tricks and techniques to Food Photography from the amazing Denise Vivaldo. She was so hilarious and made the session so fun and entertaining.

In between sessions we had a few moments to meet other bloggers, and maybe get a tweet out here and there. {we were in the mountains, and signals were almost non-existent}

I got to meet Sarah from Daisy at Home, and instantly hit it off with her. She is so sweet, and has such an amazing story. I’m so glad I got to meet her.

After we all practiced cutting our potato, the friendly camp staff used them in that night’s dinner, which was very delicious.

um… yes…moving on…

These are my girls!

That’s me on the left, Krista on the right, and in the middle is Diane from Created by Diane. She is A-MAZE-ING! She had been to this camp before, and took me under her wing and showed me the ropes. We clicked instantly! I am so happy I got to meet her, and gain a life-long friendship with her.

Another great sponsor… Gourmet Garden! We learned all about the process to make their wonderful product, and some great uses for them. We even got to sample and play around with all of the herbs. LOVE them!

What’s a food blogging conference without people taking pictures of their food?

Oh boy, did I just love this sponsor! The National Mango Board came and gave us a Mango 101 course. So informative and delicious!

I’ll be sharing some of this in a “How To Wednesday” post in a couple weeks, so stay tuned!

Sampling some mango recipes in their various forms of ripeness…

Creating a mango s’more…heaven!

A view from the outside, looking in.

Another great sponsor was Kerry Gold. They make extremely divine artisan cheeses and outta-this-world butter! I really enjoyed that session!

At the very end of camp, Patti (our camp organizer) from Worth the Whisk (cute name huh?) handed out the coveted “Golden Pine Cone Award.” Which went to someone who really defined the spirit of Camp Blogaway. This awesome lady, Mimi from Mimi Avocado, fittingly won. She was so sweet and personable. I enjoyed getting to know her very much.

Now be prepared, cause you are about to see a whole LOT of me. Here are just a handful of the lovely bloggers I met during my experience at Camp Blogaway 2012.

1. Diane from Created by Diane
2. Krista from Budget Gourmet Mom
3. Wendy from Around My Family Table
4. Barbara from Barbara Cooks
5. Kelly from Evil Shenanigans
6. Erika from In Erika’s Kitchen
7. Sara from Average Betty
8. Gerry from Foodness Gracious
9. (left to right) Alisson from Sushi Day, Rachel from La Fuji Mama
10. Carolyn from Healthy Voyager
11. Patti from Worth the Whisk
12. Dara from Cookin Canuck

I encourage you to check out the links I have shared with you guys today. Lots of great sites and stuff to explore!

I am so excited to implement some of the new stuff I learned, and start working of some new projects for the blog.

Overall, it was an awesome weekend {pretty sure I’ve used up my allotment of the word ‘awesome’ for the week}.