Miss Part One? Click here!

As if one day full of blogging and friends wasn’t enough, there was even more to be had on day two of Blogfest.

Day Two had all the workouts and more of the technical information that I was looking for from the workshops.

We started off bright and early with a 7 am workout led by Nikki Warren of Kaia Fit. We split into two groups to compete against each other with some partner work and had a long cool down session at the end. It definitely woke me up and got me ready for the day!

After our workout we had breakfast which was sponsored by General Mills. I have been loving them since reading about all the work they have been doing with bloggers and listening to feedback about what consumers want and need in their breakfast options.

Normally I eat my honey nut cheerios with milk covered in more honey, but I decided to get fancy for a photo.

Here is a partial shot of the fitness expo downstairs. It was quite the event.

I snapped a picture with Katy and Katie before heading into the first workshop of the day: Legal Advice For Bloggers by Elizabeth Bain.

Next up came the keynote presentation by Gabby Reece which was really fun to hear. She spoke about her path and what she is doing now that she has retired and spends half her time in CA and the other half in Hawaii. Love.

After her talk, we headed to another room to take her HighX workout! I just stood in line and took creepy pictures of her.

After she touched both Beth and I we took a picture full of joy. (Thanks for the photo Beth!)

This was the best workout of the day for me. There were 15 stations where we spent 3 minutes rotating through 0:30 of moves before moving onto the next. It was definitely a total body workout and I logged away some new moves to add into my classes in the future. To see a snippet of the workout, I posted a video on Instagram if you’re interested!

After our awesome workout and another workshop, we had lunch courtesy of Morningstar Farms. I loved everything and may have to check out more of their products!

After lunch we had some free time to explore the expo before heading back for our final workshops of the day:

• SEO Tips and Tricks by Sara Downey Robinson
• How To Create A Career out of Your Blog by Katy Widrick, Laura Peifer, and Katie McFarland
• How To Build a Following On: Twitter by Amanda Vogel

We also had a tweet break where celebrity trainer Gunnar Peterson answered some audience questions. While I certainly enjoy a dry sense of humor, I’m not a huge fan of condescension which is how I feel he portrayed himself.

Susie and I took a picture to stay awake since she had not gotten a lot of sleep and I’m just always ready for a nap 🙂

There was a final workout with the founder of Zumba and then a networking party, but I headed back to my in-laws before then. I’m not a big fan of Zumba and since I had already done a lot of networking, I headed back to Santa Monica.

When I got there, I was surprised with an early birthday dinner and my nephew making dessert. He made us all my microwave chocolate chip cookies! Bonus points for using my own recipe.

My niece also made me a card the encompassed all my favorite things. I promise I eat healthy food sometimes.

Saturday morning my sister in law and I headed to Lo/Cal for a decaf honey almond milk latte. Every time I visit I get one (or five), and this time was no exception.

Then we headed for breakfast at another great spot: Sauce on Hampton. We split a bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich and their garden omelet and both were amazing!

They also serve roasted yellow sweet potatoes as a side instead of regular potatoes. WIN.

I got home to Chicago around 7:30 pm and prepped for running a half marathon the next day. Yes, I am a crazy person.

(Instagram!!)

So that’s what was happening in LA last week.

Overall I had a fun time, but I left Blogfest feeling like I didn’t take away that much information. That may be because I spend a lot of time reading about blogging as a business and the behind the scenes information, but I felt like there wasn’t anything that I didn’t already know. I did learn a few new apps, but not a lot of unique information by bloggers for bloggers.

I definitely had a great time and don’t regret going, but I think I was looking for more detailed presentations with more take-aways or calls to action. A lot of the information was valuable to a lot of people, but I think my obsessive reading worked against me this time. I will still be back next year as long as scheduling and things work out, though, so I hope to see you there!

Questions:

• Have you ever met a celebrity?
• Do you like potatoes with breakfast?
• Have you made those cookies yet?? It’s only 60 seconds!!