Who's The Boss?

Say My Name

The Swag-alicious BlogHer Giveway

UPDATED: Congrats to MarketingMommy for winning the contest!  Everyone else, please come back next week when I'll be having another BlogHer08 Swag Contest.

In keeping with tradition, I am having a Swag Giveaway for those who did not make it to BlogHer (or for those who did and are a glutton for for swag).  It was hard to part with some of this wonderful stuff, but I'm spreading the swag-love. 

This Who's the Boss Swag In A Box was born from every single swag bag I received at BlogHer - The People's Party, the exclusive SV Mom's Bags, the BSM Media/Mom's Select Room, and the official Swag Bag of BlogHer08.

Included:

Wati Dress (size 4)

Brother's All Natural Fruit Crisps

Merci Chocolates

Busy Body Book

Leap Frog Water Bottle

Tail Wags Helment Cover

Mr. David children's music CD

Coupons for FREE Stoffer's Lasgana

JiDesign Note Cards

Red Scholastic Book Tote from the People's Party

...Much, much more

Estimated Value of Swag in A Box: $175

How to Enter Momma Wants a Swag Bag Contest

• Leave a Comment on this post before 11:59pm, Thursday, July 31st.
• One entry per person (leave a valid email address so that I can contact you if you win!)
• Open to residents of the US (and those internationally who can explain to me customs and pay for additional shipping). 
• Winner will be announced on Friday, August 1st.

If you don't win this contest, I'll be having a second Swag-a-licious Contest next week. 

Take-away from BlogHer08: Bloggers are People, too

When I attended BlogHer last year, I was taken aback by the undercurrent theme of monetizing your blog.  Many of the sessions I attended would quickly take a turn towards the business side of the blog.  As in how to become the next Dooce. 

This year, there was an underlying theme around playing nice on the blog-yard.  Many sessions turned into forums about how to deal with trolls, unwelcoming comments, your mother finding your blog and your not-so-nice story of her.  Ok, so I only actually attended two sessions plus the closing keynote at BlogHer, but I had many friends in many sessions so that makes me so in “the know” about what went down.  I think the turning point of this "can't we all get along" theme was during the closing keynote when Dooce called out another blogger (who happened to be in the room) about making Dooce not a real person but a mythical hobbit.  The blogger then stood up and called Dooce out about it being a compliment and not a trash comment.  FYI… You can hear the response from Jen and more on the backstory over at Gwendomama who, I might add, was my son’s first music teacher and who explains the whole issue very thoughtfully.  Dooce gave a sort-of response here, if you read between the lines. 

I suppose the hard part to blogging is that there are real people behind each blog.  I don’t think that when most people started a personal blog, they were really expecting a large audience (well, at least that’s what a lot of the more well known bloggers say).  I don’t entirely believe it since it was only about the writing, you’d be keeping a personal journal that only you had access if it was just the “writing” you cared about.  There is something intriguing about writing online.  About having an audience.  I doubt most writer’s intentions when starting a blog is to become famous.  But I’m sure that when they started writing online it was to connect with an audience.  Yes, the audience may have first started out as your best friends, your mom, and your Aunt who lives in Alaska.  Or maybe you started writing online because you were feeling things that were so raw and you felt lonely and you just needed to know that somewhere in the world there was someone who felt the same feelings. 

I started writing when Jill, one of the SV Moms Group founders, put out an email over two years ago to her entire network about starting a collaborative blog.  I was a full-time working mom in an affluent mother’s club that struggled with including working mothers.  I wanted to make sure that there was a voice for working mom’s on the blog.  So I signed up.  The blog was so brand new that my response to Jill in saying “I’m interested” was all it took to be a writer.  A year after joining SV Moms, I decided that I had more to say and created my own blog.  A year after that, Nataly contacted me to start writing for Work It, Mom. 

Honestly, I’ve never had the expectation that I’ll strike it rich, write a book based on the writings of my blog, or become a blog-ebrity like Dooce.  I write because there are a million voices out there and I want mine to be one of them.  I don't ever expect to make in blogging what I make in the high-tech industry. 

Rita Hayworth used to say "They go to bed with Gilda, they wake up with me."  I think that is same for the new celebrities of the blogging world.  We can forget that they are real people too.  It's easy to see our writings as stories, to see the blogger as a character, to forget that we are real people.   Perhaps what Heather is trying to say is that we forget she is more than Dooce.  She's a real person with real feelings that get hurt when people send her nasty emails.

Personally, I don't mind getting called an entitled bitch for asking for a replacement scoop of ice cream at Baskin Robbins.   But I don't get death threats or people telling me I'm going to hell or how they want to throw acid on me to reveal the robot under my flesh.  I guess I'm just not that popular to get the really nasty trolls.  I can see how it could be hard to distinguish the positive from the negative, the supportive reader from the uber-stalker, santa claus from the devil. 

Or maybe these new blog-ebrities need to take a healthy does of a chill pill.  There is something fantastic in getting tons of comments and having millions of hits per month.   I love getting comments.   It's fun.  I won't deny it - it's a nice stroke on my ego.   I can't even imagine the ego boost one who get when they get hundreds of comments a day.   Death threats aside (which I doubt the majority of commentors are vitriolly trolls), I think some of us can get a little too sensitive about comments.  I'm not talking about the serious, "i'm going to hurt you or members of your family" comments - people who leave comments like that need to simply be expelled from the blogging community. 

If you don't like, delete it.  If you can't stand the personal attacks, don't write in a public forum.  And if you plan on calling anyone a mythical hobbit, remember that person may be uber-sensitive and take it the wrong way.

Except for me.  You can always call me a mythical hobbit.  A skinny-bitch, mythical hobbit with really fantastic hair.   Got it? 

Every Party has a Pooper

Yesterday, sometime between the third session and the closing keynote speaker at BlogHer, I called home.  It was a tear-filled event.  Darius had been missing me awful and I felt exactly the same way about him.  My heart hurt. 

My heart has been hurting for a couple of weeks.  First it was the last-minute business trip to San Francisco for a week, then it was working out of the East Bay for another, but the straw that broke my heart was finding out I would be away again starting on Monday.  It's not like I'm traveling across the country.  Which, right now, I think would be so much easier than driving to far places in the Bay Area -- where it's close enough to come home every night but far enough away that I miss all the happenings at home.

On a side note, I just typed "Fart palaces" instead of far places - guess that shows my true feelings about commuting to the East Bay.

Honestly, my most guilty moments as a working mom are about whether or not I am spending enough time with my son.  I'm sure in that way I am pretty typical with other working moms.  It isn't enough for me to see my son for just an hour every day.  I've always pushed hard for flexible scheduling and working from home so that I can be with my son more.   

After talking to Darius, it just didn't feel right to stay at the conference one more minute.  It wasn't so much about mommy guilt.  It was about doing what's right for me.  And my family.  While I was having a great time hanging out with fabulous women, listening to awesome speakers, and swimming in my swag, it didn't feel right to be there any longer. 

It felt like the air at BlogHer was quickly leaving and the only way I would be able to breathe again would be to get my ass home as quickly as possible.  I couldn't hold my breath for another day.  I had to get out of there fast.

I packed my bags, texted my roommate that I was heading home early, and went to what can only be described as the weirdest closing keynote (more on that later).  When the conference was officially over, I was ready to get home. 

I got out of San Francisco so fast.   I usually get lost so easily driving up and down one way streets, but this time there was kung-fu momma magic that navigated me to the freeway without a single wrong turn.  I was home before Neville and Darius had finished dinner. 

My heart was whole again. 

When Darius was born, I didn't think my love for him could get any bigger than it already was.  I thought that new-mother love was as good as it gets.  Boy, I was so wrong.  My love for my child seems to grow each day.  A rational thinker, I thought my heart only had so much room for love.  But my son has shown me that my heart will continue to grow to hold the love.  That there is infinite capacity for love inside each and every one of us.  Even me.

And that listening to your heart is a fine way to go about living your life. 

Home never felt so good.

How to take a Headshot, Who's the Boss style

Step One:

Join the SV Mom's Group.  This is reason 1,879,222 that I love writing for the SV Moms Group.  Besides the fabulous writers and the best founders, it's the perks people!  SV Mom's Group loves it writers and it shows.  In the TWO free swag bags, an exclusive pre-BlogHer party, and now headshots for all their writers.  Come one, what's not to love.

Step Two:

Get your make-up done by a fabulous Latino gay man who talks your ear off about your skin tone and coloring all the while wearing more make-up than he's putting on you.  This is a crucial step because for the rest of the night people will tell you how great you look and you only have Eduardo to thank for it. 

Step Three:

When you sit down for your free photo shoot, make sure you say to the photographer than you are ready.  Or just plaster your smile the moment you are in front of the camera.  Otherwise, you may look like you smoked a doobie before the session.  Seriously, I swear that I had only had one teeny glass of wine .

Step Four:

When the photographer tells you to look "snobby" under no circumstances are you to make this face.

Nothing says "I'm a snobby bitch" more than a double chin and pancake lips. 

Step Five:

Get your laugh captured on film.  I always throw my head back when I am laughing.  And since I was now officially being a diva, White Trash Mom had to come over and put me in my place.  My cleaveage had no special charming powers over her.

Step Six:

Avoid the hair drama.  When there is only one hair dresser to touch up over 100 women (some of them totally gorgeous and put together they never needed the hair or make-up to begin with), just brush your own hair and move on.  I missed the hair drama since I always come prepared with my Texas hair already styled.  I was hoping for a true mommy wrestling match over how got to sit down next in the chair, but alas every one kept it civil.   

Step Seven:

Buckle down and take some real photos before the photographer tells you the session is over and hands you your free memory stick with all the photos - even the ones with the double chin.

BlogHer or Bust

Writing this in solidtude in my hotel room while the rest of BlogHer attendees are at one of the many sessions.  Work has invaded even this fun conference and I have to tend to it.  Afterall, I get paid for working.  I can't very well tell my boss to take a hike a week before my project ends (to major success thank you very much) just so that I can hang out with a bunch of the coolest bloggers around.   

Still, in between root cause analysis, threatening emails to co-workers that have missed their deadline, and making sure that the project ends on the high note we want it too, I've been stealing away down to the BlogHer conference. 

Highlights of Day One:

Getting to make a video with Grover at Sesame Street for my son Darius! I'm sure it will rank as the best present he's ever receieved from one of my business trips.

Getting an awesome demonstration and getting to keep a new bluetooth headset called Zivio that is made for moms.  I'll be reviewing it over at WTB Reviews soon. 

Having a 10-minute massage in the middle of the day - a relaxing luxury courtesy of Casa Medrona.

Four (yes count 'em FOUR) bags of Swag.  I haven't had the pleasure of going through the bags and relishing in all the goodies just yet.   I can't believe some of this stuff. 

The SV Moms Group generous arrangement of make-up sessions and head shots with a real photographer.   

And of course getting to hang out with fabulous women like Family Freitas, Tippy Toes and Tantrums, V Dog, Desiree of Lookiloos, Go-Go Mommy, The Mama Bird Diaries, Not Just a Working Mom, Mom Without a Map, and It's My Life...

I didn't get to attend any sessions just yet.  There is so much going on it's overwhelming.  But in a good way.  Still need to meet up with old friends and meet new ones. 

Can't wait to see what tonight brings!