My First Post (aka "The Conference")

I've never done this whole blog thing before, but someone told me it was necessary that I start one (Suzanne) because of the whole networking thing. So here I am. Why title it "The Singer," you might ask? I think it is reasonably evident for anyone whose been to either of the last two SCBWI Summer Conferences, but the reason I chose "The Singer" is because on Sunday and Monday of both years (the two days after the luncheon where I sang), if anyone I didn't know approached me, the first words out of their mouth were "Aren't you the singer?" Whether it was in the LA Ballroom, the elevator, or the most social of male gathering places, the bathroom, those four words were almost invariably the first four spoken to me. So, for better or worse, in the world of children's books I think I might be forever branded as "The Singer."

And now, onto my own brief summary of the conference. Eve, Robin, and Jay have the comprehensive list of highlights, and I am severely lacking in pictures, so my summary will probably be much weaker than everyone elses, but whatever. I headed into this conference quite skeptical that it would not live up to last year's, I really did. It was my first conference, and between my getting up on stage and several awesome speeches and breakout sessions, not to mention a really fun Silvery Moon party, I had a great time. I wasn't sure if I just got lucky that it was a good year, or if this is how it always was. The one thing I was definitely excited about, though, was that I was staying at the hotel this year, instead of commuting.

So when the time came, I picked up soon-to-be roommate Paul from the airport and we cruised on over to the hotel. I knew from that first night that I had nothing to fear about anything not surpassing anything. I was flung right into a great group of beautiful women and fun(ny) guys. How can you beat that? Throughout the weekend, we all had some pretty riotous times, and after a guffawing skip race, a quarantine for oxboxiousness, a discussion of the sexual habits of mermaids (it's all about the subtle holes), dancing and dancing and dancing (my jeans were still sweaty when I got home on Monday night...ew), the development of a new gravy serving product, a botched Sinatra imitation, a freaking hilarious "dinner show," a group picture book reading with a twist, five Beer:30's, many more drinks after the Beer:30's of every evening, and even more enticing, exhilarating, and extremely entertaining conversation, the conference came to more than surpass last year's. So thanks to everyone I got to hang out with over one of the most epicly fantastic weekends I've had in a good, long while. Oh, and I learned some stuff about writing, too.