Even though this may be a tad late and folks may be a tad overwhelmed by the glut of Alt recaps floating around, too bad, gotta do it. Every fiber in my blogging being demands it.

Being my first ‘blogging’ type conference I was a little bit unaware and slightly nervous about what to expect in Salt Lake. There is a reason I like the anonymity and isolation of the internet, you know, because of the anonymity and no pictures of me thing. Just casually considering the physical fact of being surrounded by a zillion sparkling smiles in cute outfits with blogging savvy, proper business cards and lots of snapping cameras made my cold little cynical heart shrink up in fear.

Hey, it’s the awesome Victoria from sfgirlbybay and some of me with a proper badge and everything. Also, according to all photo evidence, my phone is never out of my hand. Such a sad realization to find out I’m that phone person – and don’t worry – I despise me too.

I shacked up with the attractive and talented Jason Hudson of These Roving Eyes and the equally attractive and talented Laure Joliet (of all the things I do with Laure all the time) in a larger than expected hotel room that the 1960’s forgot. It was gloriously fun and boozy and the best of summer camp and art school combined into one.

But yeah, attractive people, just stop it. You can’t be good looking and charming and talented and all around kindly great people. Leave some for the rest of us.

Obviously this thing was fancy.

There were giant chandeliers everywhere like it was no big deal.

It was fantastic to hang out with some internet friends in the real life, like Emily, Lisa Congdon, Rena Tom, Victoria and hey there is me touching my boobs or something on the end. That probably was the best thing about Alt, not my boobs, but spending time with people who are creatively focused, whip smart and incredibly entertaining. Like Haily and Julie, who were a blast and somehow not blasted into pictures.

Let’s not leave out the boys, really though, this was a heavily estrogen laden event. It was a treat to spend some time with the equally entertaining and thoughtful Maxwell from Apartment Therapy, whose openness and great insights made the trip worth it.

The big reason for coming out of internet hiding was to speak on a panel with Kristen Grove, Jenny Komenda and Emily Henderson about interior design blogging. Check out that far away dark blob of me at a podium and here is me looking at my phone and sticking my hand in my mouth while everyone else is smiling and being charming.

(Kristen Grove, Jenny Komenda and Emily Henderson)

COME ON.

These girls are adorable and stylish and wear lipstick and I had my hand in my mouth. Ugh.

It was a great panel nevertheless, I had a tons of fun chatting with these ladies and all the folks who came to check it out. I ‘heard’ it was funny and super informative. You know, just saying, since there were great tips on social media, running an interior business and blog, styling tricks and fixes for interior photos.

Jason and the crowd of ladies demanded to be entertained and THEY WERE.

At some point I decided to be a girl and wear a dress.

So that happened and despite Laure telling me to stop making weird faces in every single picture, I could never stop. Never ever.

Overall there was a lot of booze and parties and food and late nights followed by early mornings, so I needed lots of Diet Coke to get me through the long days and ignored the vast disapproval from my roommates who prefer coffee and being classy.

I don’t care. I drink diet coke for caffeine. I’m kinda trashy. I live in Hemet. I feel no shame.

Everything was fancy throughout the four day conference and on the last day Laure and I sat in on Jason and Ryan’s fancy workshop on studio lighting before heading out with a motley crew of the girls for a little bit of local vintage shopping at The Green Ant that included Laure, Jordan of Oh Happy Day, Maggie Mason, Emily Henderson, Lisa Congdon, Jess from Sunset, and Victoria.

Sorry about the bad iphone photo, but shopping may have been a bad idea since somehow a simple little trinket to remember the trip wasn’t enough and instead I opted to buy a sofa. Mmmhmmm, I bought an Arne Norell leather sofa from the 1970’s in Utah knowing that I was flying home to California on a plane.

I live dangerously.

No worries though, it’s all going to be fine. Emily bought the matching set of chairs and we are getting that stuff shipped.

I don’t care. I have no shame. I love sofas.

Well, even with my poorly distributed DIY stamped chipboard cards and crippling social anxiety, Alt was wonderfully amazing. I had more than a great time with an incredible group of like-minded people all engaged and thoughtful about this whole weird internet endeavor. It was exhausting but very motivating and much more inspiring than that sad little darkly sarcastic part of my psyche would believe it could be.

2012 seems to be the year of blogging? Yes? Plans and redesign and new launches and big projects in the chute (like FINALLY adding stuff like my twitter here)? Yup.

Thanks for putting up with me.

**Special thanks to Laure for all the photos she is letting me use here and being my roomie and flying buddy.