The Shutter Sisters Pajama Party

I was so excited about this party. When I was growing up my mother NEVER let us go to a sleep over or have one at our house. For my mother, child molesters and mass murders lurked behind every door. Growing up I never sat up all night listening to ghost stories, talking about boys, or doing my nails while spreading gossip with other teenage girls.

Not too long ago I heard about adult women having slumber parties and they sounded fun. So much more to dish about and you don’t have to worry about your mom coming in to tell you to hush up and go to sleep. My problem is of course that I haven’t really made any close friends here in Georgia.

I have only myself to blame. I cannot always expect someone else to make the first move. It seems I have lots of acquaintances. They all like me but it just seems that I’m afraid to impose on their free time. I thought this might be a great opportunity to make new friends. I even bought a new nightgown with Tinkerbell all over it. Call me Kitschy.

When it came time to show up to the party I changed into my PJs and looked at myself in the mirror. What was I doing? Sure it said PJ party but at that moment I was more certain than ever that everyone would be wearing those Lounge Pants sets. I would stick out like a sore thumb. I changed back into the outfit I’d been wearing earlier and headed upstairs to the Shutter Sisters PJ Party.

They were friendly enough, even offered me wine but almost immediately I realized I was totally out of my element. These women were photographers. The talented kind. You know the kind of people who NEVER have photos that chop off the top of people’s heads or forget to leave the lens cover on. I felt much like I would have felt if I had walked into a room filled with artists of any media. I feel awed by their talent, so awed that I’m speechless. When I look around it seems like many of the people there know each other and I almost want to run for the door as embarrassed as if I’d walked into the wrong apartment.

I look at their work quietly and then I leave.

Swag, Thievery, and Hooligans

Here's where I come back to the swag. I'm a sweeper. This means that sometimes I win things like a t-shirt with a movie's name on it. Some people say things like "You won a T-shirt? Big deal!" For me that t-shirt is cool.

I've never had a lot of money. Any little niceties I've ever had came because I was involved with sweeping. Some people laugh and roll their eyes but I am always thrilled when I receive my next CD or t-shirt. I am so grateful to all the companies I have ever won things from that I write them hand written thank you letters. I tend to be brand loyal to companies who sponsor sweeps.

The whole concept that I would receive "SWAG" here really didn't factor in my wanting to attend and I totally imagined that it would be in the form of T-shirts, mousepads, pencils, pens, etc. I was so amazed when I dumped my first one out that it was like Christmas.

You have to understand that right now my husband does not have a job so I kind of looked at this trip to BlogHer as my birthday gift even though it was something I won from Kraft. When I saw the stuff in my first swagbag I honestly felt like this truly was the best birthday I'd ever had. I had gone to wondering how my birthday was going to shake out to wow I can't believe this.

Some girls have beautiful Sweet Sixteen parties. For some girls their 13th birthday is filled with pink balloons and cake with pink flowers. We were too poor for all that. When I was 21 I was a single mom working two jobs and I was thrilled to get my birthday off but I couldn't afford to do anything special for that day. This was to be my 50th birthday. My next big birthday wasn't going to be until I was 75. Two years ago my husband and I talked about going on a cruise or going to Hawaii which had been my life's dream. All the world was our oyster.

When Darryl lost his job everything changed. I just felt it was my lot in life to NEVER have one of those "WOW CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS?" Birthday party. Now here I was in Chicago, in a beautiful hotel, and the fact that someone handed me bag that included an Kodak HD Video cam and a $50 Pro Flowers gift card blew me away.

All the flashing of cameras and the massages, tattoos, and the parties were really all heady stuff. It didn't make me drunk with power but it did make me very appreciative. I took business cards and I would write hand written thank you cards to the people I met who supplied me with all this stuff. I had brought a box of thank you cards to thank all the people I met at Kraft but once I did that I began writing the other letters in earnest.

I never pushed anyone, never shoved anyone, never pouted whined, cried, or anything else because I "missed out" on a lot of the swag I heard about from others. Oh there's that I wish I'd known about that moment but other than that when I talk about swag it was all fun for me. I never knew that people would go CRAZY over this stuff but then again I suppose I should have known.

I remember hearing a story a couple of years ago about some giveaway that was supposed to happen in Central park. I want to say a certain number of people were going to get $50 or maybe $100 but it was only for the first X number of people. It was a radio stunt that went awry. People lined up 10 deep and when the giveaway began people were thrown to the ground and injured. When I heard about that it reminded me of what my Dad used to always say about large groups. "Stay Away."

It appears that some of the "ladies" elbowed bloggers or babies to get ahead in the line. There were reports of hand shaped bruises on Mommy Need's Coffee's arm. Reports of stolen swag were also circling. I'm serious. People were stealing from elevator carts and even stole from other people.

I was shocked. I first learned of this at BowlHer (that's another story) and it just sounded so incredible.

I also learned of an incident where there was a blackmail attempt for CROCS. Heck I got a pair of Crocs but they didn't have my size so I'll either give them away on my blog or I will give them to one of my students. Some of them do not have money for new clothes or shoes and I have certainly been there. I think they'd just love that.

The attitude of entitlement was pervasive among some rather than adopting an attitude of gratitude. I realize I have a case of low self-esteem but some people need to get over themselves.

I'll give you an example, I overheard one woman speaking with another about how she was "supposed to get a NEW dishwasher but it was taking so long so they contacted her and asked if she wanted to wait for a date in the future for that dishwasher or if she'd be willing to do a product review about detergent and receive a new front loading washer and dryer."

She didn't say it like "Oh I can't believe this. I'm just so very excited." She said it as though she felt she deserved the washer and dryer and they should give her those as well as the dishwasher because she actually had to wait to receive the dishwasher.

MY GOD!!!!! When when I was raising little ones I was working two jobs and still eligible for food stamps. I used to have to take the two of them to the laundry mat where we sat reading books in the hot building so that no one would steal our clothes. I'd have been thrilled if someone had offered to feed some coins into the dryer for me so that I could have bought the boys some fries at McDonalds or a soda.

I'm the only one in the house working right now and I'm taking care of my elderly father-in-law to boot. I am using some of my resources to buy school supplies for my students because many of them are in worse shape. Many of them are in homes with no adult working. Gosh I wish the back pack fairy would fall from the sky and give me some back packs for some of my students. As it is I bought two out of my own pocket and the one I received from Lands End also went to a student. I would have hugged any vendor who handed me a box of 50 pencils because that's about how many kids who will be stopping by my class when they take those high stakes tests telling me they forgot their pencil. I received lots of flash drives with product information that I uploaded to my computer then erased the information. Guess who is getting them? Not me. Some teachers are requiring kids to buy these and I only have one left. So excuse me for not feeling this woman's pain.

I almost jumped in to say something along the lines of "Are you kidding me?" Then I realized that I was the one eavesdropping so I really didn't have much room to talk.

The second day I was at BlogHer I saw woman open one of the many reusable grocery bags and began throwing bottle after bottle of Samples of the All Detergent. I was given two, sure I'd like more but you know what? If I took more then others wouldn't get any. They obviously only gave me two because they'd figured that was the fair number so that everyone would get some. They never said, hey help yourself there little lady. If they did I might have filled a bag and dropped them off at our local food pantry. After all the plant where my husband worked has closed down and he's far from being the only one effected by it. We are lucky because I am a teacher so we aren't dependent on the food pantry but some people are.

So do I feel a bit guilty about the swag? No. Why should I? I didn't obtain any of it in a dishonest way. I didn't demand anything. Do I feel like I was a swag hag? No because much of what I did get I shared with others and I actually wrote emails and thank you cards to many of the companies that provided these things to me. I have already begun writing reviews about some of the products like Swiffer, like Lands End, like Kraft, like McDonalds, like Ragu, and then I've emailed the rep to let them know how much I appreciated it as well as letting my readers know that I received these things FREE.

I think there are people who were conflicted with all the swag put those doubts aside and acted like a spoiled child. Some people felt that the swag demeaned there craft (more about that) yet they accepted the swag "against their better judgement." (more on that later).

I didn't feel guilty about the swag because the companies wanted to put these products in our hands in hopes that we would talk about them. It is a business transaction that they did to promote goodwill. I don't feel sullied by it. My blog is about saving money at the store so in and of its very nature it is commercial. I am not honing my craft while writing the next great American novel, pushing an agenda, or trumpeting my baby's latest accomplishment. I'm just telling people how to save money. I'm telling people about where to get free or reduced priced medication or health care. Companies are looking to spend their advertising money wisely and they know that blogging is the new revolution.

Then again if I had pushed babies, stolen swag, and acted like the world revolved around me I'd be so very embarrassed.

BlogHer Day Three – The Why

I awoke that first morning, nervous about all the day would bring. I walked a couple of blocks away with Starbucks gift card in hand to buy my favorite, a non-fat Green Tea Latte. I even bought the Vente size since I had $15 on my card. I decided to treat myself like a Queen and eat the piece of cheesecake I bought the day before from the Cheesecake Factory. All in all, a very unhealthy, fattening way to begin this great adventure. I did not scold myself as I might have once done for eating this way. Then again I did not lie to myself, assuring myself that it will be OK because I will “skip” some meal, or exercise the extra calories away. It is yet another advantage of being almost fifty. You no longer believe even your own lies and you have finally realized that nagging is never an effective way to change a behavior. I splurged because I could and I assured myself that it would be just fine if I did.

Today was the official start of BlogHer. The pre-Parties are but a memory and now it's time for the rubber to meet the road. It's time for me to reflect on the Why's of my trip to BlogHer.

Before going to BlogHer I felt it important to set goals. What was it I planned to learn from the whole event? What did I want to experience? What will I do to push me from my comfort zone? All good questions and they were questions I asked myself yet again as I sat in my bed eating.

I teach a class called Entrepreneurial Ventures. When I first began teaching, almost eight years ago, it was called Entrepreneurship. This class has sparked an argument between my husband and me. At times he feels I am a fraud to be teaching this class. He argues that anything I teach them is useless because I have no real experience in owning my own business. These heated conversations lapse into the stale argument that begins “Those who can do….” I argue that seven of my students have actually gone on to start their own business but I question myself about the lack of experience that I bring to the table.

I never really fancied myself as a business owner. I am someone who thrives on security because I’ve been so desperate for it so much of my life. So if one could label a blog a business then I became a business owner right around Christmas last year.

I didn’t start my blog with the idea of creating a business. To be truthful I began my blog because I needed one to enter blog giveaways. You see Online-Sweepstakes suddenly started being bombarded with these blog giveaways. At first I didn’t know what to make of them. Sometimes the prize being given away was one I wouldn’t have minded having. I wouldn’t have minded having one of those electronic grocery list makers. Other times the prizes seemed to be almost worthless. Win a binkie. Win a bib. Then again I’ve entered sweeps to win a T-shirt.

The question then became what would my blog be about? Popular topics include politics, food, mommy, niche, and frugal living. Each one of these bloggers feel that their topic is the height of art and some even look at the other bloggers with a sneer of contempt upon their lips. I always tell my students to do what you love I chose saving money with a twist because I also talked about sweeps and contests.

At the beginning I didn’t really care about how many people came to my site. This doesn’t mean that I totally blew the site off but it meant I was posting every day but not getting caught up in who came. I say that until I’d checked on my stats after two weeks and I was surprised that no one had come to my site. How could that be? No one cared? I told Darryl that I was thinking about stopping my blog.

Darryl was adamant about me not closing the blog up and only posting when there was a contest. I should take this seriously just like any business. Business? Did he say the word BUSINES? This wasn’t a business it was my blog. I think that’s when it first hit me that I should run this like a business which means that I should always try to give my readers (customers) the best product (posts) that I can.

Darryl fixed the mechanism for tracking visitors. I began to see a few people stopping by. We decided to run our own giveaway. Honestly I had no clue where the bloggers got the stuff that they gave away? Did they buy it and then give it away? How in the heck do you make money doing that? If you have to buy things to give them away what is the point? Still we looked around our house and decided to giveaway some Soy Joy bars that we had bought for FRE at CVS. We kind of promoted it like a New Year’s Resolution giveaway and we had almost a hundred people visit ThriftyMaven to try to win. I promoted the giveaway on Online-Sweepstakes and SweepSheet.

In the mean time the poop was hitting the fan on Online-Sweepstakes. Bloggers rated right down there with lawyers and tax collectors and slightly above Bernie Madoff. They hated the blog contests because bloggers asked people to make a post on their blog in order to win. Big deal I thought. For some it was a VERY BIG deal. Then they were asking people to tweet, blog, and Digg their posts. Too much work people were saying for such a small prize.

Darryl suggested we hold a giveaway ever two weeks so I decided it was time I actually research how to run a blog. I want to say that this is different than anything else I ever do because I ALWAYS research everything before I begin. This is just not true. Often I start something and then I begin researching in earnest. My local library’s only book about blogging was written by the people of the Huffington Post. There really wasn’t much that was applicable to what I wanted to do. So I searched the net for information.

I found out about IZEA. Basically, your blog must:

* Be at least 90 days old, with at least 20 pre-existing posts written in the last 90 days.
* Have chronological archives.
* Contain content that is original to you and the blog.
* Be a text/written content blog, meaning no message boards, websites, IM, photoblogs, vlogs, etc.
* Have only one author.
* Not include 'no follow' tags.
* Be a blog written in the English language. We do make note of any blogs submitted in other languages so we may share those as we encounter Advertisers seeking them.
* Not be a blog kept primarily for earning money.

So I had to keep working on my blog so I would meet their requirements. Even now though I was totally lost after that. I just could never seem to grasp how to get approved for anything because the site didn’t seem very user friendly.

Then I found out about BlogSpark. Very easy and they sponsor giveaways. The people I am in contact with are TERRIFIC. About the same time I began to take a look at companies sponsoring giveaways on other people’s sites and contacting them. I was able to get a couple of companies to sponsor a giveaway and I felt I was on my way. Not quite though.

Whereas I didn’t originally have a goal for registered users I began to wonder if I would ever hit the magic number of 1,000 readers. Every day dribs and drabs of people would sign up for the Maven Moment Alert. Those numbers slowly began to build and now I had to figure out how to bring the reader to my blog. It was beginning to look more and more like a business even though I was not pulling in a salary.

Then one day I was checking my traffic and I noticed some 6,000 people showed up on my site. Even now I can still scarcely believe it. The post was about Suave and how they were giving away a FREE full-sized bottle.

It was to be another two months before I had another big bubble like that one again. While not quite 6,000 I did wake up one day and notice that my traffic was getting steadily busy as the day wore on. I wanted to find out where the traffic was coming from and noticed that a Christian radio station had posted a link to my site. That first day I had some 3,000 people. On the second day about 2,000 people came and on the third day there was another 1,000 people.

I was now slightly over the halfway mark of the goal I had set of 1,000 registered users. The blog that had once been a means to an end had now become an obsession and I was spending hours looking for great deals for my readers.

Then just like everything else with blogging so far, I stumbled upon BlogHer. I say I stumbled upon it but really I found it because of a contest they were running. It was a contest for a conference they were having and you had the opportunity to win a sponsored trip to the BlogHer Conference in Chicago.

The more I found out about the Conference, the more I wanted to go. I began to wonder how I could manage to go to the conference because I know I couldn’t afford to go because my husband is unemployed.

At first I tried to win a hotel stay for the conference. It was a beautiful hotel and I told myself if I won I would figure out how I would be able to afford the airfare and the conference pass. I was just so certain I was going to go that I was almost a bit surprised to discover I did not win that hotel stay.

That’s when I learned about the Stovetop Stuffing Contest. I had to come up with an inexpensive one pot meal that contained Stovetop Stuffing. Even as I was writing the recipe down I had a feeling about it. Yet my “evil twin” told me to stop acting crazy. Do you remember those comic skits and cartoons that feature an angel on one shoulder giving you advise while the devil on your other shoulder tries to mislead you? That might as well have been where I was on this whole contest. The angel telling me that this contest had my name written all over it and there was a reason that I should go. The little angel assured me that my recipe was good and would at least get us second place if not better. The haughty devil on the other hand scoffed at the whole scenario. “You’re crazy if you think you can win something like this.” “Why in the world are you entering this contest? No one would like this recipe.”

For my readers who followed me as I nervously went through the steps of entering and begging for votes you know that I could hardly sleep at night I was so nervous about the contest.

The day I learned I had won, I was on my way home when Darryl told me that FedEx had dropped an envelope off at the house. He wanted to know if I wanted him to open it. He told me it was from Kraft. I was afraid that I hadn’t won the sponsorship but excited that I might have won one of the second prizes which were $500 gift cards for groceries.

Once I knew for certain I began to make plans for my trip to BlogHer and tried identify what I wanted to learn. I knew I wanted to bring home what I learned to my students but I also wanted to show myself that I could do this. In all my life, I’d never been so far from home without family or friend. This was to be a totally new experience for me, a woman approaching fifty.

Now as I lay in bed finishing my Cheesecake Factory Cheesecake, I scanned the agenda once more. I told myself that people will like me when they meet me and assure myself that if some didn’t that was OK too. I practiced the words I would say to the company representatives and marketers that I would meet. I wanted to be able to use examples of what I said and my thought process with my students when they came back to school.

I drained my cup of the last of the latte and walked over to the sink to brush my teeth and apply my make-up. “It’s show time!” I said with a big theatrical smile. The face that smiled back to me was one that looked more like my mother every day. Blogging was a young person’s game but I would let them know that I wasn’t ready for the shelf. “Put me in coach. I’m ready to play.” I shut off the light, left my room and headed for the elevators.