A "Cardamom"entous Day Plus Booze and Shooze

First of all, if you’re here for the first time because we met at the Healthy Living Summit, let me say welcome, and I hope you’ll stick around for a while to see what I’m up to. I will be working on my “favorite posts” page, which is one of many things I learned about today, so soon you’ll have a better idea of my journey from overweight, unhealthy lazy girl to happy, healthy, triathlete. And choco-holic.

What an amazing weekend. When it started, I only knew a few of these people:

And now, I feel like I walked away with a great group of foodie, fit and fashionable friends. It was a blast putting faces to names, even if the names were Carrots ‘N’ Cake instead of Tina and Hangry Pants instead of Heather. If I called you by your blog name this weekend, just know that it’s because I read you so often, it’s hard to break the habit!

After touring the garden and getting to know Mom’s cats on Friday night, it was time to get our girl on and head out to the HLS cocktail party. Mom let me play Skipper to her Barbie — taking the Chi flatiron to her head infomercial style.

That Chi rocks. Look at how much longer the straight side is! Don’t worry … by the time I finished with her, we looked HAWT:

We met the rest of the HLS crew at a cute bar in Boston called Rustic Kitchen.

Good food, good drinks, and good people. It was tough to mingle because there were so many gorgeous girls gabbing away, but I managed to throw some elbows stick a stiletto in some toes politely make my way through to meet as many bloggers as possible.

I had my trusty sidekick:

Although I secretly lusted after this beauty that Mom ordered:

Somewhere in all of this, I had what is either the most brilliant plan ever or another decision that I’ll chalk up to tee many martoonis. I bought a new domain: http://boozeandshooze.com. Don’t bother going there — it’s just parked. I think I was drunk on the glory that was the shoe show:

It turned out we weren’t the only mother-daughter team at the Summit (hi Sara and Marcia!), so we spent a long time getting to know the other pair:

And I also got to see my fellow Orlando bloggers Meghann and Caitlin:

After heading home, I watched the Red Sox rally for a 9th inning win (phew) then got up early for a little Power Yoga. Love those vinyasas.

This morning, the official HLS kickoff brought more good eats:

Some new flavor finds from old favorites:

And some of the most amazing swag ever:

Not pictured here: the most.amazing.treat.I.have.ever.had. Angela’s Oh She Glows bars. When I saw it in the goody bag I just couldn’t wait, and had to dig in. It was delicious. I also came home with a baked good that inspired the title of this post:

Yup, that’s me … the winning bidder for Shannon From Tri 2 Cook‘s Cardamom Coffee Zucchini bread! How am I getting all of the above home on an airplane tomorrow? As I told Twitter, I have no problem leaving clothes behind … but the Barney Butter and Amazing Grass are coming back to Florida.

We also got to snack on Pom Wonderful which I’ll be drinking tomorrow morning along with my stolen Oikos honey flavored yogurt.

So, enough of the food, and onto the Summit. How was it? Well, you can watch it for yourself here, but if you want the high points, read on:

Best speakers:

• Janel Ovrut, a registered dietician (and ‘Cuse grad — go orange!). I had the pleasure of having breakfast at the same table as Janel and some of her fellow dietician friends, and was really inspired by her healthy and reasonable approach to food. Plus, she’s a new triathlete, so that scores her even more points.
• Regina Beidler, an organic dairy farmer from Vermont. If you have seen Food, Inc., her the presentation was an even more up-close examination of the food and farming industry. I was privileged to ask her a question, and her answer was both thorough and interesting. And her daughter was adorable.

Most interesting takeaways:

• Self-hosting is the way to go when it comes to publishing blogs, which makes me even more glad I made the switch a few weeks ago. Now I just need to learn the advanced blogger tools, which ZestyCook taught us about.
• Content is king and photos are the prince. Luckily, I have the right camera (everyone on the panel has a Canon!), but now I need to work on the settings. Case in point — the crappy flash in the pictures above. Kath also explained the importance of the macro setting, something I tested out immediately:

• No one, not even Meghann, is a born runner! Just like me, she once struggled to make it down the street. Now she’s doing marathons. I thought it was great the way the panel of bloggers talked about their injuries, nutritional needs and more, and I was really glad that Jenna tackled the issue of yoga as a workout.

Were there some rocky moments this weekend? Sure. Were there parts that were more interesting and informative than others? You bet. I know these bloggers will be taking constructive criticism as well as compliments, and if there is a Healthy Living Summit 2, I’ll do everything I can to attend. My sincere thanks to everyone who had a part in the weekend, from the bloggers to the sponsors to the women (and two men!) who traveled from far and wide to take part. I was privileged and proud to attend with my Mom, and will miss her when I head home tomorrow!

I’d love to hear your thoughts on the weekend, so leave me a comment — and if there’s anything you want to ask me about triathlon training, weight loss, living in Florida or anything else, please email me. And stick with me for a few days — if you don’t like what you read, you can dump me. Or make suggestions for how I can be a better resource for you. At least send me a picture of your favorite booze and shooze!