SCBWI Carolinas Fall Conference DAY ONE

Just a quick post here to celebrate that the Carolinas Fall Conference began this afternoon and is now in full swing. I'll post helpful tidbits that the speakers shared throughout the conference -- later. For tonight, just a short list:

Janelle's favorite things about this year's Fall Conference on day one...

1.) Picked up 4 friendly speakers at the airport. Welcome to NC, ya'll.

2.) Smiled when I noticed how often the speakers from New York checked their blackberries and phones whenever they had a second of down time. Way to multi-task, guys!

3.) Caught up with writer friends from last year.

4.) Caught up with writer friends from last week too. : ) (8 members of my critique group, The Goalies, are at the conference again this year. Hooray).

5.) Listened to Carol Boston Weatherford and Jan Broadfoot talk about marketing.

6.) Chatted with a number of new attenders at the conference, and heard about their works-in- progress, their hopes and dreams, and their questions about children's publishing.

7.) Actually had a stranger say she'd been informed by another writer that I have a blog (this one) and that it was worth reading. Wow! Thanks Melissa for making my day! I think there are days when all bloggers wonder if the stuff they write is helpful or interesting to anyone at all.

8.) Sat at the conference center restaurant and watched two of my crit group buddies laugh so hard that they nearly snorted wine out of their noses when they both read the term "benchy-thing" as a descriptor in my most recent novel-draft. Apparently "benchy-thing" is not an appropriate word to use in a novel. (Awe...gorsh, guys. I use that term all the time in my regular speech! As in, "Could you please bring that benchy-thing over here? I want to set this parakeet cage down on it before this cute litte bird bites my finger tips off." Ah well...) :)

9.) Stood in the dark parking lot with new and old friends at the end of the night, with misty rain swirling around the street lights, as we discussed ways to shorten our verbal pitches and talked about the kissing scene in my book that the wine snorting friends were still critiquing for me. What a great way to end the night!

10.) Heading to bed happy that I'll be doing stuff like this again all day tomorrow! This is the life.