My First Blogger Event: Blog and the (Van)City

I started blogging almost a year ago and have felt for a long time like I wanted to be part of a blogging community here in Vancouver. I knew there were other Vancouver bloggers around - this is a pretty big and happening city, after all - but I couldn't fiiiind them. Where the heck was everybody?? #OllyOllyOxenFree!!

So when a month ago I caught wind of the #blogvancity hashtag that was popping up on Twitter (thanks to the retweet account @Vancouver_rt), I was excited and curious. What the heck was #blogvancity? How could I be a part of it? Well I had no idea, but the September 14th event went straight onto my calendar anyway.

After a few weeks and plenty of tweets exchanged with two of the event organizers, Sheila and Jordana, I received my invite for the event, formally called Blog and the (Van)City. Here's a bit of the event description:

"Blog and the (Van)City is a mini-conference designed to build a community of fashion and beauty bloggers that will support and learn from each other."

Yup, sounded like exactly what I had been looking for!

Before continuing, I should point out that I don't really classify myself as a "beauty blogger." In fact, it's quite hard for me to classify myself as anything, given that I blog about nail polish, food, hiking, mountains, restaurants, thrift shopping, workouts, music, Vancouver, my travels, and just about any other random thing I feel like posting. But I do post a nail polish blog every Friday, which technically makes about 1/4 of my content "beauty" content. Thus, here I was on the guest list for a beauty and fashion blogger event. ;)

So last Friday afternoon (Friday the 13th... ooooh spooky) I had the idea to make my own business cards for the event - and that's how I spent my Friday night and Saturday morning:

.  biznasssss cards  .

On Saturday early afternoon, I headed to Burnaby to Metropolis at Metrotown, where Blog and the (Van)City was being held in the Sears Community Room.

And here is what I very hastily applied to my nails on my way out the door to the event - China Glaze's Recycle, with a couple coats of Love & Beauty's Crystal Silver on my ring finger for some extra sass:

.  literally took this pic in the car on the way to metrotown  .

I arrived to a room full of fabulous looking ladies milling around, as well as a spread of sushi, fruit, veggies, lemon squares, sparkling apple cider and soda:

.  fewd and treats  .

There was also a Lush demo table set up, with both Ocean Salt and their Rose Jam shower gel being demo'd by some friendly Lush employees. (Sidebar - is anyone else certain that there is no nicer person on the planet than a Lush employee?? They're consistently amazing humans.) There was also a variety of Lush products available for sale there - like bath bombs, soaps, massage bars, and lotions.

.  lush brings all the boys to the yard  .

I met about 20-25 other bloggers before hearing from the panel of experts who answered all of our questions about how to work with brands or companies, how to maintain a blogging schedule, and what to do when we run out of ideas!

The panel members included:

• Cynnamon Schreinert - Associate at Hartley PR, who was there on behalf of Hartley PR's client, London Drugs
• Brandi Halls - Director, Brand Communications, Lush North America
• Sarah Murray - Style Director, Fashion Capsule Communications (a PR agency for local fashion boutiques)
• Alison Leong - local blogger at Alison-Elle.com
• Jordana - local blogger at JustJ.ca

It was a really valuable Q&A session - everyone had fascinating questions and ideas, and it was good to hear advice about keeping a blogging schedule or the best way to approach a brand about sponsoring posts. I also learned some new tricks about how to alert a brand that you've written about them. I've already begun to put some of this new knowledge to use, so the event was definitely beneficial for me.

On top of learning a lot about "professional" blogging, meeting a ton of other Vancouver bloggers was seriously just what I needed. I already feel more like a part of a community - several of us have been tweeting with each other this past week and getting familiar with each other's blogs. At the end of this blog, I'll include a list of all the bloggers (and vloggers!) that were in attendance at the event, so YOU can check them out too!

Before we all left for the afternoon, we were completely showered with swag. This was my first blogging event, so swag is definitely new to me. I... didn't mind it. Here's the rundown on the gewdies:

Nail polish duos from China Glaze's Fall 2013 Autumn Nights Collection, c/o Nail Polish Canada: 

.  yesssss  .

And a whole buttload of Revlon, Almay, Marcelle, and Annabelle products:

My swag bag contents:

.  ALL MINE  .

Products included:

• Pink-A-Boo Eyeshadow Quad from Annabelle
• Revlon Crazy Shine Nail Buffer
• 3 pots of Almay Eye Makeup Remover
• China Glaze - Kiss My Glass
• China Glaze - Goldie But Goodie
• Marcelle DD Cream (really excited to try this!)
• Revlon Colorstay Smoky Shadow Stick (w/ bonus Liquid Eye Pen)
• Revlon by Marchesa Nail Art 3D Jewel Appliques
• Revlon ColorBurst lip gloss in Sunbaked
• Double Precision Liquid Eyeliner Pen from Marcelle (double-ended with a thinner eyeliner tip on one end and a thicker tip on the other end)
• 2 Anabelle Retractable Eyeliners - One in Jet Black and one in Twilight (greyish purple)
• Marcelle Waterproofing Mascara Top Coat (never even heard of such a thing!)
• Revlon ColorStay Ultimate Suede lipstick in the shade Runway
• Revlon File 'n Peel 6-in-1 Nail File (you peel away old layers to reveal new ones as needed)
• Alchemy eyeshadow trio from Annabelle
• Revlon Chalkboard Nail Art
• Almay Longwear & Waterproof Gentle Eye Makeup Remover
• 15% off coupon for Jukeboxprint.com (where I can print real business cards)
• There's also a little square blush quad but it doesn't have any brand name on it at all, so I don't know what it's called or who it was made by!

In upcoming posts, I'll write more about individual products that I'm using/enjoying out of all this swag. The nail products are the most exciting for me, as you can imagine. But I've also been trying out the makeup removers and the lip products, and am totally intrigued by the whole idea of a DD cream...

One of the cooler parts of this entire experience was seeing my blog name in writing:

Hopefully there will be another blogger event with this group of ladies in the not-so-distant future. Even if there isn't an organized event soon, I hope to be able to meet up in Vancouver with some of the ladies I met and do some shopping or spend some blogging time together in a coffee shop.

Sidebar - I just added Google Friend Connect to the right column of my blog (um, weren't they supposed to be doing away with GFC back in July?), so if you aren't following me there yet please do connect and add me to your reader reel :) You can also follow me on Bloglovin by clicking the button at the bottom of this post.

Oh and thank you to Raine over at Spuddy Buddies for the kind words and shoutout in your Blogs I'm Loving post on Friday. It was a very nice thing for me to read, and I really appreciate your taking the time to read my blogs... That last bit goes for all of you who have made it to this line. ;)

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{Linking up with Miscellany Mondays and Tell Us Tuesday}

The other #blogvancity bloggers/vloggers:

Alison -http://www.alison-elle.com

Amy -http://eyeshadowaddict.squarespace.com

Angela - http://dowantmakeup.ca

Ania - http://www.youtube.com/user/annabellesmakeup

Ashley- http://makeupkismet.blogspot.ca/

Carolyn -https://www.youtube.com/makeitupcanada

Denise - http://www.denisechavez.com/

Jayne - http://www.cosmeticproof.com/

Jenelle - http://www.kittenonthecatwalk.com

Jordana - http://justj.ca

Lauren - http://www.youtube.com/makinguplauren

Li Lian - http://shortwidenails.blogspot.ca/

Lydia - http://www.perfectlyimperfectbeauty.com/

Mikayla - http://www.youtube.com/user/MissMikaylaG

Nina - http://www.ninaonthemoon.com/

Rosie - http://style-love.blogspot.ca/

Sarah - http://cooperscloset11.blogspot.ca

Sellina - http://www.thelookoutblog.com

Sheila - http://maddyloves.com

Viv - http://lifeinthecity.pixnet.net/blog

Whitney - http://macaronsandmischief.com