The SPORK. The PERFECT feat of human ingenuity and resourcefulness. What could be better than a hybrid between a spoon and a fork? NOT MUCH.
But the scientists at NASA, or at least somewhere deep in the bunkers at Delta came up with something even MORE amazing. The portable, collapsable SPORK. I can sleep well at night knowing that the world is in good hands.
...a great game face, with just a touch of trepidation.
Nothing makes me more proud of my kids than when they exhibit courage in the face of fear.
Photo taken of my oldest son, Stephen, rappelling into a Cenote at Hidden Worlds, Cancun, Mexico.
I wanted to capture a few of my thoughts about the M3 Summit. I really enjoyed my time in Atlanta, and meeting with so many great men (and women).
It was awesome to have so many conversations--the face-to-face time really helped me get to know those attending, and certainly will help us all as we build this whole space together. I left with a renewed sense that we can do some great work together, while building strong trusted relationships with our communities.
I enjoyed reading everyone's opinions about the show, and there are some good suggestions that will make future events even better. All-in-all, I think everyone came the same conclusion that there are a bunch of great guys (and gals) working really hard to make this space a great place for the modern media man.
Thanks to the organizers of the event, especially Donny and Debby. And thanks for all of you for coming out to hear Stacy and me speak about what we're doing at Dad Central Consulting.
Here are a handful of blog posts I've read (yes, I actually read them all...), from attendees:
If you have any questions, be sure to let me know. And if you didn't already, sign up for our Dad Blogroll!
See you all next year!
It's been a few weeks since I've seen my kids, and I'm traveling back to Seattle tomorrow. Alex will be playing in a soccer tournament, and we'll be making up for lost time (and missed birthdays) by doing some fun things together.
Being a Dad is the most rewarding thing I know, but it can be painful missing the ones that mean so much to you when you can't be there. Hats off to all the dads that aren't with their kids every day, for whatever reason.
And thank goodness for Skype! Without it, you wouldn't get classic shots like this!
Now that I’ve had a few days to recover, it’s time to wrap up my thoughts about BlogHer 10. The conference was great. There were several thousand attendees, and I had the pleasure of meeting several bloggers, brand representatives, and folks from PR and marketing agencies.
I think I talked to just about every guy I could find, but the numbers of men not working on the show floor were admittedly small. I sat through a couple of sessions on the first day, but I had the best time talking to the folks on the trade show floor, explaining to them what Dad Central is all about, and how working with bloggers can be so rewarding for everyone involved.
I got to spend some time with a few great Dad bloggers, Dada Rocks, TechyDad, and Father Muskrat, both at the Ralph Lauren party, and occasionally running into them on the show floor. You guys are doing a great job representing Dads, and it was great to meet you. In fact, Dada Rocks did a quick overview of the show on CC Chapman’s Digital Dads TV show, about 42 minutes in. Check it out.
There were a few things I consider my favorites, so I’ll make an attempt at listing them:
The things I enjoyed most about BlogHer 2010:
1) The ride down to New York. Even though we had to “think” along the way. We had a great brainstorming session, and a rousing round of “Ghost”. I’m not sure why the game kept stopping in the back seat, but for some reason, it did. I loved stopping along the way at Rein’s New York Style Deli. The food was awesome, especially those semi-sour pickles.
2) Staying at The Jane Hotel. The Jane Hotel is full of old-world charm. Close quarters reminiscent of an ocean liner. Communal bathrooms. An elevator with an attendant that shuts the gated door and turns the crank to go up and down. More on that in another post.
3) The party at the Ralph Lauren reading room. Gathering at the world headquarters of Ralph Lauren, meeting David Lauren, working with Megan and Matt S. stuffing bags and getting things set to go. And listening to David tell his story about growing up in the Ralph Lauren family, and introducing the RL Gang. The guy has great presence, and has some amazingly amazing ideas about interactive marketing. Everything about the night was perfect, including the meal we had with the folks from Ralph Lauren who helped organize the event after it was all over. What a memorable night.
4) The giveaways. My favorite: The Got Milk? cereal/milk/bowl/spoon thing. It’s a cooler. And a bowl. And a spoon. All in one. Close second: Weebles that wobble, but don’t fall down. Runners up include full-size Mr. Potato Heads, “Don’t Text and Drive” keychains, and of course the samples of PUR packets that P&G is sending to countries where they don’t have safe drinking water. I can’t wait to do the demonstration for my kids’ classes once they’re back in school.
5) Meeting the Canadians—their party rocked, from the step-and-repeat to the Canadian Mountie who welcomed the Canadian bloggers who work with Mom Central Canada. Way to go, eh. 6) Walking the floor with Stacy, and meeting all of her amazing friends. Everywhere she went, she was hugging someone—it felt like she was the prom queen, and the few times I got to hang around with her, I felt somewhere between a groupee and the prom king myself. Everyone there knew her, and it made my ability to introduce myself so much easier.
7) Being known so instantly being part of Mom Central, and the enthusiastic reaction I got when I told people about Dad Central. The company I work for has a great reputation of putting relationships first, whether with the bloggers we work with, the brand and agencies we partner with, or with each other.
8) Stacey Smith, our webmaster/designer/social engineer, and her quick turnaround of Dad Central Consulting site. She has endless energy, awesome ideas, and I enjoy working with her. Maybe with the exception of the last assignment she got from our CEO, who assigned her to be my “cultural mentor.” She only had to kick me under the table a few times, but I learn fast.
9) The SWAG exchange room. What a great idea from one of the mom bloggers last year. They kept a room open where you could leave what you didn’t want, and take what you wanted more of. I was able to send a box home to my kids that I think they’re going to love.
10) Hanging out in the GM Chill Space. Another great idea. A large, comfortable space with lots of plugs, and dongles for iPhones and Blackberries and cell phones and everything else. They had snacks and cold water and the place was perfect to relax and log in and do some blogging.
11) Getting my picture with Rayman, and getting to play Xbox 360 Kinect Your Shape by Ubisoft. It’s no secret to my Xbox friends that the Frag Dolls are awesome, but getting a chance to actually see how far along the Xbox 360 Kinect has come made me proud of my former company. It was fun to see mom bloggers try it out, and to see how flawlessly the technology performed.
12) Jimmy Dean’s Breakfast Pancakes and Sausage on a Stick. OMG. Yum.
13) Taking the “Limoliner” bus/train back to Boston from NYC. Cool way to travel—a luxury bus with wifi and power ports and leather seats and a direct route from the hotel where the convention was to downtown Boston. It wasn’t fun leaving my iPhone on the bus, but the company was great and was able to get it back to me quickly.
14) BlogHim. Even though I didn’t actually ever see any physical function, it was fun to take part in the Tweet-osphere. Mocha Dad, you rock. You made it fun to check into Twitter. And hopefully you guys actually got to meet up, even though i had to leave early. I hope the “brotherhood” is just as strong when we meet for real at M3.
15) The Mom Central party at Circo, the monkeys, and meeting Mommy Goggles and her husband. And the Jimmy Fallon bartender. And the dating couple with six kids each, Spuds and Lenore. You guys crack me up.
16) Remembering the times I spent with my kids in NYC in the past. I couldn’t walk outside without thinking of each one of them, and waiting for the time I can take our youngest who still hasn’t traveled on a business trip with Dad.
17) Our “pre-meeting” briefing at Asia de Cuba with our CEO, Stacy, and her heartfelt, individual toasts she made to each one of us around the table. There were more than a few wet eyes, and I got to know my co-workers so much better.
18) Running into my blogging buddy Beth Goza, who inspired me years ago to “try” blogging. I’m so glad I got to see her at BlogHer. There’s such a personal connection between bloggers, people who are willing to share their lives, their ideas, their talents, and their network of friends, and I think Beth is the embodiment of that. I’m glad to know that the Windows Phone has Beth heading up its social networking. It’s going to be a better product because she’s involved.
19) Meeting up briefly with Christine Cea, Kristin Smith, and David Witt from WOMMA. Good to see strong representation from our group. And I heard that the session on the FTC was great, good job, Kristin.
20) The sneezing simulator in the P&G booth. I gotta get me one of those. Someone recommended filling it with something other than water, maybe using it at a party. Could be fun. But then, you’d have to be a guy to appreciate something that strange. But that’s the beauty of a Dad attending a show like BlogHer.
Thanks again to everyone i met, and everyone who helped make the event a success for us all! Can't wait until next year!
BlogHer is one of the biggest blogger conventions held every year. I remember when it was just a few hundred folks gathered to share ideas, but it's grown to more than 1,000 attendees, and lots of company reps, speakers, and even a handful of Dad bloggers. 
I'm looking forward to meeting a few of the BlogHims heading down: DaDaRocks, MochaDad, SmonkYou, TechyDad, DBinkowski, themuskrat, avitable, The_Daver, HockeyManDad, and any other guys headed to BlogHer in NYC.
Matt Moretti writes an interesting post on Engage:Moms, highlighting research done by Mom Central, about what other parents are planning when it comes to Summer Vacation.
Some highlights from Matt:
We recently spoke with nearly 1,200 Moms planning to take a family summer vacation this year, and asked them about their habits and preferences.
Those Who Fail to Plan, Plan to Fail
The Big (or Small) Elephant In The Room -- Budget
Where To Go and Where To Stay
A Vacation from Your Vacation -- How Long is Too Long?
Mariana Perez, blogging for Mom Central, and her own Riding With No Hands, brings up some good tips for applying for Passports before traveling with kids.
We just went through this a few months ago, before heading to Cancun with our family of six. With four kids needing passports, and with less than 6-8 weeks notice, we ended up paying rush charges on top of application fees. But other than the fact that it cost us $719.84 <gulp>, the process was somewhat painless.
We live in a small town, and both our local city center and the post office offered the application service and photos, and both cost the same amount. We asked about going to Seattle to do it in person, but we were told that the rush charge still would apply, and that they only do them in person (with an appointment) if your trip is within two weeks. In our case, it was about four weeks. We both took in all the kids to the city center, had our own ID, had pre-filled the forms we downloaded, had birth certificates in hand, and it was all done in about 30 minutes, including photos.
Here are some great tips from Mariana:
We had tons of fun celebrating at the Bellevue Family Fourth. Awesome performance by the Bellevue Philharmonic, and an amazing fireworks show made it worth the hour wait to get out of the parking garage in Bellevue.
I just spent a few days with the gang at Mom Central in their Boston offices, and I’ve become their biggest fan. And I enjoy following their community on Facebook, Twitter, and their own site.
I met Stacy DeBroff, the CEO and Head Mom, three years ago at a WOMMA conference. She impressed me with her charisma, her passion, and her creativity. We struck up a conversation about the Xbox, and we talked about the possibility of doing some outreach to moms around some of the cool kids games we had at the time. We never did engage their firm for one reason or another, but Stacy and I looked forward to meeting up at each WOMMA event.
At the recent WOMMA School of WOM, we had another brief chat. She mentioned that she was serious about growing their business, leveraging the great work her company is doing with moms. Since I was on sabbatical (that’s what I like to call the time since I left Xbox late last year), I called her in her Boston office, and she introduced me to the team, and invited me to visit. My calendar was light, so a few days later, I flew out to Boston to the world headquarters of Mom Central.
Initial reaction (besides the fact that there was a bit too much purple in the décor) was how professional the office was. And once introduced to the team, I loved how passionate each person there was about what they did. Like me, they really love working with real-live customers, in their case moms who have blogs, active community sites, or large followings on Twitter, Facebook, or in Mom forums.
Much of what Mom Central does so well are the same things that I got to do at Xbox, working with Tony, Chris, Nelson, and Sara. At Xbox, we got to talk about a variety of video games targeted to influential gamers, and Mom Central gets to talk to community influencers about a variety of consumer goods targeted to moms. With the experience I had building the Gamerscore team at Microsoft, I learned how important relationships are, how vital communication with your customers is, and how building trust between customers, community members, and employees of brands can be invaluable for everyone.
I leave Boston impressed with the caliber of people that Mom Central has, how they’re doing pioneering work in a way that works for the agency, for the community members, and for the brands they work with.
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