On Wednesday, I met with Donna Cutting, author of The Celebrity Experience: Insider Secrets to Delivering Red Carpet Customer Service at Maggianos, one of my favorite restaurants. It was the first time for Donna to dine at Maggianos and I think I successfully converted her into a Maggianos junkie. 
Last night, I headed out to Lake Shore Drive for the Girls Night Out event sponsored by Wendy Piersall from Sparkplugging; Epson and One2One Network. I wasn’t sure if an interpreter was going to show up as the agency never received my email request and then struggled at the last minute to try and find someone. As it turned out, there was no interpreter, but I managed to make it through the evening firing up the lipreading skills. Everyone was friendly and most were easy to understand. Liz Strauss and I had a moment where I couldn’t lipread a thing she said and she resorted to some creative fingerspelling to help me out. I chatted with Barbara Rozgonyi and convinced Deb DiSandro of the benefits of Twitter. As I moved around the room, I discovered that several of the writers from the Chicago Moms Blog and Fifty-Something Moms Blog were scattered here and there. We all gathered together for a picture:
It was a nice evening connecting to all these cool gals and being able to talk about blogging and the business of writing. I left with some great swag–now I no longer envy those who went to BlogHer.
(left to right: Wendy Piersall, Liz Strauss, Moi, Barbara Rozgonyi)
Last, but not least, today’s a special day. My middle kiddo is now a bona-fide, certified teenager. Happy Birthday, Lauren!
