Denver - Conference

I went to Denver for a few days for a work conference. I had to go to lots of classes and didn't get as much free time as I wanted to have...but I did have a GREAT visit with Deanna {my dad's sister} and her husband Brad.

We stayed at a nice hotel right off of the 16th street mall {which is pretty cool}.

We eat at an AMAZING restaurant, Sam's No. 3, it was featured on The Food Network and it was the best mexican food I've had since Mi Ranchitos.

I did keep up with my running, even though I had to run late at night on the dreadmill....I ran at least 2 miles every day.

On the last day, we talked around down by the river and it was beautiful. We also rode on a little trolley and took a tour of some of the downtown area.  I'm glad we got to do a few things besides just working the whole time.

Miami Beach, Florida {HDV Conference}

I spent most of this week at a work conference in Miami Beach, Florida. It was AMAZING! We learned a LOT at the conference and we had a GREAT time being in Miami. We arrived Tuesday afternoon to this BEAUTIFUL, AMAZING hotel. {It was like nothing I've ever seen in my life, this is only ONE of FOUR towers!}

This was my room, seriously SO nice, complete with a mac computer and a TV in the bathroom!!

We spent some time at the opening meeting, but it was a cocktail party so it wasn't really our thing....we left and went to the pool and the beach....it was BEAUTIFUL!!

The days were spent in meetings, but we had lots of plans for the evenings...the first night we took a cab to South Beach {my first cab ride, and yes, it was a little scary}. We took a little walking tour of the Art Deco section.

We found a cute little streetside cafe where they actually had DIET COKE. {nowhere in Miami had Diet Coke, only Diet Pepsi which I don't like!} I got one but I might not have if I had known it was going to be $4.50 {at least I got free refills}.

We had the most AMAZING Food all week long....I seriously gained 5lbs. being there, it was SO SO good! {and all prepared for you and fancy, I haven't cooked a meal since last Sunday and it's been so nice}

Yes, I bought a diet coke at Walgreens and brought it with me to dinner...and those shrimp were as big as my palm!

There were fancy cars parked in the entrance every time we went outside, I thought Jason would like these all lined up! {he did and he wants the black one}

The inside of the hotel was spectacular....with so many awesome details.

Just before dinner on the last night, I wanted to walk down to the beach to take a few pictures with my good camera....it was beautiful. The waves were so fun to watch and it was such a beautiful night, although it was really humid.

I was just thinking it was time to go back when I saw a man and his wife sitting on the beach chairs with 2 large DSL cameras, I figured they would know how to take a decent picture of me on the beach so I asked him if he would be willing take a "snapshot" of me on the beach....he proceeded to take about 100 of them while telling me how to pose and where to look. It was pretty funny, but I ended up with several cute pictures of me in the water. {I wish now that I had taken off my cover up, oh well}.

I did not anticipate that large wave hitting me, I almost fell over!!

I had to hurry and change for the fancy dinner. It was supposed to be a pool party, but there was some threat of bad weather {and it was really humid} so they moved it indoors. It was such a fun night. The band was AMAZING...they played such great songs and they played for almost 2 straight hours without missing a beat between songs. We danced the night away {and hopefully burned a few calories}.

Just to prove that I was really at dinner with my work group and not the photographer! ;)

After dinner we went our separate ways, but it wasn't long before everyone was texting each other to see what was going on with the Miami Heat game. {game 7 of the NBA finals} We decided to meet in the foyer of the hotel to see if there was a party going on....we got there with about 5 minutes left in the game and the Heat were ahead....we decided to stay and watch the end....they WON and everyone went crazy for a little while....we had overheard that the players MIGHT come to our hotel to go to the private exclusive club {LIV} for the after party so we were hanging out for a while to see what was happening. All that was happening was a LOT of skin and not much clothing! It was disgusting to watch!

Finallly about 1am we gave up and went to bed....we left a large scene who probably stayed up all night!!

Our trip home was an adventure...I don't have any pictures, but we had a medical emergency on the flight and I don't believe there was ANY coincidence that there was a cardiologist sitting right behind me {and the woman was having heart problems}, we were almost diverted but he was able to get everything under control. We also got on the wrong shuttle bus after we landed at O'Hare and took a little detour on the PACE bus system, then had to wait for another bus to pick us up and take us back the get on the correct shuttle bus {at least the driver was nice enough to give us the rides for free}....I guess that is what you get when you only get 3 hours of sleep because you are having too much fun!

Now, it's time to put all the stuff we learned to good use!