Healthy Living Summit 2012 Recap, Part 2

If you missed my part 1 recap, please check that out first!

When I last left off, the official conference sessions were about to start. You can see the full Healthy Living Summit agenda on their website to see what was covered, but I’ll be sharing highlights from the panel I was on, blogging with brands, tomorrow. A bunch of you asked to hear the information we shared so hopefully you’ll find it helpful if you’re a blogger looking to work with brands more often! In addition to our panel, I also attended a great photography session led by Gretchen and a cool panel on the gray areas/hot topics of blogging.

After the sessions were over, a bunch of us got together in Meghann’s room to enjoy some wine and champagne and socialize. We had a fun group!

Roomie love! Me, Theodora, Ashley, & Gretchen:

Photo via Theodora

And then it was off to EVOO for a fun Chobani-sponsored dinner.

You guys know I love Chobani and I was honored to attend the dinner with them! They invited a group of about 18 bloggers to join them for a complimentary dinner, featuring dishes made using their yogurt. Sounded good to me! The chef came out to speak to us after the dinner and said they had fun trying to incorporate yogurt in a tasty way into all the dishes. They did a great job of it — everything was amazing!

We all started with drinks and some unpictured cheese and bread. I had a glass of Prosecco — my fave.

The first course was delicious — a sort of modified tomato basil mozzarella with a yogurt gelee instead of mozzarella! Amazing combo and the tomatoes were so ripe and flavorful.

All the portions were small, which was nice because I didn’t leave feeling overly stuffed even though I ate all of nearly every course.

Next up was a lobster with vanilla yogurt sauce and a vegetable succotash. Also amazing!

Followed by a lamb loin with a yogurt sauce and crispy eggplant. Mmmm! Yogurt sauce with lamb is always a really good combination.

And finally, dessert! A nectarine basil crisp topped with berry frozen yogurt. The combination of nectarines and basil was SO good. I couldn’t eat this all (it was pretty big) but it was REALLY good!

Here I am with Theodora, Ashley, and Lauren:

Photo via Lauren

And here’s the whole group!

A big thank you again to Chobani for hosting all of us. It was great to meet a couple of the faces behind Chobani in person!

On Sunday morning, we were all up bright and early again for a group run! The conference ended with a group 5k — here’s a blurry group shot of those of us that made it out:

We all took it easy on the run and spent most of it chatting and checking out the scenery. It was a really pretty morning — nice and cool out!

After a conference sponsored breakfast (which was delicious)…

… I said goodbye to my blog friends and headed out to meet up with my college BFFs, Kris and Lu! Kris lives in Boston and Lu lives in the north shore area; since it was beautiful out we headed north to the shore to meet her up there. I love this area of the country — so pretty.

Kris and I had lunch with Lu and her family and then headed out to kayak! Lu’s family lives near the water and owns kayaks; her dad came out with us to help get us set up on them and out on the water. 🙂

It was a gorgeous day to be out on the water!

We ended up kayaking for about 2 hours, chatting away the whole time. Pretty sweet way to spend an afternoon. 🙂

After kayaking, we walked around town a little, spotted this beauty…

…ate some unpictured gelato, and got this fun picture of ourselves with my camera propped up on the hood of Kris’s car. I <3 these girls.

What a busy but fun weekend! I arrived back in DC at 11 p.m. on Sunday night and crashed straight into bed. 🙂

Stay tuned — tomorrow I’ll share my recap of our panel session and some tips for working with brands as a blogger!