A BIG THANK YOU TO GENERAL MILLS!

I can't even begin to tell you how much I learned when I went to Minnesota. All really great! All except when I learned that I was just a mere hour from Brooke Oldroyd. A dear friend of mine that I have never met! Weird huh?! Well, she is amazing! Sweet Carrie (whom I love dearly and miss desperately) introduced us through the blogging world. One day we will meet Brooke, not that it matters, meeting or not I love her dearly, just one day it will all be even better. It coulda been last week DANG IT! Ok, I have to think about something else! It makes me sad.

SO, I will give you a super quick tour of the fun we had.

Look who was hangin around! I got the finger wag from Lucky when I admitted that I liked Trix the most. Sorry Lucky, just do. Nothing you and your whole grains can do about it!

This was the sign that greeted us. We all got a pretty big kick out of it! I do have to say that I WAS among the most influential bloggers (CRAP! SHALISE! I just remembered that I promised you a lesson on couponing and I haven't done it yet! I AM SO SORRY! Let's talk Ryan into firing me so I can do the important stuff, shall we?! Alright back to it) As I was saying, I WAS among the most influential bloggers. They were so great! They taught me so much for the up and coming release of my new blog (more to come).

General Mills selected about 50 bloggers out of over 2,000 by pouring through our blogs. How I ended up there seemed a mystery, but I was SO grateful for the opportunity!

Not to mention my chance at this.....
Oh the Box Top Booth! I figured out that the trick was to kick the box tops up off the floor. I ended up with 53! Pretty sweet! Jake was LOVIN me for that one! He is the Box Top king around here!

This is my cute friend CLAIR (click her name to see her amazing blog). She was amazing! I loved getting to know her. I am sure I annoyed her with my intent listening as she said her name with her cute London accent, hopefully she has forgiven me! :)

This is JENNY from Picky-Palate. LOVE HER! She is really one of the nicest people I have met!

One of the highlights of the trip was the photography studios. However, these signs plastered all the way down the hallway to get there made me feel a little home sick. YIKES! Look at the size of that twister! I take it back Minneapolis! You may be one of the prettiest cities I have ever been to, I may have even considered relocating to you, but then you inspire signs like this and it's over! I MEAN IT! Sun Valley is a pretty little town. I will stay put, thank you very much!

Ah, the photography studios! So pretty! So inspiring!

One thing that I LOVED about General Mills is that everywhere you go there is art lining the hallways! I LOVE that they understand the need to inspire creativity. If you are ever looking for a job, General Mills is where you want to go! That building is amazing! On site day care, gym, hair salon, gas station and auto shop, restaurants, etc. They know how to keep employees happy and happy employees are creative employees and that is GOOD!

More of the fun hallways.

This lady is the "Food Artist" she bakes the brownies, cake, pie, muffins, whatever for the shoots. The pictures are all of the food she makes. She taught us a lot about lighting, enhancing, angles, cuts, etc. It was great! Here she is teaching us about ALWAYS taking pictures of proper portion sizes. She had some pretty sweet tricks for easy measurement and portion control.

Um, could someone send me one of these?! Thank you! I almost licked this picture right off the wall!

Now, I am going to lovingly remind you to enter the giveaway below and then I am going to scoot your little bums in the direction of BAKERELLA. Have you checked her blog out yet? You should! She bakes like no other, but she is SUPER creative and that is what I love about her. That and she is just as sweet as her "cowgirl cookies"! (Keep your peepers open for lil' ole me. Thanks for that Angie!) There is so much more there for you to see, and all done in flawless BAKERELLA style!