Just when you thought my week long road trip might be coming to an end, I’ve got even more to share! I’ve already visited some amazing places like; Washington, D.C., Shenandoah National Park, The Great Smoky Mountains, Gatlinburg, TN, Nashville, Tennessee and now I can’t wait to tell you about the 2015 BlogPaws Conference.

If you’re unfamiliar with BlogPaws, it’s essentially a community of pet enthusiasts who write about and support pets via social media! Their annual conferences bring together hundreds of pet bloggers, pet enthusiasts, shelters, rescues, and brands for social media education, networking, and promoting.

I’m pretty much a newbie when it comes to BlogPaws, and I decided to attend this annual event for the first time after I found out I was a finalist for the Best Dog Blog and Best Pet Photo of 2015 in the Nose-to-Nose Awards.

Honestly I had no idea what to expect at this conference, and pretty much all I knew was that it was a pet friendly event, which meant I would be doing a whole lot of butt sniffing!

At first I was a little nervous when I entered the conference. There was a lot going on, tons of dogs, lots of chatter, and so so much to look at. But after about an hour I quickly realized this was a safe place to be and I was with MY KIND OF DOGS. (friendly, adventurous, and ready to sample lots and lots of treats).

To give you a little better idea of what a BlogPaws conference actually looks like, check out this video:

At 15 seconds in you can actually see me and my mom & dad walking around the BlogPaws vender area (bottom right corner).

The BlogPaws vender area was packed with brands that are interested in working with bloggers, and that’s good news for you, because it means I’ll hopefully be able to bring you even more fun product reviews & giveaways with some great new products in the coming months! Which P.S., if you’re ever interested in hearing my honest review about a product or brand or you’d love me to host a giveaway with them (so you could potentially win!) – just shoot them (or me) an e-mail and let them know about my blog!

I had a blast sampling products, and talking to companies about some of their new product lines.

While I’ve been to expos before, this was the liveliest one, and I couldn’t believe how much there was to see and do! And did I mention the swag? There were so many wonderful sponsors that donated products to the event, and I gotta send my thanks to them (because this was only a small potion of it)! And since I’m just one small dog, I will be donating many items to my local animal rescue!

One of the exciting things was getting the opportunity to attend some of the lectures and talks at BlogPaws. I have to say before this, I had never attended a lecture before, unless you count the times I visited an Elementary School.

While mom and dad were busy learning about SEO, monetization, pinterest marketing, and so much more, I was busy catching some Zzzz’s! Because honestly, all of it was a bit over my head. I’m much more the “talent” behind this blog anyway, and I was more than thrilled that mom and dad were there to take notes for me. Mom found some of the lectures very interesting and picked up some new skills she’ll be helping me apply to not only my blog, but my regular 9-5 business at the frame shop.

While the lectures were quite serious in nature, I made sure to liven them up some with a few of my silly tricks…..like playing dead! (It’s no fun to be serious all the time!)

Guess what, I wasn’t the only Dachshund with the silly’s there either! This is Fiona McSnuggles, a long haired sweetie who was actually blind and is a therapy dog just like me.

I also met Dolly the Doxie, a dachshund mix! Surprisingly (or maybe not so much) those were the only other dachshunds I spotted at BlogPaws.

I did however get to meet the infamous Prissy and Pop! They are celebrities on instagram, and even have jobs working as mascots in a first grade class. And yes, I’m super jealous that they are on summer break right now!

With all the excitement of the BlogPaws conference I made sure to take as many nap breaks as I could squeeze in, especially since my poor mom caught a nasty cold the day we left for our road trip adventure and spent most of the week trying her best to get through all the fun activities we had planned.

Speaking of fun, I became the recipient of my very own Busy Bee while at BlogPaws! If you’ve ever watched the movie Best in Show, then you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about when I say I was FREAKING OUT every time my Busy Bee from PetSafe (one of the sponsors of BlogPaws) got out of my sight! And if you haven’t watch the movie…do it….do it now!

After all the excitement of the week there was one last thing to do….attend the 2015 Nose-to-Nose awards! Of course I dressed to the nines since I was a finalist for Best Dog Blog and Best Pet Photo awards!

This was my first time walking a red carpet, and hopefully I worked it!

Here’s a group shot of most of the 2015 Nose-to-Nose Finalists. In case you didn’t get a chance to catch the live streaming event, you can watch the video here:

Sadly I did not take home any awards this year, but hey, I’m just honored to have been a finalist – my very first year too!

You know who did win though? My fellow dachshund adventurer blog, You Did What With Your Wiener? Congrats to Jessica, and I’m thrilled that dachshund adventure seekers are taking over the World! (well at least BlogPaws).

After 3 days of BlogPaws I was royally beat! I had so much fun, and hopefully I’ll get to attend again sometime soon (I’m thinking it may be an every few years event for me).

For now though it was time to make my trek back home to Pennsylvania where my ponies were anxiously awaiting my return!

And don’t worry, incase you were thinking this was the end of my adventures, I still have one more fun stop I made on the way home in Knoxville, Tennessee! Check back next week for the full details on my visit to the Sunsphere.

P.S. Don’t forget, for you local Pennsylvanians, I’ll be at the Ryerss Family Fun Day this Saturday from 12 – 4pm with my friend Minnow the famous Painting Pony. Hope you’ll stop by and meet me! I’ll be performing some of my favorite tricks too!