The next morning we got up super early so we could be on the road to Phoenix by 6:00. Phoenix is about an hour and a half from Camp Verde but it took us just over 2 hours to get to the convention center downtown where the conference was. We spent the whole morning at the conference going to different lectures and seeing the exhibits that some vendors had set up. They had a ton of different lectures going on every hour, each about a different science subject, so we got to choose what we wanted to see. Many of the lectures also included free stuff. We got free lesson plans, a bunch of DVDs to use in the classroom, and lots of cool ideas for teaching biology. After every lecture there was a half hour break when we got to go and walk around and see what these different vendors were selling and advertising. They had all these companies that do labs, activities, lesson plans, sell textbooks, etc. Anything related to science education you could think of was there. They also gave out a lot of free stuff :) Something really great happened while we were visiting the exhibits. A small group of us were walking around and I noticed Kiptyn Locke standing there at a booth. Kiptyn was on The Bachelorette and then the Bachelor Pad, and I have been a huge fan of his! On Bachelor pad he met his current girlfriend, Tenley, and they have been together ever since...so cute :) Anyway, my friend Kandace and I decided we had to go talk to Kiptyn and take a picture with him so we did. We probably looked so silly, all smiley and giggly cause we were so excited to see him. It turns out he was there representing a company his dad started, which does online labs. He was super nice and let us talk to him for a few minutes and take a picture:
He is such a nice looking human. Our friend Steven was nice enough to take the picture for us, but of course he made fun of us afterward :)
At noon we walked across the street from the convention center to an outdoor mall for lunch. We went to this awesome southwest style restaurant and were once again very happy with the food. It was so good! After lunch we spent the rest of the day at the conference going to more lectures, talking to vendors, and getting free stuff (I even got a bird feeder haha!). Kandace and I walked past Kiptyn another time and he waved to us and called us over to talk to him. He said he needed advice and asked us to help him pick out a dress for Tenley to wear on TV for some Christmas charity thing she's doing. He pulled out his phone and showed us some pictures she had sent him of her wearing the dresses and we told him which one we liked best. He said he would tell her and let her know we helped him :) We were of course very happy, it was so great. It was definitely something I'd have a dream about but never would have thought would actually happen in real life!
Here is a picture of all of us at the conference (sadly it turned out kinda blurry):
After a very long day, we headed back to Camp Verde at about 6:00. We went to dinner that night at a local western style restaurant and were, of course, very happy with it! It was a cute little restaurant with a live country band and western dancing where there were old people dancing with each other. It was great food and great entertainment!
After dinner a small group of us went to a casino owned by some Native American tribe that was near our hotel. We played a few slots, went to a club that had this funny Rastafarian band playing, and went cosmic bowling. It was so much fun!
The next morning we got up and made the long drive back to Cedar. It was definitely the best field trip ever, we all had an awesome time!
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