NGS 2012 - Exhausted and Excited!

So much for my plan of blogging every night! I'm on the go from early morning until late in the evening and loving every minute of it! 

Day 1
Day one opening session was a fascinating look at a 1848 panoramic photo taken of Cincinnati. The presenter showed how today's technology was used to pick out details from the photo which you couldn't see in the original! It also gave us all taste of the history of Cincinnati. Very well done!

I followed up with a session on Researching Your War of 1812 Ancestor by Craig Roberts Scott. What I learned in this session is that people interested in the war will attend this session and most likely don't need the information presented. I'm a newbie to this research and I felt it! Those in the room knew much more than I did.  It felt like a clique I was not a part of...... I did buy some great books on the subject in the Exhibitors Hall however!

Next up was Using Excel to Create Timelines. The syllabus stated you didn't need prior Excel experience. However, I have taken multiple advanced Excel classes and I had trouble keeping up in my head!

My last session of day one was Military Bounty Lands: A Rich Resource by Rick Sayre. I was pleasantly surprised and happy that I talked myself into attending this session. ((I was gun shy after the mornings Military session)  Rick did a great job and I came away with great tips and ideas to further my bounty land research. In fact, prior to the session I visited the BLM Booth asking about land patents of my war of 1812 ancestor. The kind people at the booth were not able to locate it for me but after attending this session I found it on the BLM website myself!

We walked over to Fountain Square for dinner and ice cream at Graeters. All the hype about Graeters is so true! It was wonderful!

I ended the day by walking over with Margel to the bloggers meet up at the Hyatt. After a short visit with my fellow bloggers, I headed back to the room to get ready for Day 2. It will be an early one. first up is a session with Liz Kerstens. I'm looking forward to it!

What I learned:

Get to the session you want early. Once the seats were full you were out of luck. There was no sitting on the floor or standing in the back.

How I saved my pennies:

I ate breakfast in the room with food I brought from home and packed my lunch. I was able to refill my water bottle during the day from the water coolers provided. My big splurge was the ice cream and it was worth it!