This week, I find myself thinking about who I am, about what I want to do, and about my impact on the world. The reason these questions are in my mind is largely due to the Women’s Conference which I attended last week. The Women’s Conference is a day event organized by California First Lady Maria Shriver and Governor Arnold Schwarzengger. The Women’s Conference has to be one of the most amazing events put together for women. 14,000 women come together to be inspired, be empowered and be educated in how we can be Architects of Change in our own lives, in our communities (even online) and around the world.

The conference kicked off Tuesday night with Night at the Village. The Night at the Village is setup to give women entrance into the 160,000 square foot Long Beach Convention Center exhibit hall. The hall was packed with vendors, book signings, health screenings, and ways to volunteer for your community. The Night at the Village also featured experts with advice on beauty, cooking, and fitness. Raychael Ray and actress Valerie Bertinelli spoke along with Jillian Michaels who’s fitness game for the Wii comes out this week.

“Every year, women tell us they would love more time at the conference to just be and more tickets to the conference to be with more of their friends, ” said Shriver. “Since we now reach capacity so quickly for the Women’s Conference, we believed that adding an event like Night at the Village was the perfect solution.”

Fighting against LA traffic, I did arrive about two hours after the event started. The unfortunate part of that is I missed all the night speakers. So instead, I chose to work the floor. In fact most of my pictures from the event came from the Night at the Village. The next day, was too busy attending talk sessions to spend much time on the showroom floor. Walking in, I was surprised at the scale of the event. The room is packed of women and packed of vendors and companies there to talk to women. Dove showcased their Love your body slogan and donated $1 for every signature on their wall. Of course I had to put GamingAngels.com on it. Lean Cuisine had taken mirrors and placed slogans about loving oneself on them. They also were giving away necklaces that you can attach a gem that showcased what you were looking for in life. The Red/One campaign was there to inform and selling $10 shirts made by women in Africa. Drugstore, CVS was giving flu shots and analyzing people’s skin. Turns out my skin is pretty healthy. While Walgreens and a Women’s Health Center were conducting health analysis. This included BMI check, bone density check , cholesterol and blood pressure. The health areas were very crowded, but rightfully so. I found out for the first time that I am at moderate risk for Osteoporosis, and am now starting to take Calcium tablets. My blood pressure was high, but I think that is more from the excitement of the event.

Over at the Nintendo booth, women crowded the booth having fun trying out Wii Fit, Wii Music, and various DS games. These women were laughing and having a blast as they challenged their friends to beat their Hula Hoop score. It was amazing to watch and really helped reinforce what Nintendo has accomplished over the past few years. While we hardcore gamers might be wary of the casual nature of the Wii and DS, watching these women that probably never played a video game before laughing and having fun playing enforces that what Nintendo is doing is right. They are expanding gaming for everyone. Not only for fun either. At the conference they showcased a title for the DS that featured various recipes and assisted you in cooking. As I went through the recipe, the voice read aloud what the next step was and moved along with me. It’s what I would call a useful application for my DS. Perhaps with that, I might actually enjoy cooking since my biggest problem with cooking right now is not knowing recipes. I did get into the action with a hands-on of Wii Music. Unfortunately the Nintendo songs were not unlocked yet, so our choices were a bit slim. The Nintendo rep and I settled on a Monkey’s song. I was ready to play my xylophones. For each of the instruments, you do play with the Wii-Remote and Nunchuk a bit differently. Also some instruments are easier to play than others. The song was fun to play, but I’m definitely left with the feeling that this title is more for the families than individuals that are looking for an alternative to Rock Band or Guitar Hero. While at the Nintendo Booth, Reggie Fils-Aimé and Cammie Dunaway were playing and meeting with women in the booth. I caught the video below of Reggie playing the skiing exercise in Wii Fit. Even though they were busy, Nintendo’s Cammie Dunaway took a few moments to talk about the Women’s Conference and the Wii.

While wondering the hall, I found this great program called Step Up. It’s a volunteer program where you mentor a teenager, and they find you a professional mentor. A professional mentor can be crucial to helping you figure out your place in the professional world and this is a great way to give and receive something in return.

The night wasn’t all business and charity. I couldn’t resist the lure to shop. The first thing I bought was a t-shirt from a company that is about positive messages. The shirt says I luv who I am, and has angel wings on it, so I knew I had to purchase it. Then came the booths with expensive purses. I walked past those because I couldn’t afford it. One booth was re-selling designer purses, and I didn’t see one under $1000, yet that booth was full of women buying. Who says there is a problem with our economy? I also purchased a 100% Cashmere scarf because the vendor was selling them for $10. Does it get cold enough in Southern California to wear a scarf? Sometimes, but either way at least it didn’t cost me much. Another merchant option that was popular was jewelry. The jewelry booths were packed of women picking out various sparkly items. In one island, there were women vendors who went though a program setup by Maria Shriver to help them start a business. All the women are from low-income backgrounds and are trying to build a business to better themselves. In this area, you saw some of the more creative things to buy and it was a great feeling to see these women achieve their dreams.

All too soon, they announced that the rooms were closing. I left the Night at the Village with various swag, and a warm feeling in my heart. After seeing and speaking with some amazing women that night I could not wait to see what the full day would bring.

My write up of the Women’s Conference 2008 will be up later in the week.

Here is a link to my pictures from the Conference on Flickr:

www.flickr.com GamingAngel’s Women’s Conference 2008 photoset