“Why am I crying again?” I hear someone behind me whisper as all of us are in a room listening to yet another inspiring and tear-jerking panel of speakers at the Real Simple Weekend conference in La Jolla. I don’t know if I should really call it a conference or maybe it was more of an invitation to dream. So many of us saw a link, or a fleeting post somewhere, a page in the magazine and thought “why not” and signed up for a weekend away in California at a beautiful resort to learn from the editors and writers of a magazine that has been a fixture in so many of our homes for years.
Please let it be in October again….
Maybe that’s why I signed up too. September is so busy in our house with my kids’ back to school schedules and sports. And my husband’s work is busy in this season too. Getting away to somewhere sunny from Seattle in October is also so important before the Big Dark season hits in November. I remember a few years ago, there was so much rain and dark in November, a lot of us were feeling incredibly sad. A weekend away with Real Simple Magazine to be inspired by panels of designers, or learn how to make a cheese plate or ask questions about our skin, just seemed a few steps beyond effortless and felt so intriguing at the same time.
Can you go to the Real Simple weekend alone?
And I thought this would be a type of solo travel trip for me. Now that it’s happened I know a lot of women at this weekend were also solo travelers. But I panicked last minute. I was immuno-supressed for a while at the time and I worried that I might not be able to handle it if I got sick and was alone. I mentioned to my mom that maybe she might want to spend a weekend in La Jolla with me. And then I realized she might also want to come along to part of the conference too. So I signed her up for the one day so she would still have time to paint (she picked up painting in 2020 and has become quite the artist) and wander around La Jolla alone like she planned but then she could also come along with me as well. It’s really nice that this conference had a flexible schedule that allowed people to do the weekend however they could make it work. Many locals came for just the day. But there were so many people at this weekend from all over the United States and a few from Canada like my mom as well. We met so many lovely women at the Real Simple weekend. I think we all came away feeling connected to one another and to the magazine as well.
I was really excited about the book talk part of this conference and we all received her book “What we Kept to Ourselves” as part of our gift bag. It was so fascinating to find out that the author Nancy Joyoun Kim had a similar story to my mom’s experience growing up in Canada. And we sat in her book talk for lunch and it was one of our favorite parts of the weekend.
I have also been following along with Jena Helwig the Real Simple’s Food editor’s instagram feed for a while so it was nice to be able to say hello during her cheese talk at the conference too. This was such a unique way to see the pages of the magazine come to life being able to interact with so many people who create the articles we read. We learned some great skin tips at a panel on beauty and skin and we received some Burt’s Bees facial oil in our gift bags that I have been using almost daily. And the party on the last night was really fun with music, dancing and food in a beautiful outdoor garden courtyard. There were so many memorable parts to this weekend.
Did I mention all the stuff we brought home from the Real Simple Weekend?
I imagine this was the most fabulous gift bag at a conference we’ll ever see-it was filled with books and treats and skin products. It was so heavy we had to check our bags coming home. I also had so many pictures in my phone-what a delightful weekend away.
And now I think we’re all waiting to hear when and where the next Real Simple Weekend will be.
Terumi Pong is a Seattle-based family travel writer and mom of twin teenage boys. She loves coffee and pastries, shopping local and looking for greener ways to live. She is also known as Scout’s mom (Scout is a 5ish pound little black yorkie-poo)