South Carolina Primary

Our little weekend adventure to campaign for Mitt Romney in South Carolina was just that...and adventure! It started at 6:00 Thursday night when two of the girls went to pick up the rented van that would transport seven of twelve friends to Columbia, South Carolina. They got lost...in DC! Haha it was a great start to the trip. We ended up leaving two hours later than we had planned. We only stopped twice during the 7-hour drive, once in Virginia and once in South Carolina before Charlston. I navigated the whole trip, thanks to the guidance of the iPhone I got from my wonderful parents for Christmas! We arrived at the Marriott in Columbia at about 4:00 in the morning. I got to sleep on the chair because it was nine girls to two rooms. It was actually quite comfortable (more so than the chairs I slept on in Florida!). Our room connected to the other girls room so we brought in their chair to make a nice Brielle-size bed. We were up at 8:30 the next morning to start campaining. When we showed up at headquarters, they sent us straight to the rally in Lexington. This was the first time I met Mitt Romney. It was so much fun, and he gave a great speech! He really knows what this country needs and how to fix it. I shook his hand, and held back because I was satisfied. I suddenly found myself pushed to the front of the crowd, and before I knew it, I was getting my picture taken with him! It was so cool, and I was very excited. The rest of that day was spent knocking on doors. We had to put fliers on cars at a circus, then take them ALL off because the police got mad at us. That night we went hot tubbing at our hotel, which was SO nice!!
The next day we were up early to drive an hour and a half to the rally in Greenville. We were on the sides of the streets for a while holding signs in the rain. Mitt and Newt Gingrich scheduled an event at the same time, same place so Mitt came early and Newt came late. We got to shake Mitt's hand again, and we stayed for Newt and chanted "President Romney". He is a short little guy, about my height. He went to shake my hand but noticed I was holding a Romney sign and wearing a Romney shirt so he just waved. It was awkward haha. I don't think he is a pleasant man at all. Then it was back to HQ in Columbia for us. We spent that day holding signs and making calls. After the election was over we got to go to what is called an "election party". That is where Mitt gave his concession speech and the magic happened. We got there an hour early, and one of the campaign workers recognized us from the rallies. She had us pump up the crowd, which we did. That is what you can see in all of the clips on Facebook. That is also when my picture was taken for the New York Times. It is so weird to see that big of a picture of me, of all people, in the NY Times. I don't really like the picture, but my name isn't on it so that is good. Still kinda fun though. Mitt's speech was great, and I finally got to introduce myself. We also got to meet Ann Romney, who is such a sweet lady. After the party we went to a southern tavern for dinner, which was fun. We had a lot of people talk to us about the election. I ordered pasta, which was dumb and it wasn't even good, but I had a bite of my friend's steak and it was delicious! That night we stayed in North Carolina at one of the guys' relatives. Then we headed home. It was fun but it is good to be back!!