Trademark Expo for families

The United States Patent and Trademark Office hosts a trademark expo every year.  It's a family event and is just filled with booths to help people understand trademarks better.  Does that sound boring?  Well, it was actually VERY interesting and SUPER fun :)  I learned a lot.  The most interesting, yet disturbing, thing I learned was a booth about illegal products.  So all the fake stuff that people make to look like the real deal.  I couldn't tell the difference with most of the products, even with them side by side.  They looked exactly the same.  I had the questions in my mind, "Of course I don't want to buy something illegal, but I wonder if the product's quality is that much worse than the real thing...because if it's way cheaper, why not buy the illegal thing."  Bad way of thinking, it was just a though that I had for a moment.  And then we chatted with this man about the perfume.  Ready to be grossed out?  They distribute the real perfume into 15 bottles or so and then fill the remaining space in the bottle with urine.  I guess that it brings out the perfume smell more so it lasts longer and is stronger.  YUCK.  So if you see perfume for an outrageously cheap price, don't even think about it, it's probably illegal and is full of yuckiness.   

Okay, sorry I shared that story, but I hope it helps anyone if they are tempted to buy too cheap of perfume.  

It was actually really fun and we got lots of free stuff.  And we got pictures with all the cool characters going around.  Nate was terrified of them.

The Geico gecko

He thought this was the coolest thing EVER

Of course I took a picture with Barbie

Mr. Crayon

Bob the Builder

We had our stroller so we used the elevator.  Well, we rode an elevator with the 5-hour Energy man (he's in the back), the Cheeto cheetah guy, and the Idaho spud man.  Now that doesn't happen every day.

Steve's favorite