March 6, 2011

Growing Up

How crazy is it that when I attended my 2 year old nephew’s birthday bash this weekend, my uncle showed me this image of me and my cousins from back in the day? Can you guess which one is me? To put it into perspective, it was for the birthday of my cousin’s baby boy (the happy girl in the back). Makes you stop for a minute to think about how fast time passes us by and I realize once again how thankful I am for my tight-knit family. Every time we get together, there’s always something new to gossip or talk about. Today in particular we were sharing some of our “fortunes” that were given as a few of our parents went to visit a “psychic”. I’m heavy on the air bunnies as I’m a non-believer, but when you hear things about yourself, you can’t help but be curious. I can certainly relate to a few of the things that were said, but some news was just absolutely ridiculous. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens.

In other recent news, it’s been a busy few weeks! Some of the highlights…

Seeing Adele LIVE at MTV Canada! Now that it’s passed, I can finally speak of it. MTV hosted a free concert and sent out an email blast asking people if they’d be interested in a mini-concert with Adele and a live interview. Uh, hello?! Before I even fully finished reading the email, I responded and lo and behold, waited an hour outside the doors to get let in and it was the best experience ever. Sucks to be me that day as I left my camera battery at home, but nothing can beat being in an intimate venue and seeing Adele up close. Such a fan! You can catch the show on TV on March 16th.

Kicking off Mon Sheong Trip to China 2011! So excited to be working with such a talented group of people for a really great initiative this year (few of the amazing people shown here). I’ll be co-chairing a Trip to China taking place later this year, bringing 20 Chinese Canadian citizens over to China to discover themselves through cultural experiences, build international connections with businesses and fellow students, and act upon the values of the Mon Sheong Foundation. I’ve never been to China and I’ve already been learning so much from the process of planning so far. Not to mention the team we are working with are an amazing group of people and I can’t wait to reap the final rewards once we’re in China and can enjoy the trip! I’ll be blogging and tweeting (#t2c2011) a lot more so stay tuned. For deets on how you can sign up to be one of the lucky 20, send me a note or leave a comment!

I had sashimi and I liked it… sorta

As one of my 2011 goals, I decided that I would tackle my fear of seafood once and for all. Proud to update that I’ve had the chance to try out the following (and fully swallow, without gagging):

  • lobster
  • fish
  • calamari
  • shrimp
  • crab (so difficult to eat!!!)
  • scallops
  • oyster
  • abalone
  • and of course, as depicted above, sashimi

What a world I’ve opened up myself to… :)

June 10, 2010

If I had 5 minutes with Kelly Cutrone …

If you haven’t already seen my blogpost from last night raving at how genuine and awesome Kelly is in person (see post below), here’s another one! Following the show, Kelly stayed behind to answer questions from the audience and take pictures. She was great about the crowd hoarding around her and was chill about everything. In the 30 second interaction I had with her, I had an opportunity to ask her one question but I would do it all over again if I had the chance.

You know that feeling you have when you have a million questions or things that come up to mind after the fact? Exactly how I’m feeling this morning.

So if I had 5 minutes with Kelly Cutrone, I would ask her:

- How long did it take you before you started People’s Revolution? How has your career path been so far leading to where you are today?

- Did you always know you wanted to be in Fashion PR?

- Are the cameras distracting from people’s work at People’s Revolution?

- What was the inspiration behind the name of your company?

- How has your life changed after being on The Hills/The City?

- Do you still stay in touch with Lauren Conrad?

Love!

June 9, 2010

Start of Something New

There is so much I want to say about the past four weeks; I don’t think there are words that can capture it all. Started the life of a working career woman, and I have to say I have been loving every single moment of it. It all seems to make so much sense now! All these years of questioning what profession I’m going to fall in, where I’m going to go after university, I never really had much direction to be honest. I became quite involved during my university days to give everything a try and so much of what I’ve given in volunteer hours have come back tenfold in the number of opportunities and amazing people that have crossed my path. And now I am certain that this is exactly where I want to be, constantly learning and challenging myself to continuously grow. There is still so much that I don’t know.

Over the last weekend, I participated in Edelman Toronto’s Little Give, a 48 hour charity initiative supporting 10 local charities and non-profit organizations. It was intense, it was fun, and it was emotional (in a good way!). It was an amazing opportunity to work with people from all different practices that I would never have had the chance to work with before. I was teamed up with Second Harvest, a charity that rescues perishable food and donates it to approximately 250 social services in the GTA. From an initial meeting with them, we were given an ask which became our mission to complete in a matter of 2 days. I was really impressed with how creative and different each teams’ asks were and how everyone went about helping our partners. In the end, Edelman raised $75k in cash, donated services and time from an initial donation of $25k. Amazing! I was also given the opportunity to write up a quick blog post summing up the event to be posted on the global digital site. Check it out here for more details!

The Lean Mean & Green Team!

As much as I enjoy trying to make a difference at work everyday, trying also to make sure I instill a good worklife balance. Today I went down to MTV to catch the MTV Live & MTV Aftershow for one of my favourite shows, The City. Would totally recommend anyone who’s a fan of The Hills or The City to attend the Aftershow. It’s free to attend, and all you have to bring is enthusiasm and tons of excitement so you can cheer your heads off. The Hills tapes usually every Tuesday night and you should be there on Wednesday nights if you want to watch The City. They also often have giveaways! Tonight they gave away $100 gift certificate to Beyond the Rack; the last time I went I won the last half of Season 5 of The Hills – last season ever with Lauren Conrad! We received VIP treatment, got seated in the front rows and were SO EXCITED to see Kelly Cutrone appear as a special guest! She was absolutely entertaining and was extremely friendly, answering questions from the audience and taking the time to take photos with all of the guests afterward. Thank you Kelly for making our night!

Jessi & Dan with Kelly!

Us with Kelly!