Paint October Pink!

Ahh I finally have time to sit and post a blog. I know it has been a while and maybe you think I have fallen off the face of the earth. I have been busy as usual, but in all honesty, I have been meaning to post a blog for weeks now, it has been on my to-do list but I kept getting tripped up on the title. Once I get a witty title, I'm usually pretty good on the post from then on.

I know we are well into the month of October now, like I said, I have been meaning to blog about this for a long time now. I'm sure you have noticed that October is Breast Cancer Awareness month and boy does Providence love supporting breast cancer awareness. Not this past weekend that just happened, but the weekend before was Providence's annual Flames of Hope, the Gloria Gemma Breast Cancer Waterfire. This is one of the largest events held in Providence every year and the Special Events Society plays a part in the production of the event. I had the honor of working behind the scenes during the torch processions, where hundreds of people who are either battling cancer currently, in remission for cancer, or any one who is caring for someone or who has lost someone to cancer carries a torch and walks down to the basin and lights the Waterfire. It is a really emotional ceremony, there were certain points where I got teary-eyed myself. Gloria Gemma weekend is a beautiful thing in Providence. The whole downtown turns pink, the State House is lit pink as well as a few other buildings for the month of October.

Next weekend, the President's Leadership Council will be participating in the Making Stride Against Breast Cancer Walk at Roger Williams Park. I am getting a really late start on fundraising. I set a goal of $100, a very manageable goal I think. I would really appreciate some support from all of you who follow my blog consistently. A small donation goes a long way. I am only asking $5. It's easy just click here!

It feels good to be blogging again. You will hear from me again shortly, I promise. Until next time...

So much to blog about, so little time.

Everyday I have thought of some great topic to blog about and then never find the time at night to ever post it. I can't believe it is Wednesday already and week 4 for that matter. Time flies. This past weekend was super busy one. I conducted PLC interviews, we had several UIB programs, as well as the Newport Mansions Food and Wine Festival with SES.

PLC 2010 Spring Banquet

Friday I had the opportunity to interview lots of great freshman for the President's Leadership Council. Johnson and Wales continues to raise the quality of students they are admitting so pretty much everyone we interviewed was fantastic and qualified. That made interviews very difficult because we had to cut some great students from the council. We have about 40 new additions to the council this year and I am very excited about the council this year. It is easy to get bogged down by the culture of students here at Johnson and Wales. There is such a dramatic difference in students here, there is one group where JWU is there dream school and they are here to succeed and another group of students who have wealthy families and that can buy them into a college degree even if they forgot to take their SAT's. It is refreshing to get together with a group of students who are elite and all here for the right reason and that is PLC. Honestly PLC saved me from this school. I hated it here until I got involved with the council. We interviewed so many students who were just so passionate about their major whether it was culinary, baking and pastry, or international travel and tourism, even criminal justice. I enjoyed hearing what their most favorite thing about JWU so far and what they thought there was still room for improvements on. So refreshing.

4 out of 7 UIB Eboard Members

I love my UIB family. Our E-board this year is incredible, we all get along. I enjoy all of the time I put into it. This weekend a few of us actually got a chance to hang out outside of UIB events and went to Waterfire together. We found a spot on the grassy hill overlooking the water basin at Waterplace, it was so fun to just hang out with people and relax outside. We had awesome weather this weekend, perfect 74 degrees ( my absolute favorite).

Marble House
 Newport, RI

Sunday Rae and I volunteered at the Newport Mansions Food and Wine Festival with the Special Events Society. Coincidently, Sharon, our friend we made at the Life is Good Festival was in charge of the kitchen pavilion we were scheduled to work at. What a great contact we made, I guess that's a huge part of SES: networking. It was so fun, we assisted in wine pouring and serving samples. I cannot stress how great volunteering for events is. I get experience, behind the scenes access, free admissions to events I would probably never get to go to, and we get free food and swag. Love it.

So on top of all of my extracurricular activities, I still have school work. School has not been my number one focus lately and it is starting to catch up with me. I am not doing A quality work for my classes and I need to step it up. I am so glad I got some time to squeeze in a blog post, but there is probably some homework I could be working on since we don't have a tour today and I'm sitting in the cubicle knocking out my Hulu playlist. Until next time...

Life is good, BUSY, but good.

I can already tell my second year of college is going to fly by. It's already Friday!? This past week was pretty routine, but it started off with Rae, Mattie, and I volunteering at the Life is good. Festival in Canton, MA. It was such a great experience. It was a rough start but when we finally got from the volunteer parking lot to the actual festival grounds and after our first assignment at bocce ball, it was so much fun. Have you ever played bocce ball before? Enough said. Mattie and I took the first opportunity to move and went over to the watermelon seed spitting contest. It was quite entertaining to watch parents watch their kids try and spit the seeds and then the parents dying to try after them. The entire festival was to benefit the Life is good foundation for kids. There were so many families there as well as a great artist line up for the 3 stages. After spending a few hours watching people spit seeds, it was time to move on. While attempting to take a break and enjoy the festival, Mattie and I stumbled across the kid's drink bar and it was crazy. It was in the middle of a shift transition and busy as can be. Mattie and I stepped right in to help. We spent basically the remainder of our volunteering at the kid's bar making fresh squeezed lemonades and frozen fruit drinks. After the kid's bar shut down we scarfed down pulled pork sandwiches, sweet potatoe fries, and sweet tea before heading over to help at the real bar. Funny story on Rae's blog  about us trying to sell beer. We only served a few beers, realized we were in the way and went and enjoyed the Jason Mraz concert. So awesome! 12 hours working on our feet, rainy weather, and being short staffed still equaled a great day. It's funny how when you work a music festival, although there is a great musical line up, you're not terribly disappointed about missing the concert because you're working the event. There were a couple more acts I would have loved to see like Guster, Ok Go!, Brett Dennan, and Corrine Bailey Rae but I missed them because I was working and I was not heartbroken. Now if I miss Jason, I probably would have been more upset.

Monday was our PLC meet and greet. Met some awesome freshmen. Applications are due today and interviews are next Friday! Tuesday I had my first student government meeting with the house of reps. Not bad, it's gonna be a good year in SGA I think, hopefully there will be some changes. Being a representative, we deal with appropriations for other clubs and orgs.We had another successful UIB meeting Wednesday night. Thursday we had our first College Republican meeting. We were expecting more people, we had 6, but that's better than before. Rae and I have big plans to turn JWU CR's around, hopefully it'll be a good year with them as well, considering it being an election year. This morning I took care of some UIB business and fulfilled some of my office hours before heading to the admissions office for work. Phew....I'm exhausted. 

Until next time...