MDW

Memorial Day Weekend was a blast this year.  Crystal and her boyfriend OJ came to visit us Thursday – Monday and we had a blast!  Here was the itinerary of the weekend:

Thursday night: BBQ with our friends Tara and Justin, drinks at “That Bar” in Danville

Friday: Attempted Mt. Diablo (too foggy), decided to stroll around Walnut Creek, Cigar and wine tasting at Danville Cigar followed by drinks and dinner at Norm’s

Saturday: Spent the day in San Francisco w/lunch at Papalote (best burrito in SF, literally).  Crystal and OJ were able to have dinner with OJ’s family who live in our town ;)

Sunday: BBQ in Blackhawk with the Ellis’ and dinner at Maria Maria

Monday: C&OJ return home

Shout out on the GB Blog!

I periodically check up on the Glassybaby blog and noticed I was featured in the latest entry!  When I paid a visit to the Bellevue store to collect my photo contest winnings, I remember the store manager asking if she could take my photo.  She didn’t tell me it was going to be in the Blog but I had an idea as I’m a follower and notice they tend to feature customers, news/events, happenings large and small.  My two new colors, Greenlake and Kumquat are excellent additions to my collection!

Jacqui O'Day Cooper, our Fresh From the Garden photography winner, was in the store the other day and Tracy snapped her picture.

We thought you would like to to catch another glimpse of her artistic winning photo and, of course, see the comely visage of Jacqui, enjoying her prize: a "refuge" set of glassybaby. Great photo, Jacqui!

http://blog.glassybaby.com/giving_back/2011/05/my-entry.html

Calgary

It was a great visit to Calgary and I was pleasantly surprised to find the city is actually pretty cool.  I didn’t have much time to explore as I was there two short days for work but I was able to see some of the downtown and surrounding suburbs.  The purpose of my trip was a Microsoft video shoot (if you know me well, you know I do many of these and love them).  For this case, we found a small company based out of Calgary who tweeted about their experience with Microsoft products vs. the competition.  Once we were able to get in contact with the business owner, we arranged a case study and video.  I am sure several PR activities will come to this company once the video is released which is an excellent opportunity for a small business to take advantage of.  Because this particular company is so mobile, they were able to close their office and now all work remote, something I can relate to.  Typically when we do a video shoot we conduct the interviews at the corporate HQ in a conference room or office.  This case was totally different as we did the job in the CEO’s kitchen! 

We then followed the two interviewees around town, documenting a typical day consisting of client visits, meetings at coffee shops, communication via mobile device and commute.  This video was unique and I can’t wait to see it come to fruition!  I am now at the Calgary airport sipping on some coffee and waiting for my flight to Seattle.  Funny thing I noticed today going through customs – a sign featuring a large parrot that says, “please don’t smuggle me, I might be sick.”  Who smuggles a parrot?  Knowing African Grey parrot in my family, there are multiple reasons why I believe this would be impossible but there must have been some issue in the past to warrant the sign, right? 

glassybaby photo contest follow up - I WON!!

Remember that Glassybaby photo contest I blogged about a couple weeks ago?  Today, they revealed the winning photo and I’m pleased to announce I won – here is the winning photo you can find on the GB homepage (I forgive the last name type-o, hopefully it will be fixed soon)!

We were actually in the car this morning on our way to SFO when I remembered it was today, May 1^st  the contest stated they’d post the winning photo on the GB website.  After plugging the website into my phone, I was ecstatic to see it was mine!  The photo was chosen by a panel of GB employees and will be displayed in the stores, on Facebook/Twitter and on the glassybaby homepage from May 1-3, 2011.  I wish they were featuring it longer as I’d love to see the photo in the store and will actually be in Seattle on May 4^th…missed it by one day!!  I will also be receiving the Refuge gift set which are colors “Greenlake” and “Kumquat" as a prize.

The contest was called “fresh from the garden” and didn’t have many requirements, basically a photo of a Glassybaby showcasing a connection to gardening.  I thought this would be a fun project to do and after reading about it, I had many ideas as you can see from the photos posted in an earlier entry.  There’s actually a pretty funny twist to this story.  My original idea was to plan a Mint herb in my light green Glassybaby that just so happens to be called, “Mint” (each GB has a special name that somehow relates with the color or cause).  I thought it was genius.  The connection to gardening would be an “herb garden” as I’d surround the Mint plant with Basil and Oregano since I don’t have much of a traditional garden here in California.  I did move forward with this idea and it they were beautiful photos.  The day after I submitted the photos, Glassybaby posted this advertisement from InStyle Magazine on their FB page.  I couldn’t believe it…they even used Mint!  Go figure.  I knew once the panel of judges saw my photos for the contest, they most likely wouldn’t think the concept was as original as I did….which is why I needed a plan B. 

Plan B was actually where the winning photo came from (so thank you InStyle + Matthew R.) .  I thought it would be cool to set up a scene where the GB appeared to have been dug out of the garden.  The secret here is you can’t make it look like you tried too hard.  I started staging the arrangement with a shovel and in a hole, on a shovel, etc.  One idea led to another and I ended up snapping a pic with my hand in a gardening glove, holding the GB as if I had just picked it from the garden….voila!  My mom brought up a good point, the concept also mapped back to the “goodwill” image they use featuring hands.  I didn’t think about it at the time but am pleased it worked out that way. 

All and all, I’m pretty stoked.  Not just for the gift set or the featured photo opportunity but because I did the best with what I had (you can view many of the other fresh from the garden photo entries here, there was some stiff competition).  I was a bit discouraged after seeing what I though was an original idea go down the tube in a magazine advertisement, feeling for a second that I didn’t have a giant, beautiful designer-garden to work with or I don’t have hundreds of Glassybabies to showcase like I’m sure many Glassybaby fans do….but I made it work with the resources I have.  It’s a small sense of accomplishment knowing even though your environment may not be perfect, finding “light” in a creative idea is sometimes just as good.