Hello!

Just want to let followers know about my new blog called padarose.onsugar.com. Its a blog that I enjoy taking time to write about anything and everything that makes me happy. The wonderful things I love in life, that's all. It has fashion,layouts, my daily events, news and such......

You can look it up on this site, onsugar.com.

I will keep this one updated as well! Thank you for following!

To think its all over...done...completed. The trip all 64 girls in Canada were looking forward to and so much more has ended. We miss each other indeed, miss those exciting outings, and miss the wonderful experience we all had together. The trip to Toronto was an incredible memory that I will always have in mind, and never leave behind. I learned so much, made many new friends and I am thrilled to have been given the opportunity to participate in the Miss Teen Canada World pageant for 2010! Its something none of us should take for granted because we all worked so hard to get to this level. Its a lifetime event that most in the world don't get to attend, and without the help and organization of some fabulous people, it would not have been possible for all us girls to experience.

Thank you to all who put this wonderful event together! You created so many life lasting memories for over 64 deserving girls, and gave us all this amazing opportunity to take part in. Special thanks to Michelle Weswaldi, executive director of MTC-W. Your hard work is much appreciated!

If there was ever a chance for me to participate in this pageant again, I would do it hands down! I recommend this experience to any young girl looking for a challenge and a chance to make a difference in her community, and possibly country. I will never forget this!

Visited the CN Tower this morning, interviews today and talent tonight!  We also had preliminaries last night, which was so much fun!  Everyone did great and looked beautiful....and hot in those bathing suits!  This has been an experience of a life time, and I have made over 62 new friends to be exact, all with wonderful and unique qualities.  We have learned two full routines, one for our opening number, and our bathing suit dance to "California Girls" by Katy Perry.  The theme this year for the 2010 pageant  is " Alice In Wonderland", which I am a huge fan of!  Rehearsing is long, hard, but overall more fun than anything!  I dont want this week to end.  I will have everlasting memories from this amazing trip!

On this amazing journey, I have meet some awesome people, made new freinds and best of all learned so mcuh in just two days! I feel confident, strong and extremly happy to be here where I am today. Being presentable everyday is a key part in the participation of this pageant, and to help to me do so, I found an ever so generous sponsor in my local home town of Victoria BC. Its a wonderful clothing consignment store called "Baja Rosis". The manager Caroline, has agreed to send me here in Toronto with all the accessories and clothes I need from the store! I have some fabulous finds, and have already worn many of them. This is all apart of feeling good and positive. What you wear can make you look and feel good about yourself, and in turn you exude confidence. Thats what Baja Rosis has done for me. I am having more fun than I ever imagined, and this experience will last an everlasting memory with me. A huge thank you to Baja Rosis and Caroline for their generosity and sponsorship with my pageant clothing for the week! I am always so proud to be wearing them everyday here, and have received many compliments!

Thank you Baja Rosis for making this experiance even more enjoyable for me! I really appreciate it!

"Corporate Social Responsibility and Citizen Journalism" What in the world does that exactly mean? To be honest, I had no clue, maybe a slight idea, but I was certainly not about to take that chance at a wild guess! To find out exactly what all these lovely words meant put together as they are, I made a special call to "my people" in higher places.....no I am just kidding! I actually phoned my awesome auntie Mare who is founder and owner of three businesses. The first is called "Suburbia Studios" which is an advertising company and has done work with the BC Cancer Foundation. The second is a business called "Function Fox" which deals with marketing and the third is her newest find called "Valentus Health Clinics". Valentus will shortly become involved with breast cancer prevention in the very near future, and hopes to create an eye opening new way for breast health in women. She explained to me how corporate social responsibility works, and what it means because this was right up her ally, and she cleared the air for me right away!

http://www.functionfox.com/

http://www.suburbiaadvertising.com/

http://www.valentusclinics.com/

Corporate social responsibility is about how companies manage the business processes to produce an overall positive impact on society. They want to improve society in some way, and support their community.

For this final assignment, we as the delegates were to choose only one of many different corporate partners branching out from the official charity of Miss Teen Canada-World, Free The Children. Anything is possible with the power of many. Corporations all over the world participate in good causes. Without these corporate sponsors to support and aid the needs of organizations such as Free The Children, many lives would remain unchanged and in the worst conditions possible.

In 1995, a 12 year old boy by the name of Craig Kielburger grabbed 11 of his school friends to begin fighting child labor. Today, Free The Children is an organization of children helping children through education, and has an incredible track record of success. It helps people in Kenya, Sierra Leone, rural China and Equador. Free The Children has received many awards such as the State of the World Forum Medal and Roosevelt Freedom Medal. http://www.freethechildren.com/

To keep the ongoing success alive within Free The Children, the organization has what I like to call "partners in giving". The corporate partner that stood out to me and my personality the most was the "Webkinz Foundation". The Webkinz foundation has so generously donated not just financial aid to Free The Children, but laptops and plush animals for sick kids in hospitals all over the world. But free the children has over 60 different partners that assist with the organizations needs to help build and re-build schools, supply food, water and many other essential necessities. What makes the Webkinz Foundation so special?

The Webkinz Foundation is dedicated to improving the welfare, development, health, and safety of children. They support existing programs and develop their own programs that are consistent with their goals. Founded in 1950 by Holocaust survivors Samuel Ganz and his two sons, was the original Webkinz plush toy idea. Ganz is a Canadian company best known for distributing plush animals and collectibles. More recently it is known as the manufacturer of Webkinz, the toy with an interactive virtual-reality Internet site. The success of Webkinz Pets allowed the Ganz family to start The Webkinz Foundation. The Webkinz Foundation is a charitable organization that focuses on supporting children's programs worldwide and provides the company with marketing. http://www.webkinzfoundation.org/

The Webkinz Foundation has also created the Caring Valley. The Caring Valley is a fun and meaningful way to help Webkinz World members learn about giving, and also learn about charities that work to benefit children all around the world. The foundation donates over $900,000.00 to charities featured in the Caring Valley. The most recent donation made to Free The Children from the Caring Valley Grant was $110,000.00! In January of 2009, a grant from the Webkinz foundation of $135,000.00 was used in Free The Children’s Adopt-a-Village program to the Caihe community in Gansu China. An earthquake in 2008 destroyed the only school the community had. In addition to re-building the school, Free the Children plans to have a library, latrines and build water systems to the community over the next few years. http://www.webkinzfoundation.org/grants_cv.html

So what exactly is a "Webkinz"? Well a Webkinz is a small plush animal of any kind created just for kids ages 3 and up. I have seen them around in many local stores, and heard about them when they first came out on the market. When you purchase a Webkinz, you will find a key tag attached with a secret code. A website is also given in the tag which allows you to go online and register you new pet, or it’s also called adoption on the site! Once there, children can feed and care for their virtual Webkinz pets, decorate and furnish rooms for their pets, enter challenges, play games and do odd jobs to earn "Kinzcash"; the virtual currency which pays for food, clothing and treats.

This is the kind of thing I have always loved doing as a child, and being creative with my own ideas in a magical world is still fascinating to me today as an 18 year teenager....don't laugh! I thought, what better way to become more involved with the corporate sponsor I chose than to adopt a pet myself.  Here I am, with my new Webkinz pet, a pucker fish of whom I named Mango in the Webkinz virtual world. He lives in his own home that I get to decorate, and swims around in a little bubble while playing games, and interacting on the site. I have to admit, it’s quite fun and strangely addicting! In the end, this teaches children responsibility on how to organize and maintain something early in their lives, so only to benefit them in the future.

The Webkinz Foundation and Webkinz interactive site are two separate websites, but are still linked with one another. It has been an eye opening and extensive experience learning all of this new information about the good others do in the world, and has only inspired me even more to become involved as much as I can. This assignment was both meaningful and helpful, and I can’t wait to read about the other corporate sponsors involved with the organization of Free The Children.  http://www.missteencanadaworld.com/

I just started back at my figure skating for the summer today, and boy does it ever feel good! Yes, waking up every morning at 7:00am, going for a run then heading to the rink for a wonderful 8 hour day....feels good again! Alright, so to most people this could sound awful and exhausting. To be honest, it is draining at the end of the day. Today, I came home feeling great, energized....and a tad bit hungry! Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. The sleep fairy came over me, and I was flaked out on my lawn in the sun, sound asleep! Our day at the rink consists of many activities, both on and off ice training.

We begin each morning with an off ice class. This could be anything from dance, such as hip hop, lyrical or ballet. On Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays we have our work out class....some harder than others of course! This morning was a tough one, but you feel great after and just keep looking forward to the rest of the day. Each of our off ice classes are 45 minuets long. Time can either fly by, or it can be like watching grass grow! All in all, I'm so happy to be back at my working out and dance schedule with the club!

Then we are on the ice shortly after for our Free Skate session, which is also 45 minuets long. This is where us as the skaters may practice whatever we want, and of course what we need to, for as long as we like. It may be a certain spin, jump, footwork or running through our programs time and time again until we get it perfect! But don't think this is just a casual time for us to mingle and watch others on the ice. You must always be moving on the ice and watching out for the skaters who could be in a lesson or have their solo played. Let me be the first to say, it is a workout out there and you do work up a sweat! Don't worry, its a satisfying sweat. Although, that's not to say everyday is perfect. Unfortunately, you have to have those bad days to appreciate the good ones when they come, and when they do, those bad days make it so much more worth it!

We also have a session called Skills and Dance, which are on Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we have Stroking sessions. These are 30 minuets each, and is a nice cool down after a hard working Free Skate. A coach will teach the Stroking classes, which can be anywhere from pushing it as hard as you possibly can till your thighs burn, or it can be as relaxing as yoga ( which is VERY rare ).  This helps us keep in shape for our programs, and help maintain our flow, speed and edges in anything a figure skater would do on the ice. Its all about repetition and consistency.

Of course we have our lunch break, then its back on the ice for another Free Skate session for an hour this time! At this point in the day today, I was so tired! The will to put my skates back on was not there, quite funny, but also quite true! Eventually, I laced up and was back on the ice. I was anticipating a long session ahead of me, but to my surprise, time flew by and it was done! I curtsied, and felt good about my first day back at it!

Oh ya, did I mention I still have 2 hours of Ice dancing with my partner after as well? I am pleased to say that after being away from ice dance for about a year, I began to miss it, and have now decided to start again with a new partner! We worked on many partnering skills, and a couple of dances together. In the end, it really did not seem long at all....if your working hard!

My point to this post is not to bore you with my everyday life and what I do. My point is this. Get out, get active and have fun! Its important to have some form of exercise during each day to help to feel and look your best! I'm not saying that you should do what I described in my day, because that's not possible to expect. If your feeling down in the dumps, try going for a walk or jog. It really helps heal and calm nerves in the body and releases healthy endorphins to build muscle. It also helps build confidence and a positive attitude. It also speeds up your metabolism, which means getting the right foods in your body as well. For example, I have not trained this hard in a long time, so there for my appetite has been low and have not been eating as well as I should. But today when I arrived home, I sat down for a moment, and I was all of the sudden STARVING! I know, sounds bad, but here's the advantage. When your metabolism speeds up, you burn more calories and fat, causing your body to need and want more fuel to keep it going. Putting in the right foods for you body to feed off of is key, and you can eat more of that healthy snack to keep you going, thus keeping your metabolism going.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endorphin

I have to be honest, I had 5 pieces of home made veggie pizza for dinner! Guess what? I felt and still feel good because I know the amount of fuel it takes for me to keep going during a day like this, and its satisfying! Satisfy your life with health and fitness, and feel good about it! Its also a good idea to crush those cravings for ice cream once in a while, because that feels good too! It was a great day and an awesome start to a hopefully fabulous week!

For more info on the Miss Teen Canada-World 2010 pageant, visit:

www.missteencanadaworld.com