Posts Tagged ‘Tiffany Telford’

Huge thanks to our contributors and volunteers who made our All I Want for Xmas party successful! Thanks to your contributions we are able to provide more life makeovers to vulnerable women.

Thanks to Ronnie Bugay from www.galeliodesign.com for capturing the event and what we aim to achieve with the monies raised through Beauty Night Society.

9 years ago, Caroline MacGillivray held the first Beauty Night at WISH Drop in Centre in Vancouver, BC. 14 volunteers took care of 73 women who attended the event. Many of the attendees live in poverty and experience violence. The opportunity to be in a safe space is something that is valued. The opportunity to be treated with dignity and respect made them feel good.

What started off as a special Christmas make over party, became a way to reintroduce touch to victims of violence. When attendees saw the physical change, they started to believe other types of change were possible. They attended literacy classes to show off their freshly painted nails, visited the health clinics to talk about how good they felt and walked out with an extra bounce in their step.

Working directly with the attendees, helped change the perception of many of our volunteers. One of our volunteers told us, “I go past these women every day on the bus but I don’t see them. Tonight I laughed and hugged so many of them. I can’t go back to not being able to see them.”

Last night we celebrated Beauty Night Society’s 9th birthday in Vancouver & Prince George. In Vancouver, the festivities started off with Christmas caroling. Volunteers, participants & their children sang Christmas tunes while creating Christmas cards. Thanks to accessing karaoke via youtube.com, we were able to get everyone singing and dancing.

Women and children gathered around the table with their children cutting and pasting ribbon to card stock. Womyn’s Gym coordinator, Tyla Flexman helped the women find stickers & pens as they sifted through the mountain of art supplies. Through words and art they found different ways to say thank you on paper. These cards were given to many of our volunteers.

Thanks to sponsorship through Liberty Wines & the the creative genius of Stacey Dallyn, the Beauty Night room was transformed into a winter wonderland. Wood land creatures sat under a White Christmas tree. Decorated in silver and gold, the words Beauty Night leapt out the fluffy snow that coated the walls.

Founding vice president of Beauty Night Society, Carly Teng was on hand as a roaming photographer. Carly captured pictures of the festivities of the evening. When our photography team was stuck in traffic, Carly stepped in and began to snap pictures of the women & Santa Claus.

Beauty Night board member, Dave Dickson’s eyes twinkled like St. Nick as women & children posed with him. Ten year old, Santa Helper, Katie Dalinghaus smiled pretty for the camera as she handed out the Nancy Black designed Xmas stockings to the women and children.

Stuffed to the brim with warm gloves, tooth brushes, dental care products, skin care, hair care, and body care products, the brightly coloured stockings Katie handed to the women. Like the first Beauty Night makeover event, the stockings contents came from stocking drive from individuals, churches, and businesses that wanted to contribute to Beauty Night’s 7th annual Xmas stocking drive. Led by Stocking Coordinator, Blair Lockhart, BC Hydro, TD Canada Trust, Ch2M Hill and Carrie Wheeler Talent Management and many more collected monies and products for us to fill those stockings.

Hundreds of high school students from York House, Little Flower Academy, Prince of Wales Mini School, Van Tech Secondary, Churchill Secondary School, Kwantlan College and many members of our community stitched the stockings. 5 - 7 year olds in sparks & brownie troupes decorated the stockings with their own personal flair.

Photographers Bruce & Sarah Culver set up the shots. Beauty Night volunteers & participants mugged for the camera. In the Beauty Night room, Tiffany Telford led the make over program. Carol Hogan, Ella Bak, Olivia Cammie, Meagan Stowe, Denise Van Gorkom, Margo Dalinghaus, and Amanda offered make up lessons, hair styling, manicures, mini massages and reiki.

Under the guidance of Kids Club coordinators, Alexa Fox and Sophia Hughes, women and children continued to create cards and occasionally break into a game of “jingle” tag.

While all the laughter- filled activity filled the room, Wendy Shuen and her volunteers bustled from room to room offering delectable goodies to the Beauty Night participants & volunteers. Almond cookies, fruit cake and mouth watering capicino chocolate biscuits satisfied our taste buds and our stomachs.

Throughout it all, DJ Joe, Tyla Flexman, Stacey Dallyn, Margo Dalinghaus, and Tiffany Telford bustled around making the event run smoothly.

Before the women headed out the door, Katie Dalinghaus gave them scarves created by Knit Fit Volunteers. Over 300 scarves were created by students from Elementary schools and High School students around the lower mainland. Spearheaded by Knit Fit founder & program coordinator, Laura Mah, hundreds of youth, seniors and children developed leadership skills and created scarves to keep people warm as they headed out into the snow.

In Prince George, our Beauty Night makeover event took place at Elizabeth Fry Society. Belly dance and self defense classes were held while women were offered make up application, hair styling, mini facials, manicures and much more.

Tonight - in Vancouver, we continue our celebrations at BC Women’s Hospital. Tiffany Telford, Ella Bak, Tyla Flexman, Caitlin Naylor and Lindsay McMillian will be handing out Xmas stockings and offering our makeover programming to the women in Fir Square.

As we head towards the end of the year, we have a few more events this week. In Toronto, the Xmas stockings & makeover program runs of December 17th - while Vancouver volunteers and contributors celebrate Beauty Night Society’s 9th Birthday on a Boat.

Beauty on the Boat enbarks at 7pm on December 17th. An evening on the sea with the music of Greg Cockerill and evening jaunt along the Vancouver coast. Tickets are $50 - proceeds to Beauty Night Society. For more information, please call 778-885-4526 or [email protected].

* For those who still have contributions to give, we are still handing out Xmas stockings and scarves on Xmas eve. Please contact us at [email protected].

t’s a six day count down before 2nd Xmas Beauty Night make over program in Prince George! Although the buzz is growing, we are still looking for volunteers and contributions for December 14th!

If you are unable to go, please continue to forward the message.

We need hairdressers, makeup artists, aestheticians, RMTs, volunteers to pick up contributions and much more. We are hoping that if we get enough volunteers and supplies, we might be able to increase the events to run 4 times per year!

Eventually if we develop the resources, it would be wonderful to be able to offer programming four nights per week. Based on what the women want, that would include womyn’s gym (one on one personal training), yoga classes, mom & tot nutrition classes, journaling, Kids club, personal development & inner beauty boot camp. Next year, it would be wonderful to be able to have the xmas stocking initiative & Knit Fit community building programs included with our Prince George activities.

In light of the 20 year anniversary of the Montreal Massacre on Sunday (December 6th, 2009) has prompted discussion around the country about what we can do to help women living with violence. Our makeover program is a great way to:

Reintroduce touch to victims of violence
Integrate women who are isolated into communities
Create opportunities for the participants to get involved
with the program.
Build community.

In BC alone, the Highway of Tears and the DTES Missing Women are a call for action. By working together, we can make a difference in the lives of many. When we make someone feel good, we give them hope. When you have hope you can do anything.

While Womyns Gym, Kids Club and our yoga programs run at PHS Life Skills Centre, Beauty Night Makeover Facilitator, Tiffany Telford brings some Halloween cheer to the Celluloid Social Club tonight. (Doors open at 7:30pm at the ANZA Club #3 West 8th Ave at Ontario St). Tiffany will be offering Halloween makeup for minimum $10 donation, proceeds to Beauty Night Society.

Here are the details for tonight’s event:
Big Smash! Productions + The Celluloid Social Club present
BLOODSHOTS CANADA 2009 The 48-Hour Horror Filmmaking Challenge!

GRAND PRIZE $1000 as determined by DAN O’BANNON
(writer, ALIEN and TOTAL RECALL, writer/director of punk-horror classic RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD)

SHOOTING: Friday October 23 - 7:00pm - Sunday October 25 - 7:00pm
SCREENING: Wednesday October 28 - 8:00pm at the Anza Club (3 W. 8th, Vancouver) Doors 7:30 pm / $5 cash at door

Prize for Best Hallowe’en Costume at Screening

BNS (Beauty Night Society) makeup artists doing zombie makeup for a minimum $10 donation per person. Proceeds to BNS that teaches women and youth living with violence and poverty tools to heal their lives and our communities. Beauty Night… because dignity is beautiful

The 2009 Local Jury at the screening consists of past Bloodshots winner Scott Belyea (TEN MINUTES BEFORE SHOWTIME), director Matt O’Mahoney (ELECTRIC FENCE) and genre cinema bad-boy Uwe Boll (STOIC, POSTAL)!

All details and registration info at http://www.myspace.com/bloodshotscanada

As hundreds of DV filmmakers the world over have already learned, making a short film in one weekend can be terrifying. Lack of sleep is just the beginning of your problems when you are trying to corral actors into repeating their performance with more energy at 5 in the morning and you know you have only got another 6 hours to get a final edit of your masterpiece put together.

Well, start brewing your coffee now, because the people who brought you Vancouver’s CINEMUERTE FILM FESTIVAL (1999-2005) are getting set to bring you the 6th annual BloodShots 48-Hour Horror Filmmaking Contest - 25 Teams of filmmakers all fighting against the clock to make the best horror film they possibly can. There will be celebrity judges, fabulous prizes and several tons of fake blood!

At 7:00pm on Friday October 23, registered participants are given envelopes containing a horror subgenre (in past years this has included haunted house, giallo, backwoods horror, necrophilia film and more!), a weapon, a prop and a line of dialogue. They then have 48 hours to return their finished 2-7 minute film on DVD!

Every year, there is a BLOODSHOTS screening hosted by The Celluloid Social Club, where the films are voted on by both the audience, and an in-person jury. This year’s local jury consists of past Bloodshots winner Scott Belyea (TEN MINUTES BEFORE SHOWTIME), filmmaker Matt O’Mahoney (ELECTRIC FENCE) and genre cinema bad-boy Uwe Boll (STOIC, POSTAL)!

In-person jury prizes (from Rue Morgue, Maple Pictures, Happy Bats, Mondo Macabro DVD, Videomatica, The Rio Theatre and more) will be awarded on site immediately following the screenings and a short period of deliberation by the jury. Ballots will be handed out to the audience and collected after the screening. The results of these ballots will be combined with the online voting results to give us the overall Audience Winner.

These results will be posted online at www.myspace.com/bloodshotscanada on Monday Nov. 2. The jury winner and the overall audience winner are the two finalists that go on to the final round, being sent to the Grand Prize Juror for their shot at winning $1000!

This year’s Grand Prize Juror is DAN O’BANNON (writer of ALIEN and TOTAL RECALL, writer/director of punk-horror classic RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD). We will be sending the top jury-winning film and the audience-winning film to Dan, he will NOT be at the screening in person.

The 2009 contest is open to entrants throughout British Columbia. More details on rules, registration, jury, voting, and prizes are available at http://www.myspace.com/bloodshotscanada.

If you have any questions, email Kier-La Janisse at [email protected] or call 204-998-5578.

When we asked Beauty Night Society (BNS) volunteer and participants what they would like to experience, celebration and joy was something that everyone wanted. On October 26th, we put our Halloween committee’s concepts into action. Our decorating committee (participants, volunteers & board members) came in early to set the stage for the event to follow.

Cob webs, orange and black streamers adorned the ceiling, drawers, and walls of the room. The buzz of excitement filled the entire centre. Together our decorating committee worked together to create an environment of fun that our make over volunteers could still work within.

Make up Artists Tiffany Telford, Ella Bak and Amanda Gangoso met the requests of our volunteers and participants. Hairdresser, Gary Smith created hair for “Mili Cyrus” to zombies, vampires and many more. At our nail station, Margo Dalinghaus and Kate created glamour girl nails as easily as claws for the various types of claws that people wanted.

Participant Facilitator, DJ Joe and Kerry Parsons filled the cups with hot tea while Stephanie Scott and photographer, Aaron Chung offered chocolate treats to participants who wanted to pose for our Halloween photo shoot. Posing with their children, with their friends, the women playing in front of the camera. “Aaron Chung creates a safe space for the women to enjoy being captured on film. Together with our amazing group of volunteers, participants and board members - our Beauty Night Society (BNS) celebrations are a pleasure for all involved!” explains National Executive Director and Founder, Caroline MacGillivray.

Thanks to Make Over Program Facilitator, Tiffany Telford, the children included cookie decoration as part of their activities in our Kids’ Club activities. Kids’ Club Program Co-ordinators, Alex Fox and Sophia Hughes supervised the decoration of bat shaped cookies as well as creating Halloween Masks. In the past two months, Hughes and Fox have worked together to create a fantastic program geared towards our participants’ children.

“Originally Katie Benjamin (Founder of Womyns Gym) wanted to offer child care for our Womyns Gym program participants. When we moved Womyns Gym from Tuesday and Thursdays to Monday and Wednesdays, I felt we needed to offer child care to our other program participants’ children. It wouldn’t be fair to only have it for one program. Alexa and Sophia have created a program that the kids can call their own. I am thrilled to have such amazing program coordinators. When I asked if we could create program to foster healthy self esteem and incorporate 20 minutes of physical activity every hour, Alexa and Sophia went above and beyond what I asked for. I know Kids’ Club is a huge benefit to the kids and to their parents - who participant in our other programming.”

Although we planned pumpkin carving and face painting as part of our Mom & Tot Nutrition program, the children were included in the photo shoot and face painting during the festivities on the 26th. Some of the children came dressed in costumes as did our volunteers. The rooms were filled with kangaroos, cats, vampires, zombies, and witches.

For those who did not bring costumes, Denise Van Gorkum and Amanda played fairy godmother. There women and children created magic wands, crowns, necklaces and witch hats. The opportunity to create their own costumes was incredibly fun and empowering. Watching faces filled with dejection due to forgetting a costume change to delight as they created their own was heart warming.

We were thrilled to have Womyns Gym volunteers get cat noses & whiskers or moustashes painted on their faces before training the women. We were thrilled to welcome Katie Gove from Telus’ Community Giving to our festivities. Beauty Night Society’s Womyns Gym is a proud recipient of Telus Community Giving.

The only dark spot in the evening was the fact that some of the numbers were down. When we followed up with participants the following evening, concerns of swine flu kept some of our participants at home. Although we would have loved to have seen more of our participants (we had about 25 participants throughout the entire night), we are glad that they are abiding by health policies that Beauty Night Society has shared with volunteers and participants. Rest and time to heal is vitally important during the cold and flu season!

Huge thanks to all of our volunteers, community partners - especially the PHS Life Skills Centre, Telus Community Giving, and of course our participants! When we work together, we can make a huge impact in our communities!