The Bucket List - Vancouver Edition

I'm over winter. I don't want to wear boots, or a jacket or have to carry an umbrella. I can't handle another day of streaky bronzer, and unmatched cover up. I want a tan, and here I am getting pastier by the day. I am desperate for summer.  For sun, for adventure, for jean shorts, flip flops and tan lines, fresh fruit, ice cream and patio hangs.

I currently live in a constant state of freezing. My feet are ice blocks even with socks on, and I'm up to 3 cups of coffee a day, just for the warmth. My heating blanket and hot yoga are currently my only respite from the winter blues.  So in an effort to cheer myself up, and in the spirit of my Happiness Project, I've decided to wear long underwear and Hot Chilly socks under all my clothes from now on.

Kidding. I've actually complied a list of things I'm looking forward to doing in this new city of mine, in the hopes that it will chase away the blues, bring down my heating bill, and prevent my boyfriend from banishing my heating blanket. I'd love to hear your suggestions, on things to do in Vancouver, so feel free to send them my way!

The Bucket List - Vancouver Edition

1. Go to the Vancouver Flea Market
2. Afternoon Tea at the Fairmont with some close girlfriends
3. Ice Skating on Grouse Mountain
4. Canucks Game
5. Check out the Punjabi Market in SOMA
6. Go to a race at Hastings Park
7. Try the Chocolate Buffet at The Sutton Place Hotel
8. Actually make it to Celebration of Light (I've missed it every year)
9. Watch a movie at the IMAX
10. Go camping at Cultus Lake
11. Go to the Richmond Night Market

You Can't be Good at Everything Right?

I've learned a terrible lesson this past week. One that would make do-it yourself-ers everywhere gasp in horror. However, I will now consider it to be one of my Secrets of Adulthood. The rule is as follows: "Why do it yourself when you can pay someone else to do it." I realize that this rule may seem frivalous to many but I believe the tales of my week may make you see things my way.

Story One:  When I first started my blog, I posted two pictures of posters I wanted that were sold out on IVillage. Somehow my Fairy Godmother heard my wish, and my friend Jennine had BOTH of the posters I wanted, and she sold them to me happily. Jennine is an old friend from my horseback riding days, and not only did she grant my wish and provide me with these posters, she also helped me get my new amazing apartment, in the building she lives in. She's a doll.

Back to the story. So I had these awesome posters, that needed to be framed, so instead of paying a professional to do it, I decide to take it on myself. I bought black frames at Walmart, and some spray paint and started to paint them white. Now this all would have been fine, if the stupid posters let you remove the plexiglass, but no dice, it was attached to the frame. So now, because I'm awesome at spray painting the plexiglass is now dotted with white. And I will have to take the posters in to get professionally framed anyways, as they are printed on the white matting crooked.

Moral Of The Story : Pay a professional Mila. You suck at DIY.

Story Two: Now I wish I could tell you that I learned my lesson and when it came down to moving all my stuff to Vancouver, I hired movers, or at the very least rented a truck, but no. Instead I enlisted my dad, and he borrowed his friends pick up to schlep everything down the Sea to Sky.

All fine and dandy, until the weather pulled a Whistler on us and snowed and rained on the moving day. Armed with tarps, we figured we were well prepared. That is until all the tarps blew off on the windiest corner of the Cheakamus Canyon. After 45 minutes in the freezing snow and wind we had them tied back on. Sort of.

We then decided that it would be best to stop in Squamish at Home Depot to cover the mattresses in plastic sheeting, and move the boxes into the cab of the truck as it was apparently pouring rain in Vancouver.

Bare in mind that it has now taken us 2 hours to get from Whistler to Squamish. So we did this, re-organized the truck bed, and took off. Stopping for a celebratory Mcdonalds french fry run ( This was especially special, as my dad never even let us have Mcdonalds as a kid, and he was the one who suggested it!)

After Mcdicks, we flew through Squamish, laughing at the hitchhikers, and munching on fries, until we got to Shannon Falls, where we realized....we no longer had a mattress.

3 trips between Mickey D's and Shannon Falls later, and we STILL had not located the missing mattress. So my dad pulls over to start calling mattress stores to buy a new one, and I get out to lean over the barrier, where low and behold a black plastic sail seems to be billowing off the edge of a cliff.

 Mattress or dead body right? Mattress it was!

We left Whistler at 11:30 am that day and arrived in Vancouver at 6 pm. However, we did stop at Chances on the way home to complete our hillbilly road trip, and broke even, which everyone knows counts as a win :)

Moral Of The Story: Pay a professional. The time and frustration you save, is worth the money you don't!

What do Social Media and Teen Sex have in Common?

"Social Media is like teen sex. Everybody wants to do it, but nobody knows how." 

- Avinash Kaushik, Analytics Evangelist, Google

As mentioned in my previous blog,  I'm currently taking a class on Social Media Marketing at BCIT. I've already completed the Marketing Management- Public Relations Diploma, but felt that it was mainly paper based, and that I would do well to upgrade my education with a few multimedia courses. Looking at the current job market in Vancouver, solidified this decision. Most of the available jobs are currently for Online Marketing Specialists, fluent in all social media networks, with HTML, SEO and Adobe Indesign knowledge. 

The class started off by having us sign up for a variety of social media tools, some were a bit overwhelming at first, but most of them were quite straightforward. As with most things in life, social media follows the rule that you only really get what you put it. Up until now, I have had a Twitter account but never really used it, however, within the last few weeks, I've increased my Twitter usage and found the more I tweet, the more people tweet back at me or re-tweet something about my blog! The Law of Attraction at its best. 

Another tool I've found extremely useful (as well as ultra nerdy) is Hootsuite. Hootsuite allows me to see all my social media accounts on one deck, as well as update them all at once, and track how many people click the links I tweet. Not to mention Hootsuite does all my job searching for me. I add streams on Twitter such as "Marketing Jobs Vancouver" and I can see all the tweets about this subject! Before this class, I never knew services like this even existed, now Im hooked. Google Analytics is also amazing, and while I've been using it for a couple years already, I still feel like their is a ton to learn.

Through this class I've also been introduced to several interesting websites such as Digg and Technorati. Digg highlights the days most interesting news stories, while Technorati lists all the most popular blog posts. I particularly like Technorati Women. 

Some other tools we've been introduced to that I find less valuable are Flickr, LinkedIn (but just because I'm just starting to collect contacts) and Mail Chimp, as I'm not currently working for a business that needs email marketing, and am already quite familiar with how to use it.  

Apologies in advance for two school based posts in a row, Im trying to make this blog as popular as possible, so I'm currently using it as a guinea pig for all my school projects. Stay tuned for my next post on the harrowing tale of my move back to Vancouver...

Nerd-ing Curve

I feel a bit like this girl right now. A blonde girl with her head cut off. Im currently in the process of finishing up work in Whistler, packing up my life, packing up my boyfriends life ;), organizing a move in Vancouver, and also going to school at BCIT.

However, the good news is, that after this week, I'll have a shwanky new pad in Van City, and be almost half way through my Intro to Social Media Marketing class. Which believe me, will benefit anyone who reads this blog! I'm on a steep learning curve, finding out all about Twitter, TweetDeck, Hootsuite, Mashable, Bit.ly, and many many more super nerdy, yet ultimately fascinating technologies. Grow or Die as they say.

Can't wait to make this blog bigger and better then ever. Please feel free to use some of the new tools I've added: Retweet my posts on Twitter, Like a post on FB, Like the Small Town Girl Page on FB. This can all be done at the bottom of each blog post or via Facebook and Twitter.

I also just want to give a quick shout out to all the people who already read my blog and share it with others! Thanks especially to Amy Huddle, for sharing my work with Feet Banks and thus helping me to get an article published. This blog has gone from five hits a day to into the hundreds, with most of the growth happening these last couple months! Sharing is Caring.

XX

Cleaning, Cooking, and Gardening

My beautiful friend Kelly. Check out her Blog.

I'm currently doing a 30 day yoga challenge. One of my own design however. My schedule with the impending move, and long distance boyfriend is a bit too hectic to commit to one studio. I currently do the majority of my classes at Loka in Whistler. If you haven't checked out this studio I suggest you do. It's in a super convenient location, right across from Brandy's and Earls, and the classes they offer are full of variety, and at times of the day, that make going to yoga effortless.

Loka classes are mainly Jivamukti in style, which for some reason really resonates with me. I feel like I spent years battling myself in hot or power classes. I remember several conversations with my best friends and expert yogis K & B wondering why it was such a challenge for me to make myself go to yoga, when I really believed in it and loved the benefits. I've finally come to the conclusion, that what makes me not only want to go to yoga, but crave it, is a combination of several factors:

1. Location, It needs to be close to where I work - If I go home and sit on the couch before an intended yoga class, I can guarantee you I ain't going.
2. A variety of class lengths - Sometimes I just can't handle 90 minutes of breathing and being in myself. Horrible, but true none the less.
3. A teacher that resonates with you. For anyone that has met Tina, it becomes fascinatingly obvious as to why she has such a loyal following of students. I literally want to talk to her forever or just be in her presence for as long as I can every time I go to yoga.

For me Loka has all of the above. However, YYoga hits the spot quite often too. Im currently obsessed with an Anusara Inspired class at North Shore Elements, taught by a good friend of my boyfriends. Her name is Alex Mazerolle and she teaches what I consider to be the perfect yoga class. Challenging, relaxing, inspiring, and insightful. I'm thinking of taking up Pilates as well, as she teaches the classes back to back. YYoga in Whistler (Neoalpine) is also fabulous. However, my favorite teacher Kristen, has just recently had a baby girl, so she has taken some time off.

Anyways, I digress. I intended to share with you a concept brought up to us in Jivamukti the other night. This concept is the focus for the month, and as simple-minded as it sounds, is actually quite inspiring. The focus is cleaning, cooking, and gardening. But in the most holistic sense.  Here is my take on the words.

Cleaning: You can't clear clutter from your mind, if you have clutter in your life. Every unnecessary mess, or object takes up space. In each yoga class your goal is to create space. So consider this yoga of the house. (I just did closet yoga, for my boyfriend and myself. I was ruthless, and it felt great. We gave away 6 garbage bags full of clothing.) I've also been practicing this idea, through my Happiness Project.

Cooking: Bring awareness to what you put into your body. This hits home for me, as I spent the first half of my life fueling my body to be a professional athlete, and the next portion starving myself in hopes those muscles would disappear. Where I'm at now varies from day to day, but I usually feel comfortable and confident in the food choices that I make. This concept has challenged me however, to take this knowledge of food to the next level. I'm going to learn to cook. Bye, bye takeout sushi, hello home made tabouleh. Poor boyfriend.

Gardening: This is the concept I struggle with the most. While the urban garden is an admirable goal, I just can't find any passion in it. Maybe because I've never even owned a real plant before. So step 1 in my our new place will be a small, yet effective window-sill herb garden. Wish me luck.
Side Note: This word could also be taken in a less literal sense of the word. Ala gardening of the mind. Weeding out the negative thoughts and replacing them with the positive. Planting the seeds of your dreams. Watching them grow.

BBQ Grilled Cheese

I'm not sure why I didn't post this sooner, but here is an article that I wrote for Mountain Life this past summer. I actually had to figure out how to BBQ grilled cheese, and look pretty in front of a professional photographer (Paige Harley) while doing it. I got the job through this blog, and am very happy with how the article, and the grilled cheese turned out.

Open publication - Free publishing - More hiking

Living Social

Am I the last to know about this? livingsocial.com is my new favorite thing! They send me daily deals in Vancouver, ranging from food, trips, spa deals, and fitness. So far I have bought a two night trip to Tofino for $115 and a $20 personal training one month pass, valued at $159! Not to mention, if you send the deal of the day to all your friends, and three of them purchase it, your deal is free! Im hooked.

The Happiness Project

Im a total nerd. First a post about my Grandma, and now yet ANOTHER post about a book. What can I say, I have no recent slutty Garfs pics of me and my friends pouring booze on each other. Maybe next week. ;)

I just finished a new book that I am obsessed with. Part, Eat Pray Love, part The Saint, The Surfer, and The CEO, The Happiness Project, is a memoir of Gretchen Rubins quest to make herself happier. Or, as she puts it "Sing in the morning, clean my closets, fight right, read Aristotle, and generally have more fun.

What's particularly interesting, is that Gretchen has a great life. She's not depressed, divorced, unhealthy, or recovering from a tragedy. She is a successful author, happily married, and lives in New York with her two young daughters. She even admits that she actually isn't unhappy at all. However, she takes on this project to create gratitude for her everyday life, and to show that simple steps like "Going to bed early" can increase ones happiness exponentially. 

Gretchen begins her project by identifying how one achieves happiness and by laying out her 12 Commandments, which she then turns into actions through her Resolutions chart. Each month represents a new resolution, combined with the actions necessary to make the resolution happen. For example, January's is "Boost Energy" which she decided to do through: clearing her closets, tackling nagging tasks, keeping a food diary, identifying the problem, and observing the one minute rule - which by the way states that "If it can be done in one minute or less, do it now. i.e hanging up your coat. Pure Genius.

Im not going to go into too much more detail about how she goes about achieving more happiness, but I will say, that this book is an inspiring and insightful read. It's motivated me to start fresh this year, and shed some of the habits I have created that truly don't add to my well being. My Happiness Project starts today. Bye bye oversleeping, not making my bed, throwing my clothes on the floor, and procrastinating until I am in a panic. I'll keep you updated from time to time on how I am doing with my resolutions, and I really do hope that some of you read this book and take from it as much as I did. Keep in mind that everyone's Happiness Project is different, you may not need to go to bed earlier. However, I sure do. 

For more information on The Happiness Project visit: http://www.happiness-project.com/

Tracy Anderson Method

I have to admit that I am a huge fan of Gwenyth Paltrows blog Goop. While it has come under some serious criticism, I find all her advice very insightful, and she gives her readers access to experts that only Celebs have the money for. Her latest newsletter included a video from her personal trainer Tracy Anderson, who also happens to train Madonna. The workouts she does are really innovative and quite fun. Check this one out, and if you like it there are a bunch more on you tube..just don't get caught doing the videos as it's pretty embarrassing!

Check out Gwenyth's Blog http://www.goop.com/

Music Mosaic In The Desert Air

Angie & Mila

In 14 days I'm desert bound. Off to Coachella with 6 other girls. An epic adventure, sure to be a tradition in the making.  While the rest of Whistler rejoices over the late March powder, I'm turning my thoughts to bikinis, martinis, and music. Hailed as one of the top music festivals in the world, Coachella is undoubtedly the most glamorous. $1500 a night Safari tents often sell out before camping spots, and hotels have been fully booked since December. With visions of our dust caked selves at Pemberton flashing in our mind, and armed with two friends that work for the Hilton, our 6 pack will be staying at the La Quinta Resort and Spa, boasting 41 pools and 5 top ranked golf courses. Our adventure starts April 13 and lasts a week, allowing us two days of fun and sun before and after the festivities. 

However, with sun, comes summer clothes, and with summer clothes come that panic in your stomach feeling. Enter my currently uneventful and honestly quite boring life. Since waking up the morning after Canada won gold, with the ultimate "I've been partying for 2 weeks straight" hangover, I've been on a health kick. Fresh Nikes on feet, I have been religiously hitting the gym three days a week, not going down any stairs to enjoy a beverage (all the bars in Whis are underground) and eating a well balanced diet. I currently wake up every morning hangover free, and just recently completed my first 5k. Fabulous right?

Whoop dee doo. I have never been so bored in all my life, and if it weren't for the fear of winter skin in skimpy clothing, combined with my affinity for this season's baggy short, crop top look I'd throw in the towel right now. However, being the Gemini that I am, I'm determined to follow through with this extremist side of my dual personality. Welcome to the final days of my Coachella diet...all 14 of which will be Sugar Free.  Buh Bye cereal, Starbucks, and Mini Eggs. I better see major results or I may eat my entire Easter loot on the plane to Palm Springs. 

Here's my current Workout Playlist - all of these artists will also be at Coach!

1. Head Will Roll - Yeah Yeah Yeahs

2. Empire State of Mind - Jay-Z

3. Black and Blue - Mike Snow

4. Violent and Young - Iglu & Hartly

5. Stillness is the Move - Dirty Projectors

6. Ghost - Deadmau5

7. Sleepyhead - Passion Pit

8. Quicksand - La Roux

9. Home - Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros

10. Crystalised - The XX

11. Lebanese Blonde - Thievery Corporation

12. Run This Town - Jay-Z

13. Animal- Mike Snow

14. In For The Kill - La Roux

15. Sexy Bitch - David Guetta

16.  Hide and Seek - Imogen Heap

17. Lisztomania - Phoenix