Record Numbers

Congratulations to Chris Scheele for reaching his goal of becoming an Eagle Scout. Chris's Eagle Scout project was collecting, boxing and shipping shoes to One World Running. He ended up with 1,150 pairs, which were sent off in two shipments: one to Haiti, the other to Ghana.

Chris now has the record for most shoes collected by an individual in one shipment, although Jillian Roberts is closing in on him for total number of shoes.

All of us involved with the project say "Thank you" to Chris, and wish him the best in the years to come.

2008 One World Running Shoe Report

Thanks to the many people from around the nation who donated shoes in 2008, One World Running has collected, sorted and washed roughly 16,300 pairs of shoes this year. The donations range from one pair to more than 2,000 pairs. All are valuable, are all are used, and all are kept out of landfills. We try to send out one shipment per month, with smaller numbers of shoes going to needy children and adults with the help of runners and NGOs traveling to various locales.

January


The year started out with our first shipment to a Catholic school outside of Havana, Cuba. The shoes were distributed on the Feast of the Three Kings with the help of Florida businessman who travels there legally. The nuns at the school made sure that each student received a pair of shoes, as part of their holiday gift. That donation was such a success that we received a request for another shipment that included 112 pairs of baseball cleats, as well as running shoes.

February


In February, shoes were sent to Honduras, for distribution in a school for boys in Tela and Haiti, with an NGO focusing on developing solar energy.

March


Shoes were distributed outside of Kathmandu, Nepal, by a group of American trekkers and climbers who travel there yearly.

April


El Salvador The El Salvador shipment went with a larger group of volunteers from around Colorado who brought down a large amount of donations. A series of sprint races were put on at a school in the Soyopongo neighborhood of San Salvador.

May


Belize and Colombia The Belize race was done with the help of Special Olympics Belize. Ana Weir, our volunteer director, went to Belize City to put on the race. It was a big event in the country, with Ana doing TV and radio interviews. The U.S. ambassador to Belize sent us a nice letter. The 2009 Belize City race is set for March 27. Anyone wishing to come down to help out can contact ana at anaweir@yahoo.com

June


Mali, West Africa, and Ceren, El Salvador University of Colorado professor Payson Sheets brought the shoes to Ceren, where he is doing archeological work at a site called the "Pompeii of Central America," because it was covered by volcanic ash in 563 A.D. The shoes for Mali were shipped with the help of an American Airlines pilot who travels there.

July


Haiti, with the Colorado Haiti Project, which is building a school in the small town of Petit de Tropes. Boulder Road Runner Pat Petersen graciously took the shoes to Haiti.

September


Kenya Kenyan runner Peter Tanui, a former elite who now helps out runners, brought the shoes back and distributed them to school children in the Nandi Hills near Eldoret, the birthplace of so many runners and the scene of the riots earlier this year.

October


South Africa and Ghana, with the help of volunteers Josh Davis and his wife, Sarah, both runners living in Vail. The Ghana shipment was coordinated by volunteer David Pestolozzi.

November


Kenya and Yateras, Cuba. A shipment was sent down with a group of volunteers that puts on the annual MaraYateras 8K in a small town in the mountains 15 miles from Guantanamo. This community run was a big success, with close to 500 people turning out, including many kids. Shoes were also distributed at the Havana Marathon. Shoes were also distributed at a school in Kibera, a poor neighborhood on the outskirts of Nairobi.

December


Nicaragua, Haiti and the Boys' Club of Denver. A new ultra race is being put on Dec. 14 on Ometepe, the large island in the middle of Lake Nicaragua. The shoes were taken by ultra runners traveling to Ometepe, to be distributed at a children's race to be held in conjunction with the ultra. A large batch of running shoes, along with T-shirts and soccer cleats, was sent as part of a 19,000-pound shipment of humanitarian aid going to several NGOs working in Haiti. Finally, 100 pairs of shoes and 100 T-shirts donated by race director Barry Siff went to the Boys Club of Denver, to be given to inner city youth as an encouragement to exercise.

Finally, the last shipment of 2008 is set for a new Mayan cultural center near Tulum, Mexico.

Thanks again to everyone who helped, donated and contributed to these efforts this year. They are much appreciated.

TIER 0 ALLSTAR AF1





WE ARE GOING TO BE THE ONLY ACCOUNT IN PHOENIX TO BE GETTING THESE DONT SLEEP!!!!!!!

HIGHPOINT

ALL STAR AF1





THESE ARE GOING TO BE RELEASED EXCLUSIVLY AT HIGHPOINT ON THE 15TH!

10 Hour Sale on Bluefly.com

I just got an email in my inbox from Bluefly. For 10 hours only they are having a $99.99 shoe sale! You'll find brands such as Stuart Weitzman, Elie Tahari, March Jacob, Theory and more! Score yourself some amazing deals like these gorgeous peep toe pumps by Nanette Lepore.





To visit the sale just click here. Enjoy!

Bingo!

A colleague is about to install a light-coloured carpet. I suggested she should insist on shoes being removed in the house. She said she already did this.

Good for her.

Frugal Friday

Today I thought I'd post another edition of Frugal Friday. This edition is brought to you once again by Payless. Payless is featuring some incredibly cute styles right now AND what makes things even better is that they are currently having a sale of up to 30% off select Spring merchandise. See below for some of my top picks. If you do find a pair or two or three that you love I highly suggest ordering from the website. I know when I've tried to find some of the styles in the store I haven't been able to. Happy shopping everyone! (Fair warning, not all pairs featured are on sale. Remember I did say select.)




Who needs a boat when you've got these adorably nautical inspired finds? Both are ultra feminine. The first, a seersucker wedge adorned with woven ribbon detail and a satin upper. The second, a fabric flat featuring tiny polka dots and a sweet bow to decorate the tops of your toes.







Look pretty in pink (coral) with these beauties. The Jorja Slingback with it's shiny patent leather and jeweled accent will add a fab pop of color to your spring basics and the Sassy Espadrille will have you kicking up your heels in comfort and style.





Cara Scrunch Bow Flat

Pretty, pretty green in rich shades of mint and sage. Adore the Carmelita Peep Toe. The contrast leather piping and flirty bow paired with a fabric upper and 3.5 inch heel. The Cara Flat looks fabulously comfortable and the package is all tied up with a pretty knotted bow.

Stay tuned everyone. Tomorrow promises even more offerings as Frugal Friday continues into Saturday. Y'all come back now, ya hear?

Muscle Tension Release In Ballet - Magnesium!

For success in ballet, sports and fitness, strong muscle tone must also result in fluid movement. This requires the minimal tension needed to execute a ballet movement, or ballet position, or a physical move as required in sports training. Magnesium is a nutritional super star. It improves function in the brain, bones and muscles. In team sports, advanced ballet in pointe shoes and pas de deux, magnesium is part of the nutrition that enhances ballet/sports/fitness success.

Magnesium is present in most of your body cells. It plays a starring role as a co-factor, meaning, it assists enzymes in catalysing (a catalyst is a substance that initiates or accelerates a chemical reaction without itself being affected) many necessary chemical reactions.

Magnesium affects many things that your ballet and sports require of you, physically, emotionally, and intellectually. Here's a short list:

- nerve conduction, or the sending and receiving of messages affecting muscle response
- muscular movement affecting fluidity, accuracy and coordination
- bone metabolism, affecting your growth and development, as well as your immune system
- protein manufacture in the body which is extremely complex
- fat and carbohydrate metabolism. A new frontier being researched now is magnesium in relation to insulin resistance, which, once that condition begins, makes it harder to stay thin
- glucose utilization, affecting brain power and muscle power

Whether your goals in ballet/sports/fitness are personal and recreational, or professional, I'm sure you would want all the points made above functioning for optimum results in your muscles and brain.

Because magnesium allows the muscle contractions that occur to turn off, it helps control tension and spasms caused by over training, heavy practice or rehearsal days, and inaccurate technique.

Magnesium supplements can be bought in tablet or powder form. Always read labels, and select brands that do not have anything else added, except maybe fruit flavoring from natural sources that you recognize. Powdered magnesium digests faster. It's usually a good idea to take half the recommended dosage for a couple of days, to let your body get used to a nutrient that has been deficient. Magnesium can loosen the bowels at first, but that effect goes away within a day or so. Magnesium carbonate has the biggest affect this way. Magnesium citrate and magnesium lactate are known to digest better.

Because of the relaxing effect magnesium has, you may sleep more deeply, and high blood pressure may lower towards normal. Even irregularities of the heart muscle can be helped by magnesium.

Many flavoring foods are high in magnesium: dill, chives, celery seed, spearmint, sage, coriander and basil. Put fresh into salads or chopped and sprinkled on vegetables, meat or fish, these are all delicious.

So for strong bones, good muscle tone (which requires proper relaxation for strength), getting enough rest, and staying calm, eat magnesium! Best obtained from fresh foods, yet very helpful as a food-sourced supplement, it is a super star silent partner in your ballet/sports/fitness training.

Learn the different ways of achieving muscle tension release.

You Like Me- You REALLY Like Me!


Well well well... my first "award"... I truly couldn't be more flattered. So thank you to Jenna from VBS blog for mentioning me! YAY!

So here's my top ten favorietest, most wonderfulliest, FABULOUS blogs!!

4.  Wendy B

Check 'um out you guys. They truly are fabulous. :)


The rules for this award are: (not that I for one second expect any of you busy bloggers to do this... but IF you wanna...)

-Put the logo on your blog or post.
-Nominate at least 10 blogs which you think are fabulous.
-Be sure to link to your nominees within your post.
-Let them know that they have received this award by commenting on their blog.
-Share the love and link to this post and to the person from whom you received your award.

Scrunchy Scrunch

No- don't worry, I'm not going to talk about how I think scrunchies are making a come back. They're not.
...unless Margiela comes out with one, then I'm sure we'll all be blogging about them, right?










Anyway! So I rocked my Sass & Bide black rats for the first time today and I love them. Even my dad liked them! Haha. Is that a good thing? 
I paired my new leggings with my favorite bad ass bootie of all times- my Sam Edelman "Balenciagas"... hehe

Let's Warm Up With Some Hot Choos!

Baby it is cold outside. Ice. Snow. All day. We're expecting 8 more inches overnight tonight. What better way to warm up those insides than a cup of hot cocoa paired with an even hotter pair of Choos!


I die. The color here is absolutely gorgeous. I don't know what it is but I have been semi obsessed with finding the perfect pair of olive hued shoes. Consider this a new neutral. You could pair these with anything for instant chic. Pair them with color, pair them with your neutrals, this sandal is simply stunning and timeless too.



Patent Leather Sandal

Wow. This is a great cage heel with an almost web like appearance. The unique shape and strappy details combine to create a dazzling sandal. Oh yes and then there is the back zip those designers over at JC seem to be loving sooo much this season. I love it too and I love these Choos!

Taking my own Oath of Office









In these dismal economic times, shopping for pleasure has landed in the frivulous department when prioritizing life.

With that said, I must take the pledge President Obama extended to us all and become more personally responsible...he said something like that or close to it:)

At any rate, I am taking that pledge personally and admit that I need to get some things straight financially. So, to fulfill my desire to look at beautiful clothes, I decided to look no further than my own closet.

If you get the urge to buy something that you have no business buying, follow my lead and shop in your own closet. You will be amazed what fabulous things you may have pushed to the dark corners of your closet. This is especially true with shoes, because if you are like me...you keep your shoes in a hermetically sealed room with temperatures not exceeding 76 degrees.

Okay, that's pushing it...but I do go to Big Lots and buy clear shoe containers for most of my shoes. The problem is I keep my shoes on the top shelf of my closet to make room for nonsense on the floor. Above eye-level shelving makes it easy to forget what great shoes you may have found on sale.

I am dragging this out, aren't I? The point is I just rediscovered some fabulous shoes in my closet and decided to share. Most come from Marshall's because I am a believer in their shoe department. I am a living witness that they have the same shoes that are in department stores for alot less.

So enjoy my shoe eye candy. This is not by far even a fraction of my shoe collection but these are my favorites at this very moment. Notice, the same shoe in different colors. I am trying to kick that habit:) Consider it kicked!

I also included pics of a few finds I stumbled upon at the H&M in Philly...gosh I love H & M! Come to Texas please!

If you feel so inclined...go shopping in your own closet! What great treasures are lurking under your bed or in a downstairs closet?!?...better yet, go shopping in your friend's closet! See what they have, that they are willing to part with:)

P.S....Don't hate on the blue suede fringe shoes by Calvin Klein...I can't count the number of ways I would rock those babies! My yellow dress, or maybe a blazer and sknny jeans or a purple skirt and wife beater and blazer! OH the possiblities!

Holy Skyscrapers Batman!





...and I thought I had some high shoes. This bitch is putting my ass to shaaaaaame.

I said GODDAMN! These are re-dic.

(images: foto decadent)

*Drool



These Giambattista Valli's are sick in the head. Like, seriously could they be hotter? Um, no- I'm thinking not.

I loved those florescent shoes he did that the Olsen trolls were trotting around in last year, and these are a great follow up! I love the height of the platform in front, and how its smaller than the rest of the forepart.

What else do I love about this shoe you ask? Well, I'm glad you asked. I love the cream color- I think it's perfect. I love the dark brown platform with the cream. I love the pitch of the shoe and how it looks devastatingly high! I also love the slight almond shape to the toe- I hate witchy pointy toes.

I found these on lusiaviaroma for €600

Choo Choo! (Part Deux)


Cuba Elaphe Snake Sandal


The powers that be over at Jimmy Choo call this color, foundation. How utterly perfect as this shoe could certainly become the "foundation" of your Spring/Summer wardrobe. (I'm so sorry for that. I couldn't resist.) More snakeskin. More back zip. More hotness. More delicate straps criss crossing at the vamp. Yumminess personified.



Paxton Rainbow Snake Sandal

OMG, Carrie Bradshaw would so rock this sandal. There is something so appealing about the rainbow color pallette. They are really tapping in to my inner 80's rocker chick. I really love them and you know you are bound to garner all kinds of attention when you step out in these.



Leather Sandals

Get your gladiator on in this leather sandal. With the corded leather straps and the gold hardware adornments trickling down the top of your foot, this shoe will transform any look into something fierce. You'll be a force to be reckoned with and look utterly stylish to boot.

What is Your Protein Requirement As A Ballet Dancer

I talk to both athletic (mostly ballet dancers) and non-athletic dieters frequently. It seems that both groups do not know how much protein they should eat every day, or every meal. If your goal is burning stored fat, cutting down on food intake should not be done carelessly. I am not a weight loss expert, but here is some general information to help you sort out your own dieting decisions.

After noticing recently that the subject of what is your protein requirement was being mentioned in many quarters around me, I got curious. We all know that protein is important, but we are also barraged with conflicting information in our culture, like the following:

*** eating too much meat is bad for you
*** soy is better than meat because it is lower in calories
*** fish is better than meat because it has better oils (omega 3 fatty acids)
*** don't eat fish more than twice a week because it is contaminated with mercury and other industrial chemicals
*** eating egg yolks raises your "bad" cholesterol levels
*** butter is just fat, don't eat it
*** killing animals and eating them is murder
*** even eating animal products like milk and eggs is abusive and we shouldn't

You see how crazy this can get, in terms of contradictions. Some of what I wrote above is true, but how and why? How do we find balance? We have indeed polluted our food sources with industrial chemicals, herbicides, pesticides and more. Slaughterhouses are indeed horribly cruel and do not need to be. All the "bad" can be changed.

Get the best food you can. Use a Body Mass Index calculator to determine your lean weight, and then a protein calculator to find out what your protein requirement is, based on your lean weight.

I did a search using Google with the phrase "protein intake for ballet dancers". I recommend that you read the first page of articles, all of them. I wanted to pick one, choosing a particular angle on this subject, but I didn't because it is a giant puzzle and the pieces need to be put together for you, by you.

If you choose a regimented diet where someone else makes the food, allowing you to have (artificial) sweets and (non-fat) carbs, with starch thickened non-fat sauces, I doubt you are eating anything close to your protein requirement. Also, these foods are not fresh, and who knows if they retain even ten percent of their vitamin and mineral content. So this route to weight loss is really starving yourself, and pretending that you're not. And when you starve yourself, your body will start dissolving itself to get the required nutrients in the right places in order to maintain. You WILL lose weight.

Your choice then might be to cut out ALL empty carbs, meaning white bread, pasta, crackers, potatoes, and of course sweets. That leaves you room for your protein requirement, or at least some more of it, in every meal or snack.

Fresh meats, poultry, eggs and fish are good for you, in general. Trim the fat from the meats and poultry. You will still ingest a small amount of animal fat, which your body requires to function. If you are eating salmon or tuna eat the fat and skin. Those have omega 3 fatty acids in them, which are also essential for health.

Some of the newer information about dieting is that changing calorie intake, a little, on a daily basis, is better for weight loss. Because your body can get used to anything, and will modify your metabolism to slow down when you eat fewer calories, you can trick it by not giving it the same number every day, so that there is no exact routine for it to get used to.

The goal of staying thin while getting your protein requirement, for a growing child or adult athletes and ballet dancers, and burning stored fat, is complex. Who has the time to become an expert?

Personally, I think you do. With the internet and all of the amazing information at hand, you can learn, gradually, what you need to know. I could write a book for every sentence I wrote in this article. Others already have, so I won't.

Investigate why egg yolks and butter are good for you. Investigate why artificially sweetened sodas make you crave carbs. Investigate why prepared foods full of MSG for flavor might be related to brain damage like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, or dementia and memory loss. Investigate the real deal on using soy as protein food.

If you are being treated for a disease, please follow your doctor's recommendations, but also keep looking for information for yourself. Figure out what is your protein requirement, learn about burning stored fat, and sort out your own dieting decisions.

Baby Shower!





So last night I went to what turned out to be the most awesome baby shower I've ever been to. It was actually more of a cocktail party staring a very cute pregnant friend of mine! I've honestly never been in a room with that many women in my life- my friend Heidi has more girl friends than girls I've met, I swear. There were a few subtle baby games and a station where you could decorate onesies bibs and burping cloths. 
My favorite was the bellini bar! 

Anyway, I rocked my Nicholas Kirkwoods and this super cute skirt I picked up at Forever 21. I love this Thomas Wylde clutch too- spices up any outing. Arrrgh  ;)


New Reeboks!

Old school Pumps and Ladies Top Downs and FS High Bikerchick.

Nike Lazy - Savage Denim Dunk High


Are now on consignment. If you have a measly 800 chillin, come scoop, only 12 pairs made.

banjo

Great Success! (said, of course, in Borat accent)

You guys, I seriously couldn't be happier right now. I had my Harajuku Lovers approval meeting at Gwen's house today and she LOVED the line!! I'm so pumped. It turned out great and I'm super happy with it. :)
I wanted to get a pic taken of us and the shoes but I just can't work up the nerve to do it. Ha ha ha. I'm such a nerd.

We did these super cute moccasins with cool color combos, preppy mary janes with chunky heels and multi color strap, our own version of Doc Martins, wellingtons (so cute!) and some 80's inspired stuff that I love. I can't show you pictures yet- but I will after the show the first week of February. 

I wore my Yokoo scarf and Gwen loved it. I'm still madly in love with my Stellas too. <3
It rained all day and I didn't get to eat- but my spirits were as high as ever. YAY!

xox