Kelly's Portrait Headshots - Jacksonville FL Business Photographer

I've known Kelly from Toastmasters, a public-speaking club, when I used to be a member there. She excels in the Humorous Speech category, and I'm not surprised to find out that she's also a stand-up comedian at our local Comedy Zone! Kelly needed pictures for her website, business card, and one also for the Toastmasters event program. I'm glad our schedule worked out, and that we were able to do the photo-shoot at a park and also inside the Comedy Zone. Thank you, Kelly, for having me take your portraits!

Enjoy!
xoxo

Deerwood Toastmaster Sweeped Area 60 Contest!

Deerwood Toastmasters did very well at the Area 60 contest last night against other fine clubs such as the Beaches Area TM, Osprey TM, and Ponte Vedra Beach TM.  Our member, Wayne Blackburn, won 1st place for the International Speech category, and I was amazed I won 1st place for the Table Topics category.  The International Speech is more of a prepared speech, and it is between 5-7 minutes long.  Table Topics is an impromptu speech that is between 1-2 minutes long.  This is my kind of speech--just off the cuff :)

We move on to the Division contest level on Friday, April 17th, at UNF. Wish us good luck! :)

Visit www.toastmasters.org to find out more about Toastmasters and check out District 84's website, as well, for local info.

Wayne and I


Deerwood TM members came to support us!

2nd Place Is Not So Bad

As many of you know already, I am in Toastmasters and as much as I hate public speaking, I really love this club!! We had our Evaluation Speech contest today, and I was one of the four contestants to evaluate Wayne's speech. I gave my best shot, although, I rushed my conclusion part because I was running out of time. I thought I was a goner then, but apparently, my speech was good enough to win 2nd place :) Our Membership of Education officer, Sandra, won first place, and she did a phenomenal job with her speech! We both get to compete at the area level, which will be on Oct. 3rd. I also got to see a friend of ours, Rob, win the Humorous Speech contest in his area level two weekends ago. Yay for Toastmasters! From the area level, the winner will move forward to the Division contest which will be on the weekend that I will be in NYC for an engagement session. Hey--now the pressure is off!

That's Madam President To You ;-)

As of July 1st, I officially became the President for the Deerwood Toastmasters Club :) After only being in the club for almost a year now, I decided to run for the President position for 2008-2009. The title is a bit intimidating, but I have a lot of great visions for this club besides to keep improving my speaking abilities and organizing my ideas and thoughts fluently. There are always areas for improvement and ways to sharpen my leadership skills, and I firmly believe that joining Toastmasters has made me stronger and face my fear of public speaking boldly.

The English language is not my native tongue, and I joined this club to also help me with my grammatical skills. I am glad that I did join, and I want to give a shout out to my mom for encouraging my brother to join Toastmasters in Fort Myers a couple of years ago, and my brother for "pestering" me to join last year. In turn, I encourage everyone to check out your local Toastmasters club. You can find out more about the Deerwood Toastmasters Club at our website.

I am looking forward to a great year and am blessed with wonderful people in my club. We constantly have new faces, and it's invigorating to see new members join us with full passion and energy to succeed in public speaking as well. Below are the pictures from our club meeting today. Our Area Governor for Division F, District 84, Fred Haley, had graced us with his presence and went over our club goals.

Wayne won the Best Speaker award on his first speech, and I am so proud of him!

2008-09 Club Officers. From L-R: Fred Haley, Kathleen Hazard (VP Membership), Me, Bob Frey (2nd Sergeant at Arms), Doug Polen (Secretary), and Ricky Shook (Treasurer). Missing in the picture are Sandra Murphree (VP Education), Kenyonn Demps (VP Public Relations), and Roger Galler (Sergeant at Arms).

Losing Is A Good Thing!

Or not..maybe I'm just psyching myself out. I truly enjoy being in the Toastmasters club, but there have been times that I just want to avoid it. It's been almost a month since our Area contest for Table Topics took place, and well, I lost.... Sure, I gained the experience, but I thought I did really well on my impromptu speech. Bobby and our friends were there to cheer me on and several people came to me after the speech and told me that I did well and that the speech was great. Unfortunately, it was not great enough... Out of three contestants, I got to go first and went home without a trophy. Honestly, I was so crushed that I threw myself a pity party for a week. I was there to represent the Deerwood Club, and I dreaded going to the next club meeting. Hesitantly, I went ahead and took advantage of my stage time anyway and signed up to be one of the speaker's evaluators. I had to give an impromptu evaluation speech, and the "Best Evaluator" wins a ribbon. Surprisingly, I won a ribbon that day. You would think that would have had helped me gain confidence all over again with public speaking, but here I am writing a blog instead of preparing for my speech on Wednesday. I hate writer's block and preparing speeches. I'm no MLK, JFK nor FDR--I stink on speeches. All these negative thoughts and insecurities started to creep up again...so therefore, I took a break from my writer's block. I opened my email and read Jon Gordon's "positive newsletter" to distract myself. The video clip in his email is really powerful, and I was blown away by its message... how fitting to how I feel right now... Okay, losing is a good thing.. failing is a good thing....

Enjoy the video (and wish me luck on my speech!)

http://www.jongordon.com/liferisk.html

Here's a picture of Manj and I at the Area Contest. We both represented the Deerwood Club that night. The lady on the right is Linda Deshauteurs, our Division Governor:

Toastmasters Officer Training

My dear brother always asked me to join a local Toastmasters club here in Jacksonville since the beginning of last year, and I always resisted to his advice. I promised him that after my wedding in May 2007, I would give it a try and check out the one close to my old work in Deerwood area. I clam up when I speak in front of people, and I always wondered why, oh why, would I ever pay club dues to something that I am most afraid of and pretty much, another stress addition to my life...lo and behold, here I am and after 6-7 months in the club, I have given several speeches, facilitated the meeting, and even won a 2nd place trophy for our Table Topics (impromptu speaking) contest back on January 16th. I am also the Public Relations, VP for our own chapter.

Being a Toastmaster is something I truly enjoy, and I know that there is still a lot of room for improvement with my public speaking and especially with my English grammar. English is only my second language. Being in this supportive environment really helps motivate me to reach for my own club goals, become a successful speaker and overall, a business person. Besides, being in the club will also help me in other aspects of life and just not with the Corporate world. I am confident that my public speaking experiences will help help me tremendously when it's time for me to give my photo presentation at JU on Feb. 12th (which, I'm still very stoked with my professor's invitation!).

This past Saturday, I had the chance to attend the Toastmasters Officer Training at the Bank of America corporate office here in Jacksonville. I got to meet and network with many people, so that's always good :) I also found out that JU now has its own Toastmasters chapter, and I can't wait to check that club out next month. Please check out the Toastmasters site, and feel free to send me an email if you have any questions about the club. I strongly recommend Toastmasters for everyone, and I guarantee that you will see a difference in your life :-)

xoxo


The Public Relations, VP officer training class:

Stacey (right) getting her certificate for facilitating our officer training class:
Our chapter's president, Lenny, and I representing Area 19 :)