"You're a dirty hipster!"

So this title might need to be explained to those not on "Team Joy" of the Mary Kay Inspiring Stories program. The phrase came from my new friend, Amanda. We were on-set at an interview with one of the domestic abuse survivors and her two teenage sons. Here in the LA area, they style for boys seems to be the v-neck tee and skinny jeans. Very hipster. Well, back to the story. Amanda had been talking to the two sons and then said something along the lines of "you're a dirty hipster!" We were all kinda confused. She explained that where she is from that's a common term. From then on it just became an inside joke for Team Joy. 

So here's what I've been up to since the last time I blogged...

Tuesday: 

After a day of uploading our footage from Monday and reviewing it, we all decided to go to Hollywood! However, because we don't have cars here in California, we had to take the Metro, which gave us a few good stories to tell when we get home, haha. I saw the Hollywood sign from afar, a little bit of Madame Tussaud's, Kodak Theater, Grauman's Chinese Theater, and so much more! 

Wednesday: 

We traveled down to the Newport area to interview our third, and last, survivor, Robin. She was such an outgoing and fun woman and it's incredible to hear her story. It's so amazing to me how much joy these women have in their lives now and it's wonderful to get to know them and to hear their stories and to see them truly loving life now. While in the area we also took Robin and her two boys to the Newport beach, which was beautiful! 

Thursday:

All three of the women we interviewed joined us at the Kyoto Grand Gardens to do a group interview shoot. The gardens were a beautiful backdrop for the scene even if it was a little bit noisy. It was nice to see the survivors interacting with each other and telling their stories to one another.

Friday:

Yesterday, we were joined by the beautiful Alexa Vega! I didn't really know what to expect before meeting her but she is a very down-to-earth young woman who really showed an interest in the cause and what we were doing.  It was so much fun being on set with her and getting to know her! 

Today we are editing the doc and I'll be back home at Ashland University tomorrow night.

With Love,

Ashliegh

What up, LA!?

 I know this post is a bit delayed, as I've been in LA since Saturday afternoon; but I've been so busy with production and haven't had the time to find wi-fi!

So what have I been up to?...

Saturday:
I left Ohio at approximately 6:45 AM and then had a 4 hour layover in Minneapolis, MN. From there I flew to LAX and arrived here in LA at about 2 PM. From there I went to my hotel via the worst driver in the world. LA traffic is INSANE. Anyway, after arriving at the hotel, I crashed until my roommate, Micole, arrived and then we went out for pizza.

Sunday:
Production week starts! I am on Team Give Joy so our documentary focuses on how the domestic violence survivors have found joy through over coming what they have gone through. We received our narrators script and it seemed very....oh how do I put this...tampon commercial-ish. It was very happy and fluffy and people aren't going to take that seriously if the documentary is supposed to be about domestic violence. So as a team we spent our day revising the script and envisioning how we want our documentary to look.

For lunch, our team found a cute sushi place in Little Tokyo. I had the beset tempura I have EVER had. After production we also went to find this cute little MacnCheesy restaurant that received rave reviews from a few girls on another team. After walking about a mile on Los Angeles Avenue (which was an interesting experience, see below) we found it. Closed. Gooo team. So we ended up eating at Flames Medditeranian Grill which was DELICIOUS.

What I experienced on Los Angeles Avenue:
-The beginning of a Little Tokyo parade and almost being run over by army trucks in that parade
-Stepping over sleeping homeless people
-The WORST smell. Garbage and urine. *shivers*
-Psychos screaming at my team and I for being "snobby white women."
-People about to get it on at a bus stop (I pretttty sure I saw some money being exchanged also....)
-the end of that Little Tokyo parade....3 hours later. Yes. A THREE HOUR long parade. Imagine sitting through that one!

Monday:
After a quick tech training, we started interviewing a few of our subjects. The first woman we interviewed was  this beautiful, strong woman who radiated this glow about her. During the end of her interview she was talking about the peace she felt when she left the abusive relationship and you could almost feel this sense of peace enter and fill the room. The stories we heard from the women were so inspiring and emotional to hear.

Today:
Currently, I am sitting in a Starbucks stealing their wi-fi. Well, I guess it's not stealing since I did buy a drink and breakfast sandwich. That I stood in line for. I seriously thought I wasn't going to make it to the cashier. I'm not sure what today will hold production wise but I'm very excited for what the rest of this week will hold. I believe this evening a few of my new friends and I will be going to check out Hollywood!

With Love,
Ashliegh

Miss North Coast

Miss North Coast was held this past weekend in Brunswick, Ohio and I had the honor to compete with 11 other beautiful, talented, and intelligent young women. Congratulations to Jessica Nelson on winning the title of Miss North Coast. Jessica is such an inspiration to me because of her perseverance on her road to Miss Ohio. She's been competing for the past few years on the local level and this summer acquired the title of Miss Cuyahoga County and competed at Miss Ohio. Jess is very dedicated to her platform, P.E.T.S., and works with the Humane Society. Congrats, Jessica!

I had a wonderful time getting to know the newer girls competing and getting to know girls that I've competed with before better. Haley Marie and I instantly bonded at Miss Greater Cleveland/Cuyahoga County back in July and I had fun dancing with her in the dressing rooms while getting ready, hahaha. Haley has such a bubbly, warm personality and I can't wait to compete with her more! I also had so much fun competing with one of my friends, Amber Galloway. Amber and I became friends back in 2009 when I was the Canal Fulton's Olde Canal Days Queen and she was Brunswick's Old Fashioned Days Queen. We had a lot of fun during our year as festival queens. I am so happy that we were able to reconnect at Miss North Coast!

I won't be able to compete again until Miss Mansfield/North Central, which is usually in December (hopefully they don't change it!). So that gives me about 4-5 months to prepare. I plan on changing my talent...again. I feel like I do have a lot of different talents but I'm not SPECTACULAR at any of them; I dance many forms of dance; I baton twirl; I played flute for 8 years, oboe for 4 and trumpet for 2. Now if I could somehow make a movie in 90 seconds, I would totally chose that as my talent. I'll keep all my readers out there guessing for as to what I'll do next.;]

In other news, I leave Saturday morning for Hollywood! I am SO EXCITED for this wonderful opportunity! I am hoping to blog about my experiences in Hollywood and film-making so make sure to check in regularly next week!

With Love,
Ashliegh