Are you feeling charitable during the Holiday season? Visit us at LAE and join us in the giving spirit! We're continuing our tradition of The Giving Tree. The tree sponsors women and children in need in our community during the holidays. Come into our spa and pick an item or items off of our tree and bring in the unwrapped gift back to LAE! For your generosity you will receive a $10 gift card for any service at LAE!
Follow the link to our Facebook event for more information. This event also truly showcases inner beauty in our spa and our way of giving back. It also gives you an opportunity to do the same! We hope you have been inspired by our blog and want to inspire others by participating in our giving tree. Also, look forward to a "Beauty Is" Christmas special! For the next week we will be showcasing inner beauty spotlights that have to do with giving back on the holidays! Email us at laebeautyinc@gmail.com for any suggestions!
Phebe Albert has been volunteering at a MDA camp for the past 4 summers. It is a one-week over-night camp with children under the age of 18 who have muscular dystrophy. It is a progressive physical disorder in which your muscles deteriorate over a long period of time. At a young age, you can function normally, but as you grow older your muscles atrophy. There is, however, a huge range of different versions of this disorder.
Phebe got involved for service hours in High School, but got inspired enough to come back every year. She also participates in runs or walks in the Tampa Bay area for the cause and will continue to do so in the future.
It’s the kids that keep her coming back. You form real relationships with the children. During Christmas time they all friend request her on Facebook asking the next time they get to see her.
Especially now since the children know her, they all have their inside jokes just like at any other summer camp. One particular kid, Cody, has always had a secret crush on Phebe and asks her to dance at the camp’s end of the week dance. He has been coming to the camp for two years, the last year he did not know whether he would be able to come back. But when he did, the first thing he told Phebe was that she was the only reason he did come back. This touching statement came from a boy who has a speech impairment when in stressful situations, a very inspiring experience for Phebe.
For those afraid or nervous of working with children with disability, she recommends not to be intimidated by people’s differences, but to embrace them and often times you find yourself a lot more comfortable than you thought you’d be. “Just because they’re in a wheelchair doesn’t make them any less significant as a friend than anyone else.”
She encourages people to be more active causes such as MDA. “When you work directly with a certain population you get really inspired,” says Phebe. She recommends you consider working for fundraisers or programs for any camp for a good cause, “it really brings out the best in a lot of people.” Phebe will receieve a $20 gift certificate for her generosity at LAE Beauty Inc.
One of the many great non-profit organizations around the Gainesville area is HOPE, HOrses Helping PEople, Inc.. HOPE was started in July of 2000 as a backyard program and has grown tremendously over the years and now is located on 40 acres right outside of Gainesville on Archer. A local physical therapist started HOPE with the goal of being able to enrich the lives and experiences of those living with disabilities.
HOPE gives the opportunity to patients, “riders” as they call them, to step out of their daily routine of multiple doctor office visits and clinical settings. When they are at HOPE, riders do not even realize they are having therapy, they just think they are learning to ride a horse. As of now, HOPE offers occupational therapy instead of physical therapy but their future goal is to offer physical and speech therapy in addition to occupational therapy. There are about 25 riders who come to HOPE each week for therapy.
On top of the services they offer at the farm, they have Pony Pals program, which helps them serve people who aren’t able to come to the farm. They take their miniature horse, Rocky, to residents at nursing homes and assisted living facilities.
While interviewing Kristen Shimeall, the executive director at HOPE, she said that if she could describe HOPE in one word that it would be inspiring. Shimeall elaborated saying “to watch the strength that our families have facing the obstacles they have had put in front of them by having a family member with a disability is just amazing and that always inspires me.”
As HOPE has grown into such a big and amazing facility, so has their staff. They have four different directors, two occupational therapists, several riding instructors, and two farm managers. In addition to their staff, they have about 100 volunteers a semester. Since horses require attention 24 hours a day, 7 days a week their volunteers are completely necessary and utilized. Shimeall explains that their fundraisers could not be put on without the help of their volunteers and HOPE can not thank their volunteers enough for their hardwork and dedication to making HOPE a better place in every aspect at the farm.
HOPE has blessed the lives of many riders and we can only hope that it's success continues as while as it's inspiring therapy in the future. Kristen Shimeall, executive director at HOPE, will be receiving a complementary $20 gift certificate at LAE for her hard work and dedication at HOPE for the past 3 years.
Being a mother is one of the most difficult jobs a woman can have. Even more challenging is being the mother of 130 college kids. Donna Land, House Director and House “Mom” of Alpha Tau Omega has done exactly that.
Donna has been a significant part of the ATO experience. This experience shapes theses young men’s college careers and will have a lasting effect on their entire life. Donna understands this and makes a significant effort to ensure every brother leaves college with a positive experience. Her effort begins with the pledge process and continues up until graduation.
During the pledge process, Donna attends the weekly meetings to offer advice such as etiquette. Although some of these manners are obscure, they are incredibly useful in living the gentlemanly principles upon which the fraternity was founded. In addition to her advice during pledging, Donna continues to be a valuable source of advice once initiated. Her array of life experiences make her a unique source for advisement.
A small example of her thoughtfulness and kindness is her approach to Gator game days. Game Days are a joyous occasion at Alpha Tau Omega where they enjoy entertaining all active brothers, recent alumni, older alumni, and sorority girls. To make this day special Donna spends her time setting up the dining room for the quests with orange and blue tablecloths, napkins, and even breath mints! She also pays special attention to each of the guests by engaging in conversations.
Overall, Donna is a dedicated house director. Additionally, and more importantly, she’s a delightful individual. “When thinking back on all of our interactions, there was not once when she wasn’t smiling,” Stewart Sedgewick said.
Even though she deals with irrational and wild college kids everyday, she genuinely views each of the brothers as one of her sons, providing each with the same motherly attention. Her inner beauty is contagious. You can see it in her smile, in her words and her actions. LAE Beauty will be rewarding Donna with a $20 gift certificate under her name to go towards a service of her choice.
The media has forced unrealistic pressure of perfection onto society. Because of this, many people struggle with confidence issues throughout their lives, including Hello Perfect’s founder and PR Director. “Hello Perfect was founded to help others realize their own perfection and use their self love to accomplish their dreams."
The company has gotten tons of positive feedback since their foundation. Their target audience relates to females between the ages of 13 to 17, but their message is seen as universal.Hello Perfect uses a variety of mediums such as: Facebook, Twitter, their website, YouTube, and merchandise to reach their audience. Their main message is that “The challenge in life is not to become perfect, it’s accepting that you already are.” The founders of Hello Perfect believe that everyone has the potential to accomplish their dreams.
One definition of perfect that Angela Ribbler, Director of Public Relations for Hello Perfect, found most inspiring is from Michael Kors. As a high status celebrity and fashion icon, his definition read, “…Perfect is imperfect.”
Hello Perfect is running a campaign, which includes a DreamCatcher of the month. These individuals are people who are actively working towards accomplishing their goals. Hello Perfect features one a month to promote their passion and inspire others as well. “We have a variety of DreamCatchers, from future filmmakers, to fashion magazine editors, to photojournalists, and each has had a different journey and different inspirational message to share.”
The company also sells merchandise. The jewelry is designed by their founder, Alexa Carlin. Her manufactured necklaces and bracelets are called “OmniPeace by Alexa Rose." The profits from this line of jewelry go towards helping the OmniPeace mission of ending poverty in Africa by 2025. The also sell DreamCatcher V-neck T-shirts.
Those of us behind Beauty Is found Hello Perfect similar and inspiring. Our campaign is about reaching out to people to realize and embrace their inner beauty through selfless acts of kindness. Hello Perfect reaches the same message in a different light. Both of our campaigns are about viewing yourself as already beautiful, and already perfect. Which is why we feel honored featuring their cause and dedication to their work. Both the founder, Alexa, and Director of Public Relations, Angela, will receive a $20 gift certificate at LAE for their work spreading an important message to the community.
Vision is one of our most precious senses: Unexplainable to those without it; irreplaceable to those who have it. Ever since 1936, protecting the gift of sight became one of Delta Gamma Fraternity’s highest priorities. Delta Gamma's work for the visually impaired is unique in that it has answered the needs within the Gainesville community as well as in the international scene.
Delta Gamma's philanthropic purpose has been to stop blindness before it starts. For men and women for whom blindness is a fact, the mission has been to impact the quality of their lives in a myriad of positive ways. Delta Gammas have funded genetic research, low-vision adaptive devices, tapes, Braille books and hundreds of life-enhancing programs. Just last month, Delta Gamma at the University of Florida volunteered at the Gainesville Public Library to help with an event for the local visually impaired members of the Gainesville Area. This event was to raise awareness of the white cane laws that many people do not know about.
Another event that Delta Gamma holds is an annual Easter Egg hunt at a Gainesville elementary school, where visually impaired children, their friends, and family can all come and play in a bounce house, get their faces painted, do arts and crafts, and even search for eggs that make a chirping sound for the children to be able to find.
Fundraising through their annual Anchor Splash event is just one way that the Gamma Theta Chapter at the University of Florida gives back to Service for Sight and the Delta Gamma Foundation.
Pool day is the main event, and it consists of a themed synchronized swimming competition between all of the fraternities, and some sororities, on campus. With the help and participation of their coaches, each organization forms a team of 6-10 people who create and perform a five minute routine at the O’Connell Center pool, starting with a dance on the pool deck, and ending with a synchronized swim.
The 34th annual Anchor Splash was held in late September of this year, and the director of this event, Haley Sasser, said it was one of the most successful Anchorsplashes Delta Gamma has put on in a long time, raising more money than in the past. “Watching all of my sisters having a great time while raising awareness and funds for our foundation was amazing, and I can’t wait until Anchorsplash next year.”
LAE would like to offer the women of Delta Gamma Fraternity 15% off their next purchase at LAE when they mention this blog post.
When she walks into a room, you notice her. She radiates with a breathtaking smile that simply lights up a room. Her name is Bianca Lopez-Isa, and she is a second year psychology major who is a pre-dental student at the University of Florida. Ever since her sophomore year of high school, she has gone on an annual mission trip to the Dominican Republic. Her all-girls school, Academy of the Holy Names, in Tampa, Florida, started a foundation called Seeds of Hope 11 years ago; Seeds of Hope benefits a mission trip every year for the people of La Victoria, a city that is about 45 minutes from the Dominican Republic’s capital.
This mission trip Bianca attends is 7 days long, and this will be her fourth time going on it in the spring, despite the fact that she is in college now. The trip consists of fixing houses, distributing clothes and shoes, taking care of babies in the nutrition center, and also distributing clean water and food to the local families.
The trip is done through a program at the local church where families will come to for help, and in exchange for the help they receive from Seeds of Hope and this mission trip, the families volunteer at the church. All of the women who attend the mission trip stay with sisters in a convent.
Bianca Lopez-Isa says that it is the best and most rewarding seven days of her life. “I feel self-fulfilled knowing that I have helped the poorest people from my own culture.” She says that the Dominican people have taught her so much about life and about the true meaning of happiness, considering they are so poor and yet so happy.
True beauty shines from the inside out, and Bianca’s compassion for others and selflessness show every time you see her. Whether she is at the library studying or in the Dominican Republic fixing a house, her inner beauty is something that cannot be ignored.
