Last night....

.....was a fantastic night. A group of us from work went to the American Marketing Association Crystal Awards. We were finalists in 10 categories so we all went to see if we would win. We knew we at least had to take home one - right?!? We started off the night walking around the room looking at the different entries that became finalists (scoping out the competition). Let me tell you the competition was pretty fierce. I entered the Kids' Fun Run into the Special Events/Nonprofit category. It is a huge project that takes place every year and it just so happens to be my project. Well, because the competition in my category was so good I just really had it in my mind that we were not going to win. One of the campaigns had Dr. Oz in it - how do you compete with an Oprah endorsement??? Anyway, around 7PM the opened the doors to the ball room and we all shuffled in to find our tables. Everyone had a little goody bag waiting for them on their chair, there were huge glitter "A's" on the stage, glittery floral centerpieces, so as you can tell everything was decked out. The theme for the night was "Bring your A game". As I look around, I can see the excitement building in everyone's eyes as they serve dinner and we get closer to finding out the winners. They bring out a couple speakers, introduce the judges (which are people that are advanced in the marketing field from all over the US) and then comes the entertainment. Let's just say that part was humorous and interesting. Dessert finally comes and they start announcing the winners, one by one. Luckily I didn't have to wait long to find out of the Kids' Fun Run won - it was the second category called. Low and behold they announce the Kids' Fun Run is the winner. Everyone at the table turned and of course I get all excited and they all start laughing because they just say it was all over my face how excited I was. So I walked up accepted the award on behalf of TCH and then hastily walk back to the table so I can be with my coworkers as they win their awards. It was such a fun night! Oh, in total we took home 6 Crystal Awards that are proudly displayed in our office. I work with a really talented group of people. I know the KFR wouldn't have come to life without everyone's help!

You can check out all the other winners if you are interested. Everyone really had great work! http://www.crystalawards.org/Current%20winners.shtml