Revving Up for Event Day

My event in 2 weeks starts at 8:00 a.m. As you can probably gather, most event planning work is done before an event (hence the term planning!). Once you're on-site, it's monitoring and problem-solving but if you're not well-prepared, there is only so much you can do. So the day before, and the morning of, are critical.


If I'm low on sleep, I will barely make it through the event. I know, I've tried. So I have a system (of course). There is no sleeping in on weekends during events season. For a recent event, I started to go to bed early 4 nights prior: 10 p.m. to get up at 6 a.m. then 9 p.m. to get up at 5 a.m. Not too tough.

But my upcoming event requires a 4 a.m. alarm which seems so much worse than 5 a.m. I plan on starting my sleeping regiment for that day five days prior working my way up in 30 minute intervals. Extreme, you think? Not to me on the night before, when I can easily fall asleep at 8 p.m., have 8 hours of peaceful rest before a 18 hour day leading production, staff, volunteers and attendees.

Don't underestimate the power of sleep! If you have any other tricks (chamomile tea, anyone?), I'd love to hear them before I start my regiment!

Balancing Better

I find that one of the greatest challenges in my life is balancing. Perhaps that is why I enjoy yoga so much. I'm fairly good at tree pose and when I raise my foot to my thigh and put my hands in prayer position, I finally feel balanced, centered. That and the 10 minute nap at the end of class. Yet as soon as I step that foot off the yoga mat, the to-do list comes rushing back.

In the next month I'll be handling a conference for 400 lawyers, an expo for 4,000 actors, an all-day affair for 150 women executives, and a move from two apartments into one. In addition, I'm helping my significant other with his ongoing grad school applications, my singing group with their fundraising and promotional efforts and following up on proposals I've just finished for spring events.

I take breaks from these work efforts by thinking about trick-or-treating with my niece, and planning a reunion of friends at my sister's home in Pennsylvania and upcoming trips to New Orleans, Barcelona and Denver. But this just means that the brain is still churning! Perhaps I should take up meditation. Or medication?

What do you think? Any ideas? How do you get balanced and centered?

Here Goes Something!

Once upon a time, I was an avid journal and letter scribe, but since joining the working world and churning out an email each minute, the enthusiasm for writing had waned and the journals now sit on a shelf gathering dust.

A year ago my best friend moved to Ireland and started a blog (visit it here: http://deejkat.blogspot.com/) and I was introduced to the weblog world. Each day I visit the page, hoping for the next hysterical installment. I certainly don't envision anyone searching out my entries with the same obsession but I like the idea of throwing one's thoughts out to the world and seeing what boomerangs back.

So a little bit more about me just in case I lose interest and/or time and don't write again for a while.

I grew up in Babylon Village, Long Island, NY and attended college at Towson University in Maryland. I've been living in the NY metro area since then (Brooklyn and Hudson County, NJ) and working in NYC until starting my home-based event planning company a year and a half ago (www.gingerdonnanevents.com). I love what I do (except maybe at midnight after an 18-hour event day) and feel like I'm living my dream life. I just hope no one pinches me. My friends, family and colleagues/clients are very important to me, and I cherish opportunities to expand the circle, so I invite you to comment on my posts and introduce yourself!

Till then, take care.