Takeaways from TedxHalifax

Last Friday, I spent the day at the TedxHalifax event of TedxNovaScotia. It was a fully loaded and truly eclectic day. I don’t even know how I would begin to summarize the day, so I submit to you tidbits of notes and thoughts I had over the course of the day. Enjoy

• Make your own granola bars
• Bring more balance to your life – but it doesn’t have to happen in one day
• Must-have for next Ideas Fest: a big screen updated with tweets of the event
• Become native to a place (i.e. learn about plants and trees)
• Invest in hay
• Listen to more Jenn Grant
• Let your light shine like Ben Caplan
• Learn about seasonal cooking
• “Make your fridge reflect your core values”, i.e. eat cows that have a view.
• Community is about safe space
• Take the Woodside Ferry more often, and sit on the top deck

Not bad for a Friday, eh?

Le succès d'un premier dialogue pour anciens

...édition Chaleur et Péninsule Acadienne!

Lundi, nous avons eu notre « dialogue pour anciens » inaugural, au Restaurant et Martini Lounge Nectar, à Bathurst avec l’invitée spéciale Lise Ouellette, directrice générale de l’Association francophone des municipalités du Nouveau-Brunswick.

L’idée pour ces dialogues est surgit d’une succession d’entretiens avec nos anciens et anciennes ces derniers mois. Ce que nous en avons ressorti, c’est que les initiatives pour les anciens doivent créer des opportunités pour prendre part à des questionnements et dialogues d’importance, continuer leur apprentissage et construire des relations avec des pairs et leaders établis dans la région.

C’est ainsi que suite à une énoncer de quelques faits saignants sur l’enjeu de la réforme et de la gouvernance, et quelques pistes de réflexion sur la place et l’émergence du changement, nous nous sommes engagés à décortiquer ce grand thème en vue de nos perspectives et nos propres constats.

Où en sommes-nous arrivés? Comme toujours, les conversations les plus enrichissantes nous laisse souvent avec plus de questions que de réponses. Où est partie notre culture de changement? Comment pouvons-nous ressaisir notre sens de communauté? Comment pouvons-nous faire valoir la voix des jeunes dans la gestion de nos communautés? Comment se mettre à l’action?

Un très gros merci à Lise Ouellette, à nos partenaires et amis de la région, à nos anciens et à leurs invités pour leur participation enthousiaste.

Newsletter is coming soon!

A large portion of my first month(ish) of full time work for 21inc has been spent on a newsletter. It's been pretty exciting (and a good learning process) for me because I usually don't get to work in print.

When I first started we had a template from J.D. Irving, Ltd. and I worked from there. I learned a lot about InDesign, which is a program I'd never really used before. Since this is the first edition, it took a long time. And a lot of rearranging text, photos, and design elements. I have a new appreciation for print because, well, it's really hard to make everything fit onto that one page sometimes (but it can always be done). Now that we have a solid layout of where the text and photos go, and what order all the pages are in, I'm sure that the next edition will be pulled together much quicker.

I feel really accomplished now that it's finished though. And I'm pretty proud of myself, it looks really awesome and I'm quite happy with it. (I have also declared that everyone I know is going to read it.)

The articles are pretty fantastic, we have some pretty great content. I definitely have some favourite parts, and I definitely enjoyed reading it (I hope you do too, when it's released)