Ananda Leeke – Page 8

Happy New Year! My Heart Belongs to Haiti This Month!

Posted by Ananda Leekeon January 4, 2011in Digital Sisterhood Month, Haitian Disaster Relief Efforts, Heart of Haiti2 Comments

Happy New Year All!

It’s been a few weeks since I last posted. Why? Digital Sisterhood Month! 31 days of celebrating women online and the connections they make, conversations they have, communities they build, causes they support, collaborative partnerships they establish, and commerce they engage in with women they meet online and offline. Visit the Digital Sisterhood Network web site to learn more.

This month my heart belongs to Haiti because I want to honor the resiliency of the Haitian people who experienced a devastating earthquake on January 12, 2010. Last year I taught an online yoga class for Yoga Day USA that was dedicated to the people of Haiti. At the beginning of the class, I asked viewers to donate money to Doctors Without Borders to support their work in Haiti. Click here to watch the video.

This year I am serving as an ambassador for the Heart of Haiti campaign, a Macy’s partnership that was created to provide sustainable income to Haitian artisans impacted by the January earthquake. Read my November 29th post to learn more. Also, listen to the following December episodes of Digital Sisterhood Radio that mention my work with the Heart of Haiti campaign:

December 14th show on lessons learned from Blogalicious: I shared how I learned about the Heart of Haiti campaign from Danica Kombol, co-managing partner of Everywhere and the presentation by Willa Shalit and the Haitian artisans at Blogalicious 2010.

December 20th show featuring ‘Digital Native’ Lauren Thomas, founder of Digital Aftershock: I discussed how I met Lauren Thomas, former Digital Coordinator of Everywhere, at the Heart of Haiti booth during Blogalicious 2010 and had a powerful conversation that convinced me to sign up for the campaign. I also shared how I interviewed Lauren about the Heart of Haiti campaign with my cell phone for my Cinchcast audio blog at Blogalicious.

Water Carriers Rev — Water Carriers by Dr. Lois Mailou Jones, Haiti 1985 - acrylic, 25 ¼ x 19 ¾ in.

I almost forgot to mention that I organized a Digital Sisterhood Month field trip for DC area women in social media to visit the National Museum of Women in the Arts on December 3 to see the “Lois Mailou Jones: A Life in Vibrant Color” exhibit. During her lifetime, Dr. Jones (born November 3, 1905 – died June 9, 1998), a Howard University art professor (one of my favorite artists), created a body of artwork that was inspired by Haiti and her marriage to Haitian artist Louis Vergniaud Pierre-Noel. One of my greatest treats was showing the women who attended the museum field trip some of my favorite Haitian-inspired paintings created by Dr. Jones. Check out the amazing “Water Carriers” painting on the left side of the blog post.

What do you think?

I LOVE IT and HAITI!

Drop by my blog this week and next week for more posts about my passion for Haiti and work with the Heart of Haiti campaign!

Enjoy your day and week!

Re-Cap of DC Digital Sisterhood Focus Group on 12/12: How Women in Social Media Discuss Beauty, Fashion, Hair & Lifestyles

Posted by Ananda Leekeon December 13, 2010December 13, 2010in Digital Sisterhood Focus Group, Digital Sisterhood Month2 Comments

Photo of Digital Sisterhood Focus Group Panel on 12/12/10

Day #12 of Digital Sisterhood Month was a special digital diva day for me because I moderated the Digital Sisterhood Focus Group on how women in social media discuss fashion, beauty, hair, and lifestyles at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Library in Washington, DC. The dynamic digital sister panelists included:

1. LaWanda Amaker, Founder of L.A. Beaute Beat and Media Mingle;

2. Monica Byrd, Founder of Fashionista Flea Market, Pregginista, and Charm Chat, and DC Women’s Style Examiner;

3. Kelly Collis, Founder of City Shop Girl;

4. Glory Edim, Founder of I Hate My 9 to 5 blog;

5. Sheena D. Franklin, Founder/CEO of Bella Bush;

6. Aisha Massac, Esthetician, Makeup Artist, and Founder of I.C. Faces;

7. Courtney Powell, founder of ThinkandGrowChick.com;

8. Laquita Thomas-Banks, Founder of All Naptural blog and DC Natural Hair Examiner; and

9. Dana Williams-Johnson, Founder of The Art of Accessories.

Many thanks to Xina Eiland for serving as the event videographer, Sharon Malachi for serving as the event photographer, and Glory Edim’s mother Ms. Henrietta for making “Digital Sisterhood” cupcakes (they were yummy) for the ladies!

Click here to see photos from the event.

Click here to listen to my audio blog recap of the event.

Click here to watch a video (21 minutes) that introduces the panelists and their blogging passions.

Ananda’s Digital Sisterhood Month Adventures at Fabulous Women Business Owners’ December Meeting

Posted by Ananda Leekeon December 9, 2010December 9, 2010in Digital Sisterhood Month, Fabulous Women Business OwnersLeave a comment

Chief Hot Momma Kathy Korman Frey talking about mentoring and the Hot Mommas Project, originally uploaded by anandaleeke.

Digital Sisterhood Month Week #2 started with a bang. I taught an online kind and gentle office yoga class that you should check out if you have 18 minutes and a need for some OM energy in your day. Click on the link to watch the video: http://stickam.com/anandaleeke.

I also launched the weekly Digital Sisterhood Wednesday celebration and hosted the Tweetchat about women’s most popular Twitter conversations. Both Twitter events inspired me and really helped me reach into my heart to give thanks for the beauty and power of women sharing online.

The highlight of my offline day was attending the DC Fabulous Women Business Owners holiday party and mentoring meeting that was hosted by Christina Bailey, co-founder of Tindale Real Estate, at Hounshell Real Estate offices. Visit www.tindalerealestate.com to learn more about Christina and her business. I took several photos. Click here to see them on Flickr.

Kathy Korman Frey, Chief Hot Momma and founder of the Hot Mommas Project, was the keynote speaker. Kathy talked about the power of mentoring in women and girls’ lives. For more information, visit www.hotmommasproject.org. Sarah Massey, founder of the Fabulous Women Business Owners group and Massey Media, jumpstarted the evening with a mentoring sharing circle that allowed women to share their business, mentoring expertise, and mentee needs. Click on the link to listen to my audio blog about the event (it begins with my 12/9 morning reflection on – 16 minutes): www.cinchcast.com/anandaleeke/133841.

I love the Fabulous Women Business Owners group because the women are about business and being bright lights of sisterhood. Many thanks to all of the women who made the event a sisterhood sensation!

Do you belong to any local women’s groups that meet offline?

What makes these groups so fabulous in your world?

Share your thoughts in the comment section of this blog. Thank you.

Digital Sisterhood Month Blessings,

Ananda Leeke

Opening Your Heart to Haiti: I am a Heart of Haiti Ambassador

Posted by Ananda Leekeon November 29, 2010November 29, 2010in Heart of Haiti6 Comments

Happy Sunday!

Guess what? I am a Heart of Haiti Ambassador! You may be wondering what is the Heart of Haiti? The Heart of Haiti campaign is a Macy’s partnership that was created to provide sustainable income to Haitian artisans impacted by the January earthquake. Through the partnership, the artisans create artwork that is sold as the Heart of Haiti collection in Macy’s stores. The sales from these hand-made products including quilts, metalwork, paper måché, painting and jewelry generate the sustainable income and provide trade instead of aid to the Haitian artisans. The Clinton Foundation inspired Macy’s to create this amazing partnership. Macy’s is selling the Heart of Haiti collection at 25 stores including the Metro Center location in Washington, DC (for all my DC area folks) and on macys.com.

mehoh — Ananda holding Haitian artwork at Heart of Haiti booth at the Blogalicious Conference held in Miami, FL in October 2010

I learned about the Heart of Haiti campaign during the Blogalicious 2010 Conference held on October 8-10, 2010, in Miami, Florida. During a speed networking session, I met Danica Kombol, a managing and founding partner at Everywhere, who introduced me to the Heart of Haiti Campaign. Click here to listen to my interview with Danica: www.cinchcast.com/anandaleeke/100144.

Later that morning, I listened to a Heart of Haiti campaign presentation featuring Willa Shalit and two Haitian artisans. They discussed the powerful work they are doing to create artwork and support Haitian artisans as they rebuild their lives after the January earthquake. That’s when I fell head of heels in love with their work.

After the presentation, I visited the Heart of Haiti booth in the Blogalicious Exhibitor Hall to learn how I could support the campaign. Lauren Thomas, former digital coordinator with Everywhere, gave me more information about the artwork and campaign. My conversation with Lauren turned into an interview. Click here to listen: www.cinchcast.com/anandaleeke/100204.

A week after I returned to DC, I received emails from Lauren and the Blogalicious team about a local Heart of Haiti event at Macy’s at Metro Center featuring my favorite Haitian singer Emeline Michel. Visit www.emeline-michel.com. I decided to attend and invite my dad so he could learn more about the campaign. We were both impressed with the campaign and collection. Click here to see photos of the Heart of Haiti events I have attended: http://www.flickr.com/photos/anandaleeke/sets/72157625478398964.

My dad has become a big fan of the Heart of Haiti collection. So has my mother! I plan on recruiting other family members, friends, and people who read my blog by serving as an ambassador!

Please support the Heart of Haiti campaign by purchasing a product from the Macy’s collection this holiday season! See the links below for more information.

Macy’s Heart of Haiti:

http://bit.ly/heartofhaiti
Heart of Haiti on Twitter: http://twitter.com/heartofhaiti
Heart of Haiti Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/#!/HeartofHaiti
Fair Winds Trading: http://fairwindstrading.com
Willa Shalit on Twitter: http://twitter.com/willashalit

Ananda submitted her Ignite DC #6 Speaker Submission on Digital Sisterhood today!

Posted by Ananda Leekeon November 18, 2010November 22, 2010in digital sisterhood, Digital Sisterhood: A Gen X-er Memoir of Life & the Internet, Ignite DCLeave a comment

039, originally uploaded by anandaleeke.

Have you heard of Ignite DC? Visit http://www.ignite-dc.com.

Ignite DC is a fabulous five minute speaker event held several times a year in DC. During the event, 16 speakers take the stage to share their thoughts in five minutes with 20 slides. Speakers include artists, technologists, thinkers, and personalities. Their presentations spark new conversations and collaborations across cultures and disciplines.

I participated in Ignite DC #4 on June 16. My topic was “Who’s living inside of me?” and used excerpts from my book That Which Awakens Me: A Creative Woman’s Poetic Memoir of Self-Discovery (2009 – Amazon.com). Click here to watch a 5 minute video of my presentation.

Ignite DC #4 was a positively fantastic experience! I learned so much from my fellow speakers and enjoyed networking with audience members. It was so great that I decided to submit a topic proposal for Ignite DC #6 which will be held on February 3, 2011.

My Ignite DC #6 topic is “What is Digital Sisterhood” It utilizes my research and excerpts from my next book Digital Sisterhood (December 2011). See the summary below.

Ananda’s Ignite DC #6 Summary

What is Digital Sisterhood? (excerpt from Digital Sisterhood by Ananda Leeke, December 2011)

What is Digital Sisterhood?

Did you know women represent 87.1 million of the total U.S. adult online population (163.8 million) in 2010? According to the BlogHer-iVillage 2010 Social Media Matters Study, co-sponsored by Ketchum and the Nielsen Company, there are 67.5 million women (18 to 76 years old) out of 126.9 million social media users in the U.S. Now that’s digital sisterhood!

Digital sisterhood is the feminine currency women use to create relationship wealth through the connections they make, conversations they have, communities they build, causes they support, collaborative partnerships they establish, and commerce they engage in with women they meet online and offline. The relationship wealth of digital sisterhood is based on what women care about and their shared interests and experiences. How do women connect? What are their conversations? What communities do they build? What collaborative partnerships do they form? What types of commerce do they engage in?

The answers to these questions lead to one truth. Women are standing in their power and reclaiming themselves online and offline. They move with a power not seen before. It is rooted in women being fully,

P – Present when they

O – Own their lives as

W – Women who believe they have

E – Everything they need to live out their

R – Revolution of authenticity.

May all women know their investment in themselves and each other will yield a high return!

Ananda Launches Her December Digital Sisterhood Birthday Fundraiser Today!

Posted by Ananda Leekeon November 18, 2010November 18, 2010in digital sisterhood, Digital Sisterhood: A Gen X-er Memoir of Life & the InternetLeave a comment

156, originally uploaded by anandaleeke.

Happy November 18th All!

Did you know that in 30 days I will celebrate my birthday on December 18th? In honor of my special day, I have decided to launch my December Digital Sisterhood Birthday Fundraiser on Kickstarter.com today.

Here’s how my December Digital Sisterhood Birthday Fundraiser works. Between now and December 18th at 11:59 pm, I am asking my family, friends, Facebook fans, Twitter followers, LinkedIn connections, and social media peeps to make a donation of $1, $5, $10, $15, $20, $25, $30, $35 $40, $45, $50 or more by clicking on the link: http://kck.st/avHVlu.

Guess what? You get a special award for each donation you make! Visit my Kickstarter.com page to learn about the special awards: http://kck.st/avHVlu.

All donations will be used to cover the cost of my self-publishing fees with iUniverse, Inc.

FYI – To date, 28 generous folks have donated $827 towards my goal of raising $1,600 by December 23. Isn’t that amazing? I think it shows how powerful social media and the generosity of people are when they come together to do good. What blessings!

Thank you in advance for your positive energy, support, and generosity!

Blessings, Gratitude and Deep Appreciation,

Ananda
www.anandaleeke.com

Ananda’s New Book Title News – Digital Sisterhood: A Gen X-er Memoir of Life & the Internet

Posted by Ananda Leekeon October 22, 2010October 22, 2010in Blogalicious, Digital Sisterhood: A Gen X-er Memoir of Life & the InternetLeave a comment

Blessings All,

So many wonderful things have happened since I started my Kickstarter.com fundraising campaign in September. The first wonderful thing that happened was online and offline support for my fundraising effort. So many people used Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Tumblr, blogs, email, web sites, other social media tools, the telephone, and word of mouth to spread the news about my efforts. I am so grateful for everyone’s support! Many thanks!

The second wonderful thing that happened was receiving $547 in pledges from 17 generous people in less than a month. Gratitude and deep humility are the best words to express my thanks to these special people.

When I started my Kickstarter.com campaign, I had a goal to raise $500 by December 23. It was a conservative goal that I thought would help me taste the Kickstarter.com fundraising process. Well, as you can see, I have been blessed abundantly. So I decided to relaunch my fundraising campaign today with an additional goal of $1,053 to meet my overall goal of $1,600 by December 23. This money will be used to cover the cost of my self-publishing and mailing fees.

The third wonderful thing that happened was gaining clarity about my book title while attending the Blogalicious 2010 conference on October 8 to October 10 in Miami, Florida. While I was at Blogalicious, I co-moderated an open-mic luncheon and conducted audio interviews with women bloggers about digital sisterhood. My great takeaway from these experiences was the power of the phrase “digital sisterhood.”

After I returned home from Blogalicious, I began hosting a weekly event called #STB10 #DigitalSisterhood Wednesday where women in social media are encouraged to celebrate, promote, and tweet about their favorite digital sisters on Twitter. The Twitterstream from the October 13th and October 20th events produced an “aha” moment for me about moving forward on changing the title of my book project. So today, I am proud to announce the new name of my next book: Digital Sisterhood: A Gen X-er Memoir of Life & the Internet. Let me know what you think about the title. I am open to your feedback!

As a side note, I have reserved “digital sisterhood” as a web site, Twitter account, and WordPress blog:

Look for more news about these digital properties going live in 2011.

One last thing … Join me in getting the word out about my fundraising efforts online and offline. Please make a donation too! Click on the link to donate $1-$25: http://kck.st/avHVlu. Thank you in advance for your support!

Gratitude and Joy,

Ananda Leeke
Author of Digital Sisterhood: A Gen X-er Memoir of Life & the Internet (December 2011)
www.anandaleeke.com

Calling All Women in Social Media! Join Ananda’s 10/13 Twitter Launch of #STB10 #DigitalSisterhood Wednesdays.

Posted by Ananda Leekeon October 12, 2010October 13, 2010in Blogalicious, Sisterhood the Blog Book, Sisterhood the Blog Twitter Chats, Sisterhood the Blog: Soundbytes from the 21st Century Women's Online Revolution, Sisterhood, the BlogLeave a comment

@AnandaLeeke launched her Twitter #STB10 #DigitalSisterhood Wednesdays @ #Blogalicious10 on Vimeo by anandaleeke, originally uploaded by anandaleeke.

On the last day of Blogalicious 2010, I recorded a video about my 10/13 Twitter launch of #STB10 #DigitalSisterhood Wednesdays. Click on the link to watch the video: http://vimeo.com/15741180.
#STB10 #DigitalSisterhood Wednesdays will give women in social media a weekly opportunity to build and strengthen their communities. Each week women will be encouraged to celebrate and promote their digital sisters by using the #FF (Friday Follow) format to list their digital sisters’ Twitter IDs. Women will also be encouraged to tweet about their digital sisters’ businesses, wisdom, creativity, blogs, Facebook pages, causes, videos, web sites, etc.

#STB10 is a hashtag that refers to Sisterhood the Blog 2010. I developed it to track my Twitter conversations, DC-based focus groups, and online radio shows about her Sisterhood the Blog book project. Sisterhood the Blog is a memoir about my Internet experiences from 1986 to 2011. I include how women on the Internet have influenced and inspired my life. I am using the information collected on Twitter as research for my book project. Click here to learn about the book project and Kickstarter fundraiser: kck.st/avHVlu.

Remember to use the #STB10 and #DigitalSisterhood hashtags on October 13 and every Wednesday thereafter.

Follow me on Twitter to track all of the great #STB10 #DigitalSisterhood sharing on Wednesdays: http://twitter.com/anandaleeke.

Thank you for your support!

Sisterhood the Blog’s #STB10 Twitter Chats – Upcoming chats on 11/3, 12/1, 1/5, 2/2 and 3/2 @9pm EST on Twitter

Posted by Ananda Leekeon October 7, 2010October 7, 2010in digital sisterhood, Sisterhood the Blog Twitter Chats, Sisterhood the Blog: Soundbytes from the 21st Century Women's Online RevolutionLeave a comment

Yesterday I hosted the first Sisterhood the Blog #STB10 Twitter chat on digital sisterhood. It was held from 9:00 pm EST to 10:00 pm EST. What fun! Several women showed up and showed out in a great way. We exchanged our ideas and experiences. Wonderful sharing! Check out the Twitter feed from the chat below.

The Twitter chat was so juicy I decided to host five more chats as a way to collect data for my Sisterhood the Blog book project: http://kck.st/avHVlu. The next #STB10 Twitter chats will be held on November 3, December 1, January 5, February 2, and March 2 from 9:00 pm EST to 10:00 pm EST. Please plan to join me for some digital sisterhood sharing!

Excerpts from #STB10 Twitter Chat on October 6