Friday Fun! 

This morning I was at the Four Seasons for a shoot with Kelsey who is a co-owner of Anamaya Resort in Costa Rica. We were taking about my digital detox and the importance of disconnecting in an uber connected world.

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Morning Commute for a Change

It’s amazing how much you forget how to take the subway when you haven’t in a while. This morning I went from Dundas West to Summerhill and somehow made three mistakes along the way, wrong stop, wrong way, wrong side.  What a n00b! I’m nearly done my book on Kobo so I guess that’s the real reason.  I use do take the subway to work at my first job in Toronto. About an hour each way from Broadview to Yorkdale. It was worth it because I wanted to work in fashion SO BAD and this was my foot in the door at a really big private retail company.  It’s so weird when you catch eyes with someone on the subway. Quick, look away.  Typing on my phone is a great way to stay entertained. Almost done my coffee but I’m here now. Took way longer than I expected. Should have taken an Uber. It’s not as close to the subway stop as I thought, I really screwed up these directions but it’s pretty nice out today. ☀️

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4 Companies Offering Great Customer Service

One of the things I really love about Telus is their commitment to customer service. They feel great customer service starts from the ground up and they’ve made a commitment to telling Canadians they need to Expect More from their telcom providers. Today I’m sharing a couple other great customer experience stories from other companies putting customers first. Little Burgundy – Broken Boots Near the end of summer I purchased a killer pair of boots designed by Jeffrey Campbell from littleburgundyshoes.com. I’ve been wearing them regularly but recently the cool cut-out heels broke.   I didn’t want get stuck on the phone ringing customer service so I sent a tweet with some photos to @LittleBurgundy and they replied within about 30 minutes. It took about 5 min to fin d a new pair of booth in store and the return was easy. I really love when a company is socially connect and able to help their customers over Twitter.  Nice work guys! Now I will check out the sales and probably buy more. 🙂 @LittleBurgundy hi guys, @JCshoes I ordered <2 mo ago broke this week. Both of them! Can you help!? ?? pic.twitter.com/eiXtpAEHnK — CASiE STEWART (@casiestewart) October 21, 2015 Go Daddy – Server Upgrade I’ve been with GoDaddy for my website hosting since switching over to WordPress from Blogger.com years ago. I’ve had nothing but great customer service from their team. I’ve had them renew my domain (until 2022!) help with a hacking situation (on the 1st day of TIFF!) and more recently with a server upgrade. GoDaddy recently changed their hosting and the plan I was on no longer had analytics. As a blogger and online business owner, the stats are important to me. I had considered switching to another host when their help team offered to look into my situation. Instead…

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Throwback Thursday | GO JAYS GO!

I decided to make an audio of this blogpost because I have such fond memories of this day. Have a listen or scroll down to read it. The photo above is from 1992 when the Blue Jays won the world series for the first time.We’re standing on Bremner near Navy Warf facing south. I just got off the phone with mum as I was confirming a couple details about the day since I was only 10 when it happened. In the photo L-R are my sister, Bronwyn, Carly (Bomb Girls), Paige, and me. Our mums were taking classes at a school in Cambridge that day when they looked at each other and said “what are we doing, we should be there!” after hearing the Blue Jays parade was happening in Toronto. So, they each went to sign us kids out of schools (we were at different ones), met up, packed all 5 kids in the car, and drove to Toronto. We were there pretty early and got a spot at the front just outside the Skydome near gate 10. Now that mum mentioned it, I remember a police officer waiting there with us. She said crowds started to form and we got moved to the front of the group near us where the office stayed most of the afternoon. He looked at our mums like they were crazy, there were NOT many kids there. AT ALL. The parade went on forever and I remember seeing Roberto Alomar, Kelly Gruber, Joe Carter. It is one of the most fond memories of being a kid. The next day I went to school and told all the kids I was at the parade. I remember feeling cool and everything thinking mum was cool too. When I chatted her just now she said: “Life is about creating memories”   She always…

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Beach Volleyball @ Pan Am Games 2015

This morning Hann and I went to a beach volleyball match at Pan Am Park. I’ve never been to a Pan Am (or Olympic) event so it was pretty neat to take the stands and get in on the action. The park is massive and takes up the whole Exibition Place parking lot. I imagine it gets pretty happening later in the day. The activations inside were just getting set up when we walked in.      Argentina took on Cuba and the girls were awesome. The last time I played volleyball was probably in grade 6 and I’ve not played since. Was really impressive to see them pound the ball and dive right into the sand.  They’re super fit!          Thanks Chevrolet Canada and Klout for the tickets. I was given them last week along with tickets to the opening ceremony.  Worth checking out the park while the games are on. You can sit on Muskoka chairs and watch the games on a massive screen. I recommend taking TTC or an Uber, parking was $30! 😂 ☀️☀️☀️☀️☀️☀️ CASIE  

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Daylight, Saving Grace, Feel That Sun Upon Your Face

Started the day bright with a nice little brekky in our home office. I do social media coaching and consulting aside from my blog so the morning is when I check those appts off my list.  My love for granola is still going strong. I need to get some good running shoes. I’m ready to hit the pavement again too. I love daylight savings spring forward. That sun, feels so nice. Warm air, free hair. This photo has a couple ‘Sia’ comments on IG. Busted out the leather this weekend and threw on a fur vest. Anything to ditch the old winter jacket! Glasses are from Polette Eyewear in France, jacket Rudsak. Had lunch w/ April in Kensington. So bright and colourful round there. Went to buy her some flowers and realized I forgot my wallet. Thank heavens for Uber being connected to my card so I could pay by phone. Have I mentioned my excitement about mobile payments coming soon? Learned about it a bit in a dinner with Interac last week for Fraud Protection Month. Read the post here. I think I’ll do a bit more work and head out for a walk since we’ve got more daylight today. It’s amazing the motivation that comes from a little sunshine. Take it where every you go 🙂 CASIE

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Back Seat Bloggin’ En Route to CoralTV

En route to St. Lawrence Market to shoot a segment for Coral TV. I’m a host on a certain design show today. I’ll update you once it’s live. For now, I’m blogging on the go from the back seat of an UberX Taxi! Back seat blogger FTW. In other news, the sunshine is really beautiful today. We’re working on incorporating this teak tray from Artemano Decor into a party tablescape. Move over Martha! Hoping you get some of those beautiful rays on your face today. Sending sunshine wherever you might be. ❤️ CASIE

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Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.

Writing each day is really good for you. It helps you get things done, assists in memory, and for me is really great therapy. If you’ve ever wanted to start a blog and think “what will I write about?”. Let me tell you, there’s so many things that happen in a day, you can find inspiration everywhere. What you eat, drink, wear, or where you travel to, even in your own city. If you open you eyes to the world and shift your perspective, you’ll see it in a new light. A photo posted by C A S I E S T E W A R T (@casiestewart) on Jan 1, 2015 at 1:58pm PST Day 1/365, 2015: Here are some great things that happened Made notes about my day in a new notebook. I like spiral bound 5.5 x 8,5 in blank sketch paper. It’s for things I don’t blog like what I eat, vitamins, workout, how many Mason jars of water I drank. Did a new workout. Sweat my ass off. Ate good food. Nothing deep fried or heavily processed/takeout. Not being hungover really helped with that. Reclaimed my for love for granola. Yes, I like granola. Used to eat it heaps when I was a kid and my new found love for lactose free milk, it makes a delicious snack. Got a selfie stick. Sean bought one for me at Pacific Mall AND I LOVE IT.  Opened my new Clarisonic Pearl and used it. Started with Clarisonic in December 2014 and have noticed my skin is more soft and ugly.  It’s important to write this down so I always remember to use it. One minute can seem like a long time when you are in a rush. Put on fuzzy socks with Vaseline. If you read any beauty blogs…

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Tech | Buffer Festival Industry Day 2014

About a week ago I attended the first ever Buffer Festival Industry Day. Here’s a quick little snip of some of  my fav moments! It was great listening to top YouTubers talk about their experiences in brand building and projects. I was right up front to admire Harley from Epic Meal Time’s beard. He was my fav on the panel and it was neat to hear how the Epic Meal Time brand has evolved. A couple years ago I was at a Biz Media party and the team from Epic Meal time was there (blog post here w/ photos). They made a bacon volcano and bacon roses to go along with a suite of other epic meat creations. There was a meat photobooth too. I arrived just in time to catch my friend Brad Ford from Contiki chatting about brands, fans, and influence.  This is one of my fav topics and it was cool to hear how the other brands were working with influencers. I can speak first hand about the awesome job Contiki has done in connecting with ambassadors to tell their brand story.  I’m working on a little something new with Contiki but no details just yet…you’ll know soon enough! Take a look at my adventure to Thailand with them last year here. This was an awesome event for anyone looking to beef up their knowledge of how to make it on YouTube. I can only imagine how much the landscape will change by the time Buffer Festival rolls around next year. Something not to be missed! Hope your week is good. I’m off to the OBEY Clothing spring preview then to hang out with Globe Style and Sophie Kinsella, author of the Shopaholics series. Have an awesome day! CASIE

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TheTech | Business of YouTube: Buffer Festival Industry Day

There is no doubt that video is a powerful platform to connect with your audience. If you are a brand, blogger, or you want to be famous on the Internet, knowing how to work the YouTube machine is to your advantage. The key to this is to build a large follower base and have plenty of views on your videos. Luckily, you can buy these, just make sure you use the best site to buy youtube views otherwise you might fall to victim to one of the many scam sites out there. You might not like the idea of buying views and followers but it has been proven to lead to their authentic counterpart, and many people have chosen this path to the top. There are plenty of alternatives to Youtube you can also use. I had the opportunity to travel to Thailand last year with some of Canada’s top YouTubers and it was a learning experience. There’s a real science to cracking the YouTube code and the more you know, well, the better you’ll be! I’ve partnered w/ the CFC to let you know about Buffer Festival Industry Day on October 16th. The one day event is not a YouTube fan event, but rather a chance to soak up information about the business of YouTube from some of the top YouTubers in the world. YouTube is the 2nd biggest search engine (to Google) and 1 out of EVERY 2 internet users visits YouTube. Innovation is key to relevancy in our ever changing internet world, so if YouTube is on your radar you don’t wanna miss this. About Buffer Festival Industry Day: This one-day conference is for industry professionals looking to optimize YouTube as a content and talent development platform and a marketing and distribution channel. It provides a unique…

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