Miss Florida USA Faces

West Hollywood was the place to be this past Saturday Morning as several Miss Florida USA and Miss Florida Teen USA Titleholders as well as our very own Jenna Edwards joined the fun of Marshmallow Palloza! The sixth annual Spring Marshmallow Drop proceeded a morning of Easter Egg Hunts and fun with the Easter Bunny. West Park hosted the event as Hollywood Vice Mayor Fran Russo joined the titleholders to hand out the prizes.

Those prizes were courtesy of the Marshmallow Drop. The event features over 100,000 marshmallows dropped via helicopter into a circle in the middle of the field. With several hundred children waiting against the protective fences the all clear signal was given. Then it was a quick sprint in pursuit of the 48 colored marshmallows that awarded prizes. The phrase of the day was “Don’t Eat The Marshmallows!”

Ms. Edwards with several hundred screaming children in the background and still kills the stand-up!

Then it was back to the presentation stage where all of our delegates awaited with prizes for the lucky 48. The biggest prize was a bicycle that made a special 10-year-old girl very happy! After all of the prizes were awarded it was time to end the morning with a very fun rendition of The Easter Bunny Hop. After a rousing performance it was time to wish everyone a Happy Easter and say goodbye!

Our two favorite Broward County Fair Queens – which one won the marshmallow drop? (left)

The North Miami Chamber of Commerce hosted the forty sixth annual Miss North Miami USA Pageant at Miami Shores County Club Saturday night. It was dinner and a pageant in this unique pageant environment. The Chambers members were in full force as was our favorite pageant producer Penny Valentine who has been running the pageant since 1965. We are so honored to have them be a part of our Miss Florida USA Family.

Pageant Director Judith Coffman put on a wonderful pageant with a distinctive Broadway Theme. It was also great to see our Miss Florida USA Jenna Edwards join her pageant sisters Kristen Berset (FLUSA 2004) and Shannon Ford (FLUSA 2002) during the evening. Ms. Edward’s path to Miss Florida USA began here last year as she made a very lovely final speech. Big congratulations to our friends in North Miami for a wonderful evening.

Pageant Director Glenda Byrd along with her dedicated volunteers staged their 3^rd annual Miss Gold Coast USA Pageant in Royal Palm Beach. Opening the pageant season in The Palm Beaches several of our Miss Florida USA Family South showed their support for the newest titleholders. A big thank you goes to Linda DiGiacomo for the pictures!

» Miss Marion County USA and “Legacy of Hope Concert"

Ark of Hope (a Marion County Based non-profit organization who mentors children in Florida’s Foster Care Program) along with Miss Marion County USA, Meghan Isom, have assembled an upcoming concert fundraiser to raise funds to build new facilities in nearby High Springs. Their current facility has become very small in that the growing number of foster children has increased.

Ms. Isom invites all of her North & Central Florida Pageant Family to attend an event that will help produce the funds needed for many dreams to come true. On April 20, 2007 many local Christian bands located in the Gainesville area, will be joined as one in supporting such efforts. Also joining them will be the founders of Ark of Hope, Blair and Verna Corbett and many others whom support the organization. Come out for a night of fun!

If would like more information or would like to make a donation directly please contact at: www.arkforkids.org.

» KUDOS & DID YOU KNOWS

- Kudos to our Tallahassee USA Team of Miss Capital City Teen USA 2008 Brittany Pate; Miss Tallahassee Teen USA 2008 Kelly Haffner; Miss Capital City USA 2008 Rebecca Dahmen and Miss Tallahassee USA 2008 Jami Lynn Daniels were invited to ride in the annual Springtime Tallahassee Parade. Capital Euro Cars graciously provided the cars to transport the Queens through downtown Tallahassee. Way to represent ladies!

- Kudos to Miss West Broward Teen USA 2008 Michelle Chaban as she helped choreograph the Arthritis Foundation Fashion Show held at the Kravis Center in West Palm Beach. Miss Chaban helped the children models work the runway for their fashion show; the only catch was that each child had arthritis. Way to do a wonderful thing Michelle!

» PICTURES & STORIES WANTED!

If you enjoy reading the stories of our Miss Florida USA Family and want us to know what great things are happening either during or after you reign please email us at telair@aol.com. We love touting our sorority of outstanding Florida women. Please send us a paragraph (or two) on your appearances, awards or community service and include pictures. We want you to have all of the support of this great lifestyle we call Miss Florida USA!

» Alumni News Wanted!

If you know of any Miss Florida USA alumni in the news please drop us an email to feature them in future articles. Email all info to info@missfloridausa.com! Until next week here to good pageantry!

PICTURE OF THE WEEK!

Our POTW Committee gathered this week to pick their favorite picture and color eggs for the big Easter Egg Hunt this weekend. So it goes without saying that we were working on a theme….and when we saw an entry from this past weekends Marshmallow Palloza we knew we had to get The Easter Bunny involved! So congratulations EB you are the proud recipient of our Picture of The Week. Happy Easter everyone!