The White-​​Wilson Cen­ter for Women’s Imag­ing has part­nered with local orga­ni­za­tions to host the sec­ond annual Lit­tle Black Dress Party, and to give-​​away 10 Total Woman’s Health Packages!

Due to the cur­rent eco­nomic cli­mate, a star­tling new trend has emerged. Pre­ven­tive health screen­ings, such as a mam­mo­gram, are down 30 per­cent nation­wide. In order to make pre­ven­tive health screen­ings more acces­si­ble to the women in our com­mu­nity, the White-​​Wilson Cen­ter for Woman’s Imag­ing is giv­ing away a screen­ing mam­mo­gram and bone den­sity scan to the 10 win­ners of the Total Woman’s Health Package.

The Total Woman’s Health Pack­age includes the following:

• A screen­ing mammogram
• Bone den­sity scan
• Lit­tle black dress from Dillard’s
• Life Bal­ance pack­age from Suc­cess with Desley
• Mas­sage from It’s All About You Mas­sage and Day Spa
• $75 Gift Card
• 2 Tick­ets to the Lit­tle Black Dress Party
• Lots of other girly goodies!

To be eli­gi­ble to win the Total Woman’s Health Pack­age, you must be a woman, a res­i­dent of Okaloosa, Wal­ton or Santa Rosa Coun­ties and 18 years of age by March 31, 2011. To reg­is­ter for the Total Woman’s Health Pack­age visit www​.fwblit​tle​black​dress​party​.com.

Early detec­tion is the most effec­tive way to fight back against debil­i­tat­ing dis­eases like breast can­cer, osteo­poro­sis and heart dis­ease. The White-​​Wilson Cen­ter for Women’s Imag­ing and Emer­ald Ladies Jour­nal have part­nered with Dillard’s, Qan­tum Com­mu­ni­ca­tions, Cox Com­mu­ni­ca­tions, The Pro­mo­tions Chick, Emer­ald Chic and other local orga­ni­za­tions to raise aware­ness regard­ing the impor­tance of pre­ven­ta­tive health­care amongst women and to host the sec­ond annual Lit­tle Black Dress Party.

The Lit­tle Black Dress Party is May 21 at the Emer­ald Coast Con­ven­tion Cen­ter, and will fea­ture a fash­ion show by Dillard’s, an auc­tion, heavy hors d’oeuvres and a cash bar. Tick­ets are $60 and 100% of event pro­ceeds will ben­e­fit The Shel­ter House, Oppor­tu­nity Inc., and the local chap­ters of The Amer­i­can Can­cer Soci­ety and The Amer­i­can Heart Asso­ci­a­tion. Call 863‑8204 for tick­ets, or visit www​.fwblit​tle​black​dress​party​.com.

As Alys Beach fell into the dis­tance while in the back seat of my friends con­vert­ible, me and my friends, all elated from the night’s event, stared at the stars and won­dered just how can such nat­ural beauty be per­son­i­fied into what turned out to be the most sen­sual soirée of the year. Dig­i­tal Graf­fiti pegged every artis­tic but­ton on my meter. Rethink­ing the evening while feel­ing the breeze across my face and rid­ing along scenic 30-​​A, I couldn’t help but truly appre­ci­ate the eclec­tic nature of Santa Rosa Beach and the pure vibrancy that it brings to those of us who allow it to pen­e­trate our minds, hearts, and emo­tions. To me, Dig­i­tal Graf­fiti not only hits home, it becomes a part of my cre­ative nature and infil­trates my senses in a way that no other artis­tic event can in this area.

The venue alone is enough to trans­port you from here to another exotic loca­tion as it always does with me. Artists from across the world show­cased their mas­ter­pieces of dig­i­tal art pro­jected on the stark white walls of Alys Beach’s com­mu­nity of homes. Cal­iza Pool, a part of Alys Beach, which in itself is a mas­ter­piece, was adorned with col­or­ful images and beau­ti­ful peo­ple danc­ing to music, played by a DJ was who ele­vated on a plat­form over the pool.

All in all, I am, and have always been, a walk­ing bill­board for this event. It is indeed the party of the year and quite frankly, kicked off my sum­mer in the best way pos­si­ble. If you missed it this year, check out some pho­tos and a few videos of the win­ning artists. Truly amazing.…

Dig­i­tal Graf­fit 2010 Entry Bala Boyd–Void? from Bala Boyd on Vimeo.

Bomb­shell from Don Relyea on Vimeo.

Nearly 300 men and women came together to pro­mote women’s health and raise money for local char­i­ties at the first annual Lit­tle Black Dress Party on May 22, at the Emer­ald Coast Con­fer­ence Cen­ter. The event included a Fash­ion Show by Dillard’s, live and silent auc­tions, a live band, great food and a fab­u­lous time!

The White-​​Wilson Cen­ter for Women’s Imag­ing part­nered with Emer­ald Ladies Jour­nal and other local orga­ni­za­tions to host the event. Over $15,000 was raised for The Shel­ter House, Oppor­tu­nity Inc., and the local chap­ters of The Amer­i­can Can­cer Soci­ety and The Amer­i­can Heart Association.

Each char­ity was pre­sented a check for $3,700 at the Lit­tle Black Dress Wrap-​​Up Recep­tion on June 30, 2010 at Two Trees Restau­rant in Fort Wal­ton Beach.

If you didn’t make it to the event this year, don’t hang your LBD (lit­tle black dress) up quite yet. Plans are already in the works for another event in 2011.

For more infor­ma­tion on this event or for a list of rec­om­mended annual health screen­ings visit: http://​www​.white​-wil​son​.com/​l​i​t​t​l​e​b​l​a​c​k​d​r​e​s​s​p​a​r​t​y​.​htm.

I am NOT a morn­ing per­son, let’s just start right there…But as lethar­gic as I felt the past two morn­ings when my alarm clock, which has never seen that early, buzzed me awake at 4am, I fun­neled large amounts of cof­fee and quickly began to antic­i­pate the excite­ment of the day ahead.

Yes­ter­day, as I made my way inside the two-​​bedroom cot­tage in Alys Beach, I joined the lovely group of ladies who have come together for a photo shoot that means more than just show­ing off cute clothes and beau­ti­ful women, it’s a state­ment. It’s a col­lab­o­ra­tion of pow­er­ful, intel­li­gent and styl­ish women who have trav­eled and worked across the coun­try, yet have found their home in the retreats of Scenic 30-​​A. With the city lifestyle still in their blood, it comes as no sur­prise that they want those else­where to see just what it is that makes this area so attrac­tive and stylish.

The idea to show­case the area’s styl­ish beach riv­iera orig­i­nated with Sheila Goode, a well-​​known and amaz­ing pho­tog­ra­pher, who part­nered with Nfo­cus Mag­a­zine, the pre­mier social lifestyle mag­a­zine out of Nashville, to cover a story about New York fash­ion at the beach. For some rea­son, it seems that “emer­ald coast” style res­onates a under­whelm­ing impres­sion in the minds of those who don’t live here. In fact, the very ladies who Sheila brought together includ­ing myself, Alli­son Craft (Alli­son Craft Designs), Hay­ley Green (Hay­ley Green Pho­tog­ra­phy), Julie Van Otten (Make-​​up Artist), Stephanie Nichols (DejaVu & Judith March Cloth­ing), & Paige Schnell (Trac­ery Inte­ri­ors) have all at some point or another worked in or with the fash­ion indus­try in some of the biggest fash­ion epi­cen­ters in the coun­try. We all want to show­case not only our arts and tal­ents, but more impor­tantly to make a state­ment about all the fash­ions and fash­ion­istas which make this area so incred­i­bly chic and memorable.

Sheila approached me to help style about eight dif­fer­ent ladies, NYC style, in cloth­ing donated by designer, Stephanie Nichols, who pro­duces a line of woman’s clothes called Judith March and Deja Vu. Alli­son Craft’s beau­ti­ful hand­made pearls were laid out all over the comfy white bed ready to be paired with the tons of fab­u­lous shoes, acces­sories, hand­bags and hats that filled the rooms with color, inspi­ra­tion and flair. We all fever­ishly pulled, plucked, paired, and per­fected out­fits, hair, makeup and acces­sories to make sure we had the per­fect looks. The finale to all of yesterday’s hard work, sweat (because it was 100 degrees out­side), and patience, was the last shoot of the day.…the Sex in the City shoot. Some­thing about see­ing every­thing put together and brought to life out­side at the mag­nif­i­cent Cal­iza Pool, made me com­pletely under­stand what we were work­ing towards and why we really do want to show off our local style, tal­ents, and designs. Every­thing has cul­mi­nated into a fab­u­lous, fun and mem­o­rable shoot.

Here are some of the shots I took dur­ing the last two days. These are only a few that I was able to squeeze in, but we lit­er­ally have hun­dreds of awe­some pics, so there’s more to come!!  S’amuser!

Art on walls. Seems sim­ple enough.…But dig­i­tal art pro­jected on the illus­tri­ous white walls of Alys Beach? A WHOLE dif­fer­ent story. Every June, for the past three years, artists and vis­i­tors from all over the world make their way to the infa­mous and always cap­ti­vat­ing Alys Beach for one of the world’s most amaz­ing events - Dig­i­tal Graf­fiti.

An event I anx­iously await for every year, this fes­ti­val of arts stands alone in its beauty, mag­nif­i­cence and grandeur. If you’re not famil­iar with Dig­i­tal Graf­fiti, then you are way behind the curve. The grow­ing pop­u­lar­ity of DG has only proven that Alys Beach knows how to throw a party. Not only a party, but a world-​​renowned cul­mi­na­tion of artists, music, fab­u­lous peo­ple, and of course all come together at Cal­iza Pool, my out­let to another civilization.

After hun­dreds of sub­mis­sions, and much debate I’m sure, DG has recently announced the list of artists who made the final cut and will be show­cas­ing their art on Sat­ur­day, June 12, 2010. You DON’T want to miss this!!!

1. “Aes­thetic Species Maps” by David Mont­gomery of Fer­nan­d­ina Beach, Florida
2. “Alys Beach 3D Struc­ture Pro­jec­tion” by Christo­pher Lee of Dothan, Alabama
3. “Bomb­shell” by Don Relyea of Dal­las, Texas
4. “Eye Spy” by Rus­sell Beans of Seacrest, Florida
5. “Five Por­traits in Five Min­utes” by Kasumi of Cleve­land, Ohio
6. “Flight­pat­tern” by Gwen Van­hee of Zedel­gem, Belgium
7. “Frosti” by Matt Pear­son of Brighton, United Kingdom
8. “Geom­e­try of Poi” by Kate Riegle — van West of Chicago, Illinois
9. “Green­ray” by Andre Rangel of Portugal
10. “Human Flux” by Nikola Mihov of Sofia, Bulgaria
11. “Inner Klänge” by Lemeh42 of Moter­ado, Italy
12. “JD’s Fun House 2010″ by John Daniel of Panama City, Florida
13. “Kalei­do­scopia” by Andy McK­e­own of Shrews­bury, United Kingdom
14. “Laser Art” by Christo­pher Lee of Dothan, Alabama
15. “Lumi­nous Curiosi­ties” by Christina Pier­son of Los Ange­les, California
16. “Moon­lit McGill” by Amber Bush­nell of Mis­soula, Montana
17. “Night Walk­ers” by Yan­dell Wal­ton of VIC, Australia
18. “Organic Cycles” by Kris­ten Regan of Pen­sacola, Florida
19. “Part of the Surge and Not the Sea” by Kevin Romoser of Wayne, New Jersey
20. “Planet Cal­iza” by Kurt Lis­chka of Santa Rosa Beach, Florida
21. “Re-​​Birth” by Said Dokins and Mauri­cio Rodriguez of Cuauhte­moc, Mexico
22. “Res­o­nance” by Charles Raf­fety of Mis­soula, Montana
23. “Roberto” by David Ter­ra­nova of New York, New York
24. “SAN” by Jack­son Petit of The Bahamas
25. “Sous­bleu” by Gwen Van­hee of Zedel­gem, Belgium
26. “Take Care” by Matt Pear­son of Brighton, United Kingdom
27. “The Ancient Mariner” by Michael Bur­ton of Lin­coln, Nebraska
28. “Trans­mis­sion (32 chan­nels)” by Sam Holden of Lon­don, United Kingdom
29. “True Fic­tions: Home of the Brave” by Mal­colm Lit­son of Lon­don, United Kingdom
30. “UGOKU” by Kasumi of Cleve­land, Ohio
31. “untitled_(memory)” by Matthew West of Sioux Falls, South Dakota
32. “Vacio” by Daniel Ivan of Ame­cameca, Mexico
33. “Void?” by Bala Boyd of Freeport, Florida
34. “Walk­ers” by Nick Rands of Lon­don, United Kingdom
35. “White Dishes” by Stephanie Paine of Lafayette, Indiana
36. “Win­nipeg Sto­ries: Sac­ri­fi­cial Mem­o­ries” by Clint Enns of Win­nipeg, Canada

Atten­tion ladies! We finally found a good excuse to buy another lit­tle black dress—and this time it’s for char­ity! The White-​​Wilson Cen­ter for Women’s Imag­ing has part­nered with local orga­ni­za­tions to host The Lit­tle Black Dress Party to help pro­mote pre­ven­ta­tive health­care and raise money for local char­i­ties. Men, you are invited too, and you do not have to wear a lit­tle black dress. In fact, we encour­age you not to!

With the cur­rent eco­nomic con­di­tions, White-​​Wilson Med­ical Cen­ter has seen a decline in pre­ven­ta­tive health screen­ings, specif­i­cally amongst women ages 18–55. Unfor­tu­nately, these eco­nomic dif­fi­cul­ties don’t change the fact that early detec­tion is the most effec­tive way to fight back against debil­i­tat­ing dis­eases such as breast and colon can­cer, osteo­poro­sis and heart disease.

In response, White-​​Wilson Med­ical Cen­ter and Emer­ald Ladies Jour­nal have part­nered with Dillard’s, Qan­tum Com­mu­ni­ca­tions, Cox Com­mu­ni­ca­tions, The North­west Florida Daily News, Image Print­ing, Emer­ald Chic and the Emer­ald Coast Con­fer­ence Cen­ter to raise aware­ness regard­ing the impor­tance of pre­ven­ta­tive health­care amongst women and to host this elec­tri­fy­ing event. We are pas­sion­ate that pre­ven­ta­tive care is the best way to save lives.

The Lit­tle Black Dress Party is May 22 at the Emer­ald Coast Con­fer­ence Cen­ter, and will fea­ture live music by Déjà vu Band, a fash­ion show by Dillard’s, a live auc­tion, heavy hors d’oeuvres and a cash bar. Tick­ets are $60 and cor­po­rate tables of 10 are $600; 100% of event pro­ceeds will ben­e­fit The Shel­ter House, Oppor­tu­nity Inc., and the local chap­ters of The Amer­i­can Can­cer Soci­ety and The Amer­i­can Heart Asso­ci­a­tion. Call 863‑8204 for tickets.

We still need items for the live auc­tion as well as event spon­sors. By part­ner­ing together, we believe that we can make a dif­fer­ence in the lives of the women in our com­mu­nity. We are proud to bring you this excit­ing new event and hope that you will slip into your favorite lit­tle black dress (or black suit for gen­tle­men) and come cel­e­brate life and good health with us!

For more infor­ma­tion on this event or for a list of rec­om­mended annual health screen­ings visit: http://​www​.white​-wil​son​.com/​l​i​t​t​l​e​b​l​a​c​k​d​r​e​s​s​p​a​r​t​y​.​htm.