Traveling to Las Vegas was FANTASTIC! Being able to attend the Miss USA pageant live was such an honor. Ever since I was a little girl I use to watch the pageant from my home with my mother. I always looked up to every girl who made it on that stage and had the gift of representing their state. This time not only was I able to watch it live but I got to go as apart of the Miss USA family being a Teen titleholder! It was a time in my life I will never forget! 
During the month of April I was asked to host the closing ceremonies for the Special Olympics Connecticut, 2010 Urban Youth Day. This was such a privilege, and one of the most rewarding things I have ever done. I got to recognize all of the participating schools throughout Connecticut and present the medals! Special Olympics is a wonderful cause.
I recently attended the “Let Your Inner Star Shine Far” Career Fair. Here, I had the opportunity to speak to the elementary students of Willimantic’s Natchaug School. I explained to underprivileged children that with determination, hard work, and a lot of effort they can become whatever they want in their future. I spoke to them about my experiences and what it has taken me to become who I am today, Miss Connecticut Teen USA 2010. This led me to introduce to them to the idea of community service, which I personally believe, is the most important aspect of growing up. 
I left them that day with a quote often said by Eleanor Roosevelt. “The future belongs to those, who believe in the beauty of their dreams”. With time and more education, these children will soon be doing great things with their lives in pursuing whatever their hearts desire. Hopefully the quote I shared with them will be remembered as they too begin to do their part to make this world better. 
On April 12th, I participated in the Mother Earth Fashion Show sponsored by “A New Beginning Salon” located in Bethel. The show took place in support of the “Clean Ocean” charity, with the intentions of making a cleaner environment, specifically our oceans and other water sources. For the fashion show the models and I wore vintage, retro clothing! To go along with this theme the hairdressers from “ A New Beginning Salon” threw my hair up into a “bob” style hair-do. It was strange to see myself go from long hair to short in a matter of minutes. The fashion show was a blast and it was great to be fashion forward and environmentally friendly at the same time! Thanks to everyone who is doing there part, either by coming to the fashion show, or just at home to do what they can to improve our environmental conditions.
On the weekend of January 22nd I headed out to Virginia to be apart of a StandOut Production retreat. Here I got to spend my weekend with many of the Miss and Teen USA contestants. All of the girls were so welcoming and warm hearted right away, I knew we were going to have a fun filled weekend. Chelsea Cooley Altman a former Miss USA, and At Dunn a health and fitness guru were the two amazing people who held the retreat and would be in charge of everything that would happen for all of the girls that weekend. Both of them had so many activities planned for all of us that would help make us not only a better contestant at Miss and Teen USA, but also a better person as a whole. Besides the horse back riding, rock climbing, bon-fire,roller skating, fitness with At, and walking class with Chelsea, my absolute favorite activity was the leap of faith! For this activity you had to climb a very tall, wiggly telephone pole, once you finally made it to the top you had to stand on two feet holding on to absolutely nothing and jump off it! At first I was very hesitant about doing this but Chelsea finally convinced be to do it by telling me two things, one, it is not that bad and two, that I would feel amazing after doing it. Once I completed this activity I only agreed on one thing Chelsea said and that was that it made me feel amazing, but when it came to being not so bad I couldn’t disagree more! It was very scary and challenging and not the easiest for someone who isn’t fond of heights! Sadly the weekend flew by and before I knew it it was time to go home. I learned so much from both Chelsea and At but I also learned so much from all the girls. I am so happy that I got to meet many of the girls I will go to Miss Teen USA with, I can confidently say that we have an amazing , beautiful group of young ladies!
On December 12th I had my first of two official photo shoots as Miss Connecticut Teen USA! My adventures that weekend began at Catherine Fiehn’s studio in Milford Connecticut. Since the age of thirteen I have been working with Catherine Fiehn and she has always done such beautiful work. I knew that this time would be no different, and she would continue to! While at Catherine’s studio Ashley my sister queen would also join me there to shoot with Catherine! Together we had so much fun and lots of laughs, we even got to take a holiday picture together in our matching snowmen pajamas! Thank you to Catherine Fiehn for always taking the best pictures and making everyone’s photo shoots so much fun!
Next on the list was Massachusetts! Here I met up with all the Clemente girls Ashley, Lacey, Nydelis, Brooke, and Shelby. Together we had our holiday photos done by Smith Maxfield, but first Neil had to work his magic! Thank you to Neil for doing our hair and make-up, Jeff Smith for taking the beautiful pictures, and Richard Berberian for allowing us to wear his magnificent jewelry!
Once the photo shoot was finished we all went to dinner with Laurie and Anthony ( the best directors ever). At the dinner table we all shared so many stories and got to learn a lot about one another. I left dinner with this quote in mind, “Friends are the Family we choose”. I can honestly say that Laurie, Anthony, Neil, my sister queens and their parents are all my family. I LOVE YOU GUYS!!