What a journey ahead of us! Welcome to the May blog. My name is Margie Gaynor and I will be giving you insight into the exciting festivities held within the second month of the Quest. We had just finished our personal development days and now the focus was on the Official Launch night.  
 
The Official Launch night had all of us girls both excited and nervous. Our speeches prepared, outfits ready and off we went to the Country Club, were we would give a five-minute speech on ‘What Wagga Means to Me?’ I knew that the Quest would put me out of my comfort zone and challenge me in different ways, and this was definitely the beginning.
 
The room was filled with multiple members of the community, family and friends. Entrants and I greeted our guests, and got to know so many new people. For dinner we had lovely meals and for each course we moved tables to ensure we got to socialise with various people. The entrants and myself enjoyed getting the chance to meet so many wonderful people. For me this night really helped me gain greater confidence within myself. It was proof that I could do anything that I set my mind to. Our sponsors walked us into the launch as we were being introduced to the guests. My sponsor is WDF Professionals and I was lucky enough to be escorted into the room by Vicky Richards. When we got our sashes and badge it all started to feel real, this journey had officially begun. When the launch was over, the entrants and I had meetings ahead of us to plan for the upcoming events.
 
Our upcoming event – Trivia Night - June 21st 2019 at 6.30pm
Announcing our first event, ‘A Night at the Movies’. The trivia night will be a fun night to raise money for our four deserving beneficiaries. Planning is underway and all entrants are enthusiastically preparing and working together to make sure the events are all organised. Working as a team has been so much fun and each entrant brings a different dynamic to the group. I feel so lucky to be a part of such a passionate, hard working group of young women. It will be a great journey with all of my fellow entrants as we all support one another in order to raise money and give back to the community.
 
I would like to thank the current Miss Wagga Stina Constantine and Community Princess Presslea Cowan for supporting the entrants and myself by taking the time to get to know us. You both do an amazing job.
 
I hope you all enjoyed looking into our Month of May and our journey so far in the Miss Wagga Wagga Quest.

- Margie Gaynor 
​Miss Wagga Wagga Quest 2020 Entrant 

Firstly, I would like to say congratulations, to the current Miss Wagga Wagga, Stina Constantine and Community Princess, Presslea Cowan, for their wonderful contribution to the quest and community so far. These two incredible women have been nothing short of an inspiration to me and my fellow MWWQ 2020 entrants.

My name is Brittany Hackett and I have been a Wagga Wagga girl my whole life. After suffering anxiety and a range of mental health issues for a majority of my life, this is something that I would never have thought twice about being involved in let alone entering – until the day a colleague approached me and asked me if I would take the leap and that was exactly what I did.

In April, all seven entrants were confirmed and got together to meet for a range of personal development sessions. This included, dining etiquette hosted by the wonderful Jamie Shepley, the head chef at The Roundabout Restaurant, who have also come onboard as a Quest sponsor. We all enjoyed a fantastic four course meal, and some really fantastic tips and tricks on how to present ourselves properly at the dinner table.

We were also blessed with Rick Storrier who taught us everything we needed to know about public speaking and speech writing, this was to have us prepared for the 5 minute speech we each had to write and present at our up-coming launch night.

Following this session, we had Casey Wilson from House on the Hill Marketing coach us on how to organise events and we are very grateful that we have Casey Wilson’s knowledge to bounce off for the duration of this quest.

We were then lucky enough to head to the 2AAA FM radio station and were met with a very warm welcome by the lovely, Alan Lean and Marguerite Smith for some much appreciated radio and media training. This was daunting at first, though Alan and Marguerite made it seem easy and fun!

Next on the list was a “dress appropriate” session, held at Ted & Olive boutique. Unfortunately I was out of town for this session and missed out; though I know the rest of the entrants had a superb evening with MWWQ Chair Alex and our Mayoress Jenny Conkey. 

Lastly, two nights before our launch night, we had a beauty and hair session. This was held at Lulu & Kit in Fitzmaurice Street. We received a wonderful “up-do style” hair session from the ladies at Lulu & Kit as well as a make-up session from Frances Conroy makeup artistry.

Now we were ready for our first public address – The Launch night, 8th of May 2019.
I am sure I am not just speaking for myself when I say, the moment I stepped in that room, ahead of all of the guests, I was ready to run away and never come back!

To my fellow entrants, Erica, Montanna, Hannah, Hayley, Tegan and Margie, I cannot wait to see what these next few months have in store for us. How special it is to be given this opportunity and to have met you all.
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- Brittany Hackett
Miss Wagga Wagga Quest 2020 Entrant