GLAMOURous Evening!

I was lucky enough to get to be a seat filler at the Glamour Women of the Year Awards again this year!  This is MY Academy Awards.  I even got to take a friend with me this year, so Katie came along.  She was the perfect companion for this because she LOVED it.  We knew ahead of time who the winners of the awards were and were already excited about that list.  But, it was also very, very fun to be surprised with who the presenters were.

Poster at the entrance to Carnegie Hall

As we entered the theatre and made our way to some empty seats up front, I brushed arms with Gayle King and Katie and I crossed our fingers that her BFF, Oprah, might be nearby.

I started the show filling a sit on the aisle on the 3rd row.  Pretty important location, yes?  Easy access to the stage to receive an award, right?  Riiight.  I had no idea at the time whose seat I was in.  There was a lady in front of me who turned around to speak to the man I was sitting next to and she made a comment that the lady he was with looked beautiful.  His response?  "Thank you.  She just went backstage to touch up a bit.  Tory Burch designed her dress for her."  (Found out later that Tory Burch was actually at the show, but I didn't see her..probably wouldn't have known her if I had).  At this point I was clued in...this was the seat of someone important!  Okay, so it wasn't the biggest celeb of the night, but it was an award winners seat...Lindsay Vonn!  The famous Olympic skier who got so much press this year!  Fun!  I didn't get to stay there for long though and bounced around a couple of times before I ended up in a pretty dull spot on the outer edge for most of the show.  At least I had a seat for the show!  Katie lucked into a 2nd row spot and was sitting right at the feet of many of the celebs who spoke on stage...she freaked!

Besides all the great celebrity sightings, the show is also pretty fantastic.  There were so many women honored for some really amazing things.  This is a show you leave feeling proud, inspired, encouraged, and challenged. 

So, who'd we see?  Well....

*NOTE...none of the following pictures are mine.  These are much better than anything I was able to get.

Janelle Monae started the show off with a little song & dance

Arianna Huffington presented to Queen Rania of Jordan

This lady is an inspiration!  She supports her own family (4 kids!) while working to see that girls all over the world have access to good education.

Kate Hudson presented an award to Fergie

They were so cute!  Girlfriends!  Fergie said she requested that Glamour ask Kate to present her award just so they could see each other, since Fergie is always out on tour.  They had plans to go out and have girlfriend time after the show.

Both Hillary Swank and Janet Jackson

presented to Donatella Versace

I loved her dress, but you gotta admit

- she is one strange looking lady.

Plastic Surgery, much?

Hillary wore Versace when she won her Oscar and has considered Versace her good luck charms ever since.  Janet spoke of how Gianni Versace dressed her brother, Michael, from a very young age.  Then, Donatella started doing all Janet's clothing for her own tours.  When Michael died, Donatella dressed the entire Jackson family for the funeral.

Katie Couric presented to Dr. Hawa Abdi and her daughters

They are three women doctors running a refugee camp in Somalia - amazing!

Chelsea Clinton presented to 20 young women/girls

who have done crazy incredible things

One of the young girls (17-year-old, I think) had built a GPS system for spacecraft!

Mayor Bloomberg presented to Lindsay Vonn,

Mia Hamm and Lisa Leslie

This presentation was extremely awkward as Lisa Leslie was probably a whole foot taller than Mayor Bloomberg.  He looked extremely uncomfortable.  I felt extremely uncomfortable just watching it.  You know who wasn't looking too uncomfortable?  The 6'6" Lisa Leslie.  Completely confident, despite her crazy tall height.  And she talked about it a bit in her speech...being so tall wasn't exactly easy as a teenager, but she learned to embrace it and made lemonade out of lemons.

UN Ambassador Susan Rice (2009 winner)
presented an award for all the female
Heads of State across the world.

Only four of these powerful women could make it to the occasion from across the world...these 4 came from Slovakia, Trinidad & Tobago, Liberia, and Lithuania.

Elizabeth Glaser was one of the first Glamour
Women of the Year winners in 1990.  Her
son, Jake, was there to remember her.

Diane Sawyer presented to Katie Spotz

Katie Spotz became the youngest person to ever row across the Atlantic Ocean.  All to raise awareness for the need for clean drinking water across the world.  She was a beautiful and amazing 22-year-old.

And the crowd went WILD when
Oprah Winfrey took the stage.
She presented to her dear friend Julia Roberts.

Julia was who I was most excited to see and she did not disappoint.  So classy and beautiful.  Her speech was funny and inspiring.  She was honored for all the work she has done for children with Rett syndrome.  Her advice to the young girls in the audience?  "Never tuck your hair behind your ears.  It never looks good."

Stanley Tucci presented to Cher

Cher has supported men who have been injured at war.  Two veterans were there who each had lost 1 or 2 legs and gone on to climb crazy mountains across the world thru a program that Cher supports.

Kelly Osborne presented to Constance McMillan

Constance was honored for fighting for her right to take her girlfriend to prom with her.

I have to be honest. This part was tough for me. I hate to get all controversial here, but it's just truly how I felt.  I didn't agree with some things that were said and it is hard to stand up and applaud something that I don't think is best. Kelly said that judging and bullying is what is wrong and that her God loves gay people. And she is so right about all of that. But, what I don't think she gets is that God is a loving Father who wants the very best for His children. And He tells us this isn't part of His plan (it's all over the New Testament and it's helpful to remember that God and His Word was, are, and always will be. And that He alone is Sovereign and All-Knowing and we, clearly, are not). Just as (most of) our earthly fathers would grieve if we started making decisions that they thought were not in our best interest, so does our Heavenly Father.  The difference being that our Heavenly Father is infinitely wise, perfectly just, always loving, where sometimes our earthly fathers falter.  I know all too well that it's not easy to choose the path of righteousness.  I began to think...I struggle pretty intensely with some specific sins. Although I'm not ready to air all the details here, Satan has found the things that he can easily enslave me to and it is very, very hard on a daily basis for me not to fall into his traps. It saddens me and I know that I am missing out on all kinds of blessings, joy, peace, and hope that God freely gives the righteous. I can choose to be a slave to sin or I can choose to be a slave to obedience, which leads to freedom.  Unfortunately, I often find myself obeying the calling of sin. I am pretty sure that if I were to receive an award related to my sin, people wouldn't stand up and applaud the choices I'm making. The sins I struggle with are ones that our culture mostly agrees are not good choices. So, I think the audience would feel sad for me, rather than cheer me on and encourage me to keep doing the same. And that's how I felt when this award was given...sad that she's missing out on the freedom of life lived in righteousness and she doesn't even care or seem to know that there is something even better. It just wasn't something that I could celebrate.....

"Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." Romans 12:2

"Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness"?  Romans 6:16

I grieve my sins.  I desperately want to quit selling myself short of all God has planned for me and my life and pray to that end that His love would overwhelm me in such a way that I would be increasingly more obedient to Him and find the righteousness and freedom He so freely offers.

Whoops!  Serious tangent there.  On a lighter note, the gift bag rocked!!