Bombshell Brunches Podcast

Impromptu Tea Spill Time! Raquelle is having a great day. Why? Because she recently took a values exercise and has realised that her appetite for adventure (i.e. one of her highest values) is not being fulfilled, affecting her daily satisfaction. We talk through how establishing and honouring your values can impact your relationships, career, and overall life design. Grab that tea, sit back, and take the next week to ask yourself: what values do YOU want to define and design your best, fullest life?

RESOURCES:

• Dr. Ashley Margeson’s Episode 
• The Superwoman Code 
• The Artists' Way 
•  Adam Creek 

To connect with Bombshell Brunches: click HERE

To connect with Kristina Lao: click HERE

To connect with Raquelle Roodenburg: click HERE

Thank you to our incredible BB Team: Glen, Bosco, Hannah, Grace, Elvin and Nicole!  

Levels Music Production: Audio Career Pathway Support (to connect with Levels Music Pro, click HERE)

The Bake Daddy is in the house!

Today we were joined by one of the most nurturing humans, Craig Taylor aka @thebakedaddy_. 

Craig talks about the incredible time he had on the Food Network's show Great Chocolate Showdown where contestants compete for a $50,000 prize. We break down how one cake changed the trajectory of his career and one quote changed the dynamics of a fierce competition into a family of competitors who encouraged growth instead of breaking someone down.

Get ready - because next time Raquelle's in town we're hitting up the kitchen to get our own bake off!

About Craig:

Craig Taylor has been a professional cake curator since March 2017, the day after his father died. Having worked over 20 years in the casino world, his world upended with his father’s passing. He set himself a mission the very next day: to make a peppermint bark cheesecake for his girlfriend’s birthday. He quickly learned peppermint bark was out of season and nowhere to be found in stores, so he spent the day running from store to store in search of all the ingredients he’d need to make it from scratch – before he even got started on the cheesecake.

Craig has since been selected as one of the ten contestants on the Food Network’s Great Chocolate Showdown, and continues to make highly customised baked goods, with an unparalleled attention to detail. 

To connect with Craig: click HERE 

To connect with Bombshell Brunches: click HERE

To connect with Kristina Lao: click HERE

To connect with Raquelle Roodenburg: click HERE

Thank you to our incredible BB Team: Glen, Bosco, Hannah, Grace, Elvin and Nicole!  

Levels Music Production: Audio Career Pathway Support (to connect with Levels Music Pro, click HERE)

Welcome to our Tuesday ramble. We deconstructed our normal Brunch Break to let you in on our behind-the-curtain chats. From showing up in meeting rooms, Tuesday rambles, massive turtles and using your voice, we take a moment away from graduate studies, auditions and studio days, and decompress the way we know best: with YOU. 

To connect with Bombshell Brunches: click HERE

To connect with Kristina Lao: click HERE

To connect with Raquelle Roodenburg: click HERE

Thank you to our incredible BB Team: Glen, Bosco, Hannah, Grace, Elvin and Nicole!  

Levels Music Production: Audio Career Pathway Support (to connect with Levels Music Pro, click HERE)

Dr. Javeria Shah is, in short, a scholarly activist with a hilarious sense of humour, and a deep, kind intelligence surrounding decolonisation practice. We laughed from the get-go about her impeccable Robert DeNiro impersonation, murder hornets (which are still at large, I’ll have you know), and poo emojis (flashback to toilet roll scarcity, anyone?). We wrapped it all up in the world of social justice, and Dr. Javeria’s academic-led impact on deconstructing social norms. Dr. Javeria glamorizes geekdom, and is the perfect example of being the change you want to see. 

About Dr. Javeria Khadija Shah

A cultural sociologist and interdisciplinary scholar with expertise in policy, media education, sociology, and the visual arts. I specialise in person-centred research that interrogates and re-conceptualises societal positioning(s) of the individual and their self-identity formation - and my current research is strongly focused on the conceptualisation of socialisation as ‘social performance’.

RESOURCES:

• My Name Is Documentary
• The Social Performance Academy
• Black History 365

“The role of the artist is to make the revolution irresistible” - Toni Cade Bambara

To connect with Dr. Javeria click HERE 

To connect with Bombshell Brunches: click HERE

To connect with Kristina Lao: click HERE

To connect with Raquelle Roodenburg: click HERE

Thank you to our incredible BB Team: Glen, Bosco, Hannah, Grace, Elvin and Nicole!  

Levels Music Production: Audio Career Pathway Support (to connect with Levels Music Pro, click HERE)

Well… it all starts with a dildo on the wall. This episode went all over the place from some of Kristina and Raquelle’s own past experiences to bad puns to learning how to navigate difficult conversations and learning not to internalize other people’s reactions to sex.  

Sex Therapist, Diana Sadat guides us through discussing lulls in a relationship with a partner to showing up as your most fulfilled self in a relationship to navigating sexual trauma and holding safe space for others.

We talk about the necessity of building safety and respect into a relationship and how intimacy and eroticism can be fluid rather than a “pick the position” experience. 

Buckle up, bombshells because this episode cuts to the core of the #BeBraveLiveFull ethos and reminds us how important open communication is for levelling up in all parts of life!

About Diana: 

Diana is a counsellor and certified sex therapist – after filling up her practice in a short couple of months, she took her love of sex therapy and established Allura Sex Therapy Centre, Vancouver’s leading counselling practice that exclusively focuses on sex, sexuality, and relationships. Her passion for this work spans across a variety of issues from lack of desire and pain during sex to shame around sexual interests and attractions. Her mission is to help people find pleasure in their lives, develop an authentic and connected relationship to their sexuality and relationships, and throw out the messaging and beliefs that society has given them that holds them back. She loves supporting other therapists in developing their skills in this work and loves that she gets to spend her day helping as many people as possible become more comfortable and confident approaching the topic of sex and sexuality!

RESOURCES:

Allura: click HERE

To connect with Diana: click HERE 

To connect with Bombshell Brunches: click HERE

To connect with Kristina Lao: click HERE

To connect with Raquelle Roodenburg: click HERE

Thank you to our incredible BB Team: Glen, Bosco, Hannah, Grace, Elvin and Nicole!  

Levels Music Production: Audio Career Pathway Support (to connect with Levels Music Pro, click HERE)

Vanessa (aka Raquelle’s Mama, or Mama R, as Kristina likes to say) is a force to be reckoned with. A true example of being the champion of your circumstances, Vanessa brunches with us on how she took her 19-year old self and newborn baby Raquelle to personal and professional heights. Now, with over 27 years of experience in health and benefits at the largest international actuarial consulting firms, we talk life design, strategising for success, and negotiating tips for your career at every level. Vanessa has harnessed (pun intended) personal passions, and created ways to monetize, level up and achieve those big, bodacious goals (while raising Nigerian Dwarf Goats). We’re so inspired by this powerhouse of a woman and her zillion animals, and we know you will be too!

About Vanessa: 

On the personal front:

Vanessa is first-born Canadian in her family who immigrated to Canada from the Netherlands. Being the 3rd of 4 children, she grew up on the west coast in British Columbia, mostly in Vancouver and the Gulf Islands. 

Passionate Mama to two beautiful girls, various hobbies including dabbling in equestrian showjumping, breeding KWPN (Koninklijk Warmbloed Paardenstamboek Nederland aka “Dutch Warmblood”) horses focused in showjumping, raising Nigerian Dwarf goats, and running this little hobby farm on a small acreage on the outskirts of Vancouver, in Maple Ridge, with a “handful” of chickens, turkeys, miniature horses, orchard and market garden.

Vanessa also has a career…

On the professional side:

Vanessa has over 27 years of experience in health and benefits working at a few of the largest international actuarial consulting firms, providing strategic and day-to-day consulting services to her clients which include a wide variety of local, national and international organizations, specializing in multi-employer plans and trust plans.

Vanessa is licensed with the Insurance Council of British Columbia for Life and Accident and Sickness Insurance, and is Past Chair of the Canadian Pension and Benefits Institute (CPBI) Pacific Region, a speaker at various industry events, facilitating pension and benefits education to industry professionals.

To connect with Vanessa, click HERE 

To connect with Bombshell Brunches: click HERE

To connect with Kristina Lao: click HERE

To connect with Raquelle Roodenburg: click HERE

Thank you to our incredible BB Team: Glen, Bosco, Hannah, Grace, Elvin and Nicole!  

Levels Music Production: Audio Career Pathway Support (to connect with Levels Music Pro, click HERE)

Our latest episode with Liz Hendersen, commercial stylist for over a decade and the co-founder of Project Wardrobe (a clothing rental house for the film industry) was SUCH a treat. We dove into the difficulties around starting a business that is not commonly understood, the trials of renting warehouse space as two women, fierce friends and partnerships, the incredible power of RESPECT as a foundation in order to have real friendships and tough conversations AND acknowledging that business doesn’t have to be a ZERO sum game.

We can’t recommend this episode enough! Keep your eyes on the @bombshellbrunches instagram because we’re going to have lots more content from Liz coming your way. 

About Liz: 

Liz is a stylist, a world traveller, life lover and co-owner of Project Wardrobe Rental House, a commercial styling company and warehouse that she and her business partner Lisa Masi founded in 2018. Liz has worked on hundreds of commercials over her career, including top brands like Mattel, Hasbro and Samsung. She now lives in Cloverdale with her high school sweetheart and two amazing children.

RESOURCES:

• Vancouver Prop and Costume

To connect with Liz: click HERE 

To connect with Project Wardrobe: click HERE

To connect with Bombshell Brunches: click HERE

To connect with Kristina Lao: click HERE

To connect with Raquelle Roodenburg: click HERE

Thank you to our incredible BB Team: Glen, Bosco, Hannah, Grace, Elvin and Nicole!  

Levels Music Production: Audio Career Pathway Support (to connect with Levels Music Pro, click HERE)

Alysha is a force of nature, and of nurture - humanising stigmatised people and exercising values-led leadership is something that we can all learn from. We sat down with Alysha to talk through her love of transformative interaction, starting with her own experiences with bad bosses and through a serendipitous series of exchanges within her neighbourhood, that led her to run this incredible charity. The saying goes that many of us are just two paycheques away from poverty. Alysha and her team actively reduce the stigma surrounding the Downtown Eastside’s population, and remind us that every single person has a unique and important story. This episode will leave your heart full, your mind changed, and your life fuller. The next time you walk by someone on the street, you’ll see a person first.  

About Alysha: 

Alysha has been in the hair industry for 11 years. After starting her career in salons she found a passion for barbering and switched lanes in 2011. While living in Gastown (an area of Vancouver’s downtown east side for non-Vancouverites) she befriended some downtown eastsiders. After seeing the way they were being treated and having experienced addiction in her family, she decided to start 2 Paycheques Away as a way to change the stigma around addiction, homelessness and mental health on the DTES. 

2 Paycheques Away, unlocks new perceptions of spirited and resilient individuals from the DTES by sharing their stories as told during their visit to the barber.

REFERENCES:

• 2 Paycheques Away
• Working Gear
• Beauty Night Society
• V6A Film Documentary

To connect with Alysha: click HERE 

To connect with Bombshell Brunches: click HERE

To connect with Kristina Lao: click HERE

To connect with Raquelle Roodenburg: click HERE

Thank you to our incredible BB Team: Glen, Bosco, Hannah, Grace, Elvin and Nicole!  

Levels Music Production: Audio Career Pathway Support (to connect with Levels Music Pro, click HERE)

Matthew Neutra is an innovator, a compelling speaker, and a distiller of imaginative, big-picture ideas. His commitment to mentorship, effective storytelling, and supporting emerging creatives leaves no wonder as to why he’s a next-level thinker and Lead Experience Engineer at Bose. 

From establishing trust, to asking the right questions (not trying to have the right answers), and wholeheartedly embracing failure, Matt leads us through some of the best tips and tricks he’s learned over the years, to set every one of us up for success in our own creative thinking endeavours. 

No matter what your business, industry or life phase, this talk will have you thinking about the best ways to engage with those around you, and build lasting, lovely relationships.

About Our Guest: 

Matthew Neutra has been at the bleeding edge of immersive media, experience design and digital signage for over a decade and an half.  His passion for storytelling, clear communication and technology have driven him to experiment, tinker and build extraordinary experiences.  These include a stereoscopic dome theater with one of a kind immersive audio, a full scale immersive Millennium Falcon experience, audio AR, immersive branched narrative, physical/digital immersion and all manner of spatial audio experiences.  Matt has a B.S. in Geology, and M.S. in Geo-information Science/Remote sensing and worked on the pre-cursor to Google Earth in the late 1990’s.  He likes rock climbing, ice climbing and he is a Libra.

To connect with Matthew Neutra: click HERE 

To connect with Bombshell Brunches: click HERE

To connect with Kristina Lao: click HERE

To connect with Raquelle Roodenburg: click HERE

Thank you to our incredible BB Team: Glen, Bosco, Hannah, Grace, Elvin and Nicole!  

Levels Music Production: Audio Career Pathway Support (to connect with Levels Music Pro, click HERE)

We are ecstatic to introduce you to our latest bombshell who arrived (very on-brand) yielding a mimosa glass in one hand and a Nerf gun in the other. Award-winning All-Star Middle Linebacker, two-time Grey Cup champion, and a eight-year Canadian Football League veteran, Shea Emry talked with us about the importance of creating safe spaces for men to “ventilate” (politically correct terminology here) their feelings. After suffering a concussion which put him out for almost a whole season, Shea who was battling depression, began looking inwards - adventuring and navigating mental health and his childhood traumas. This episode is hilarious but equally informative and incredibly important as we support the men around us who are struggling to get out of the societally upheld box of tough guys and alpha-no-emotions. No matter what your background, assigned gender or preferences - this episode has something for everyone - think epic snowball fights, yachts, the power of yelling and axe throwing. 

About Shea Emry:

Former Pro Footballer turned men's mental health advocate and adventure entrepreneur Shea Emry is tackling new challenges. He’s battled some behemoth humans and suffered from countless concussions as a result. Combining those concussions with childhood trauma have, in turn, made his latest endeavours more difficult than they needed to be. Since retirement, he has founded a number of companies; Wellmen, A men's adventure club, aimed at inspiring men to find healthy ways to ventilate their human experience, Axewood axe throwing crew, and most recently Avalaunch Snowball Blitz — which is paintball style snowball fight experience. All of which are based at the Whistler Racket Club. Debilitating fear, self-doubt, and procrastination have impeded his efficiency and ability to be his best version of himself. Join us as we journey through his story, how he’s been able to continuously battle his fears daily and bring childish dreams to fruition by saying what the huck? Why the huck not? Let's huck’n do this. 

To connect with Shea: click HERE 

To connect with Bombshell Brunches: click HERE

To connect with Kristina Lao: click HERE

To connect with Raquelle Roodenburg: click HERE

Thank you to our incredible BB Team: Glen, Bosco, Hannah, Grace, Elvin and Nicole!  

Levels Music Production: Audio Career Pathway Support (to connect with Levels Music Pro, click HERE)