Tag Cooking with Kindness

Parties That Cook Reflects on the Top 12 Accomplishments of 2012

0 comments By The Kitchen Whisperer Filed in Entertaining, News & Events Tagged with , , , , , , , , , January 15th, 2013 @ 3:19 pm

We managed to survive the madness of the holidays, only to find ourselves waist-deep in January events! Just as we did last year, we’re about to dive into Parties That Cook’s Top Accomplishments of 2012.

1.  Broke our Own Records. In 2012, we hosted our largest event to-date (can you even picture 213 guests?!) and later booked our largest event to-date. This January, we’ll be sure to welcome all 275 guest with open arms!

2.  Launched New Events. 2012 brought the almost accidental development of Cooking with Kindness, a corporate event where groups come together in the kitchen of a local family shelter to cook for, serve, and dine alongside its residents.

3.  Became a Certified Women-Owned Business. That’s right. Not only is PTC founder and CEO, Bibby Giginilliat, a woman (surprise!), she also passed the rigorous application process and proved herself as visionary of the company.

4.  Hosted another Successful Women’s Initiative Fundraiser. We are on a roll, folks! Cooking up Success for Women’s Initiative has surely taken off. Raising $17,500 is nothing to be ashamed of!

5.  Celebrated Birthdays and Birth Days. Not only did we host awesome birthday celebrations (per usual), but we also welcomed 2 new little guys to the PTC family! HUGE congratulations to Erin and Rosie!

6.  Grew like Crazy in Multiple Markets. Talk about a growth spurt! When 68% growth (Chicago) isn’t the biggest change you’ve seen, you know you’re doing something right. Hello, 675% growth in Portland!!

7.  Cooked up Romance. We’ve conquered Date Night proposals in 2011, so we thought we’d challenge ourselves with Singles. Who better to partner with, running approx. 30 events in 3 cities, than Match.com?

8.  Won Awards and Made Headlines. We were awarded #63 on the list of Fastest Growing Small Businesses by the San Francisco Business Times and earned a spot on the Inc. 500|5000 List of America’s Fastest Growing Private Companies for the first time! Man, it feels good to be a baller. We’re proud to say we were featured in Crain’s Chicago Business for the first time. See it for yourself here.

9.  Worked on Cohesion within Our Team. A series of workshops with facilitator, Abby, raised our corporate and personal consciousness. Things have never been smoother.

10.  Positioned PTC to Make BIG Moves in 2013. Remember how we moved Carolyn to Portlandia to manage the NW territory? Talk about a good move! We also hired some amazing new office talent, AND managed to let go of bulk. We have officially embraced our new mantra: less is more.

Parties That Cook’s Top 10 New Year’s Resolutions for 2013

0 comments By The Kitchen Whisperer Filed in News & Events Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , , December 28th, 2012 @ 12:44 pm

We’ve almost made it through the year. And boy was 2012 a doozy… Luckily, the only thing left to do is sit back, relax, and start prepping for 2013! First things first: Your New Year’s Resolutions. Last year we provided a quick list of our resolutions for inspiration, and this year is no different. Feel free to jump on our bandwagon, and adopt any of the following ambitions, goals and resolutions.

De-clutter Your Life: Less is more. This might be Parties That Cook’s motto for the year. 2013 will be all about cutting back on excess, cleaning out, and making our operations effortless!

Get Healthy: Whether it be in the physical sense (cutting back on wheat and dairy, or drinking more green smoothies) or improving your sanity, work on bettering yourself this year. Yoga, meditating, or just reflecting on the day/week might help, but the key is to NOT spread yourself too thin at work or in play.

Stay Focused: I know we encouraged adventure last year, but it seems a certain PTC Planner took our advice to the extreme. She now recommends actually saying “No” more often. Stay focused and energized for what’s really important in life. Of course you can still have your fun, but in the end it seems to come down to priorities.

Get Active: Don’t forget to make goals that don’t revolve around the office! We’ve got a couple of PTC ladies training for a half marathon, another crazy rock climber, and yet another embarking on an A-Z restaurant challenge this year. Aim high and expand horizons.

Have More Fun in the Kitchen: Don’t look at cooking as a chore! Start a cookbook club (follow ours if you need inspiration), take a few cooking classes, or just perfect your beurre blanc at home. If the cooking process doesn’t excite you, you’re crazy start a food fight at least the results will be delicious!

Continue Learning: This resolution may look familiar – and it should! We resolved to continue learning in 2012, and never want to stop. If it’s not a new skill you’re interested in, try learning about the people around you. Your environment is always changing, even if things may feel the same on the surface. (Note: Teaching can be an equally impressive feat. Try getting your new puppy to sit and stay!)

Paint the Town Green: Start a garden! Try growing your own herbs or tasty veggies like radishes & green beans. Not only will you fit in with the trending farm-to-table movement, but the results will leave you with a rewarding sense of accomplishment. To those in tiny apartments with no yard: I feel your pain, but it can be done!

Practice Fiscal Responsibility: Yet another recurring goal makes an appearance on this list. Just because you behaved yourself, limited your spending and saved some money in 2012, does not mean you can go crazy in 2013. (We all know you didn’t really cut your lunch budget for work days, anyway.) Challenge yourself this year, and actually bring your lunch to work 3 times a week! If I can do it*, so can you.

Give Back: Volunteer at a local shelter, mentor youth, heck, host a Cooking with Kindness event for your company! Get out there and make a difference – it only takes one person (YOU). I promise that the benefits of giving back (joy, fulfillment, warm fuzzies) far outweigh any cost (time, money).

Make Big Moves: At work and in your personal life, you want to come out of 2013 feeling like a champion. It’s not about planning to do something; just do it. Kick butt (can I say that?) in your sales territory, blow your goals out of the water, go on that dream vacation you’ve been craving! Any amount of progress on your goals will feel like a WIN.

*Not saying I did.

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