Shana Smith, Mrs Orange County wins Civic Award and 1st Runner Up at Mrs. California United States

May 20, 2009 - PRLog -- This past weeken Shana Smith, Mrs Orange County  competed in the Mrs. California United States Pageant.  The Mrs. California United States pageant is a preliminary to the Mrs. United States pageant being held this summer in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Mrs. United States celebrates the successful married woman and celebrates each contestant for her beauty, intelligence, community service and confidence! Complete woman...total beauty!
Mrs Smith was awarded the coveted Civic Award recognizing her  work in her community.  She is very active and very passionate about gaining awareness for domestic violence.  In addition she also placed First Runner Up, therefore if the winner takes home the national title Mrs. Smith will assume the role as Mrs. California.
After speaking more about her platform I felt very informed and understanding as to why this busy wife and mother wanted to take on the additional role of 'titleholder'.   In her words, "The crown itself is so important because I know how much it can help in my cause towards ending stereotypes in Domestic Violence. I want to be able to speak more, reach more people in Orange County and across our state to show them that a victim of abuse has no 'typical' that we are all different in many ways. I want to show people that abuse does not see race, socio-economic background or even sexual orientation. Due to our economy the rate of domestic violence has increased 18% nationally in the past year, this needs to change and I want to be part of that change."  She volunteers her time with several Orange County domestic violence organizations, whether it be spending time with children, stuffing envelopes or helping to plan an annual fundraiser she is up for the task.  Most recently she was the event chairperson for CSP’s annual gala benefitting the youth shelter in Huntington Beach and she is currently working on obtaining additional t-shirts from local victims of crime for CSP’s Clothesline Project that is on display at several colleges during the month's of November and April for Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Awareness months.
If you would like to see more about Shana and her journey to Mrs. California United States please visit her blog: http://2009mrsorangecounty.blogspot.com

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I have started a new project for the children in domestic violence shelters in Orange County. I will be collecting the following items to be given to each child coming in to the shelters.