June 12, 2018

#Connect – A Recap Of Siyaflo’s Inaugural Health & Wellness Event!

Siyaflo had its very first health and wellness event on June 3rd! We packed the house at iDance Vancouver!

It was a morning of yoga, meditation, fitness & nutrition talks, dance, prizes from sponsors, and getting to know each other. My goal was to bring everyone together in a fun atmosphere to move and to connect, here’s a recap of the morning…

(Photos by Wonderful Ida)

Delicious watermelon juice and the biggest bananas you’ve ever seen were ready for attendees when they arrived – kindly donated by sponsor BE FRESH. There was time beforehand for everyone to chat a bit, network if they wanted, and taste some food, juice, and rooibos tea (of course, anyone who knows me knows how much time I spend in South Africa, so I had to have some rooibos tea! *Hint, that’s where it’s from).

Once everyone was settled in the studio, I chatted a bit about what Siyaflo is, and why I started creating events like this. I wanted to bring everyone together in a fun, lighthearted environment where people could get to know strangers, to connect, to move their bodies, to learn, and to focus on their health.

Then I got the attendees to introduce themselves to each other and talk about something they’re obsessed with. Holistic nutritionist Meghan De Jong was busy here connecting with an attendee.

It was all smiles from fitness instructor Sofie Jayne Calvert.

We then did a fun little ice breaker called Constellations to get to know each other a little more. We found out one of the people to be born furthest away was our yoga instructor Kinga, who was born in Greece! Many people said they were happiest in nature, some where extremely good at making things with their hands (we certainly had some crafty attendees!), and many were open to change!

Next it was time to start the yoga session!

The lovely Kinga Gorski led the group in a great yoga class.

I definitely needed to stretch! I always feel like people don’t stretch enough. If you watch animals in the wild (or even your dog!) they’re often stretching and moving their bodies. Too many of us are too used to sitting behind a desk, slouching, and not moving enough!

Some of the stretching poses were very-dance like, which obviously I was a fan of. Love this photo! So graceful 🙂

And who doesn’t like child’s pose?

Kinga ended off with a short meditation to help us calm our minds.

After the yoga and meditation session, I interviewed Sofie Calvert & Meghan De Jong in a q & a format.

Sofie is a fitness instructor, she works in a group setting, one-on-one, and online.

She talked to us about how often to exercise, and what’s too much exercise. She stressed how often she sees people – especially women! – over exercising, and causing harm to their bodies.

She also showed us the best exercises to tone your stomach and arms. This particular exercise was about strengthening your arms and back – have someone push against your arms while you push against them.

Next Meghan introduced herself. She’s a holistic nutritionist at sproutednutrition.ca.

I asked her about her go-to healthy snacks (she loves bliss balls and apples with nut butter), meal planning, and probiotics.

She told us to make sure to get probiotics that are from a human strain, not an animal strain – do your research online or ask a specialist at a place like Finlandia.

Thanks for all your answers ladies!

Next Case Otic led us through an awesome dance class!

Everyone got into it…

Case had us doing all sorts of fun grooving and hip hop. He teaches every Sunday at iDance Vancouver.

Of course I had to film some of it!

We definitely got our heart rates up and broke a sweat!

Then we ended off the event with prizes, of course! The lovely speakers and instructors helped me hand everything out. There was delicious food like vegan chocolate mousse and chocolate spread, nut-based mylk, a free personal training session, a free stretch therapy session, and even free dance classes!

It was such a great group! A few had to duck out before we could take the group photo, but everyone received goodie bags on their way out so it was all smiles. Thanks everyone for coming to the inaugural event! Can’t wait for the next one in July! 🙂