You’re invited to the Annual Sunshine Festival in Vernon BC on June 14th (This Saturday)

Don’t miss the largest street fair/sidewalk sale in the North Okanagan with an upwards of 10,000 people in attendance. Downtown truly comes alive with block after block of outstanding bargains, entertainment, children’s activities, outside street cafes, art and cultural performances and much more!

This festival includes and is not limited to a rock climbing wall, 2 entertainment stages, 2-3 bounce and plays and face painting.

On the Main Stage (2900 Block) I will be performing a 30 minute family show at 11:30 AM.

On 3400 block at 1:10 PM I will be performing a 20 minute street show, along with another street show at 2:10 on 3100 block. Don’t miss it!

I’ll be performing at a number of other public festivals and events over the summer and I’ll update you as the dates get closer.

Shop & Experience the Westside, 50% off Goodie Bags

From June 23rd to July 1st, the entire city of Westbank will be on sale! For more information on the event goto www.comeonover.info

Ali K. Zam Productions will be offering 50% off goodie bags for your birthday party show if you book the show between June 23rd and July 1st. For more information on Ali K. Zam’s birthday party show, goto www.HassleFreeBirthday.com.

Do you have children? New booster seat law in BC

New laws in effect July 1, 2008
All children must use booster seats until their 9th birthday unless they have reached the height of 145 cm (4′9″) tall. For more information goto BCAA Traffic Safety Foundation.
http://www.tsfbcaa.com/boost_bc

The FUN corner

Optical Illusion (Image)

1. First open up: First click here doesn’t look like to much does it?
2. Stand up and goto the back of the room. Look closely and you should see a famous painting!

“Magic is about transformation. It reminds us that everything changes – including ourselves.” – Jeff McBride

All the people ask me where I buy my magic from. Do I get it local? Online? Sadly there’s no real magic shop in Kelowna. If you’re just looking for some beginner tricks then you do have some local options.

1) Kelowna Costume used to have a small shelf of beginner magic tricks. I don’t know if they still have it anymore, but it worth a shot. They also have top hats, capes, and things like that for kids.

2) If you’re looking for magic theme goodie bags for a birthday party then you can order some from me when booking a magic show (I also have Ali K. Zam Official Magicians Wand’s)

3) Check your local dollar store. Don’t get the little boxes that have like 10 tricks in them for $1 though, the tricks are poorly made and often don’t even work properly, instead get the ones that are $1/each.

4) If you check Zellers or Walmart they sometimes have like 30 piece magic sets. There’s also Loadza Toyz in Orchard Park Mall that has some magic tricks and puzzles.

If you’re looking for some intermediate to professional magic and some quality made props then you have to go online. Don’t worry though, there’s lots of great online magic shops and many offer either major discounts, or free shipping.

1) In Vancouver (On Granville) there’s Clownin’ Around Magic
Not very good for online shopping, but if you call them you can find out what they have in stock.

2) In Calgary there’s The Vanishing Rabbit (Discount for IBM members)

3) My favorite place to shop online without a doubt is The Magic Depot
They have free shipping on orders over $40 (Who orders less than that anyways?), their website is pretty slick, and did I mention that they have the BEST customer service around? Its true!

4) The rest of the time I order magic online, I get it directly from different magic inventors. If anybody needs help finding something online, just let me know by email or on in the comments and I’ll try my best to help you out.

Saturday morning started out with a buffet breakfast, then CEO and Foundder Brian from 1-800-Got-Junk? spoke and it was really quite interesting. Then there was another panel discussion, then finally the Best and the Brightest panel where I would be speaking with 3 other entrepreneurs. The others were Christopher from Mow & Snow Land Care, then Bob Wells and Scott Swanson from My Tech Guys.

15 minutes goes by really fast when you’re up there speaking, so I didn’t get a chance to cover everything I wanted to. Still though, I think everybody got the message I was trying to convey.

In the afternoon there was another policy session that I didn’t need to attend so I decided that I’d go out and explore what Whistler had to offer. Somebody was telling me about the “Zip Line” tours you could go on where you zip from tree to tree. I’d never really heard of anything like that before, but it sounded fun so I signed up for the Ziptrek Ecotours. Unfortunately I went by myself (although you go out in groups of 10), I had a blast and it was so much fun. If you ever get a chance to go, do it! The entire trek took about 3 hours, just in time to make it back for the final big dinner party back at the hotel.

At the dinner my mom found out that her chamber received a certificate for honorable mention for Chamber of the year. She was soo excited and that single moment was the highlight of the entire event for me!

After dinner I had a bunch of people come up to me and ask me to perform for their tables with I happily agreed to. A little later the band March Hare performed and they were excellent! They were high energy and kept everyone on the dance floor until 1am.

The next morning we were set to go back home, but before we left we decided to explore Whistler a little bit more. My mom and I decided to take the gondola up to the top of Blackcomb mountain.

Then we drove for 6 hours all the way back home. The end

If you read my last post then you know that last weekend I was invited to speak at the BC Chamber of Commerce Annual General Meeting. My mom works at the Westbank Chamber of Commerece and she was attending the event that I was going to speak at! How cool is that? It worked out well because we drove down together, and were able to share a hotel room.

We left a day early so that we wouldn’t have to rush or leave really early in the morning. The drive from here to Whistler was amazing. We went up through Merritt, up to Spenders Bridge, down to Lytton, then up through Lillott, and finally through Pemberton to Whistler.

The 5 hour drive took us 6 hours, but we made it safe and sound. We stayed at the Delta hotel. The room was pretty nice, had a washer/dryer, dishwasher. The extra blanket for the room was lumpy though, the lid for the coffee machine was missing, and the ironing board was broken but everything was fixed as soon as we asked. The service was top notch, as I would come to find out was standard everywhere I went in Whistler. This next photo is the view from our room.

We settled in then left the hotel to do a little exploring. This village is gorgeous, and we quickly found a little sushi restaurant that was fairly busy so we stopped for dinner.

The next day was registration. We were early, but my registration package hadn’t been put together yet because I was one of the speakers. I ended up getting it later on the same day. My mom went around networking with people that she hasn’t seen since last years event. I pulled her away for a moment and got somebody to take this picture of us.

The first day started out with a lunch, routine opening ceremony type stuff for the AGM, in the afternoon there were a few speakers, followed by a fancy dinner and a few more speakers (Detecting the theme here?).

The next morning started off with a breakfast, then the first policy session. This is where Chambers submit policy that the BC Chamber will pass onto the Government. The Westbank Chambers resolution was to increase the number of campsites. There were a few small language changes that had to be made so it wasn’t passed. In the afternoon there was a lunch, more speakers, then dinner, and more speakers. At night there was a little party where I took the time to break out the magic and perform.

Special edition newsletter for the Kelowna Magic Club.

Next OSM meeting:
Tuesday June 3rd 2008
6:00-8:00pm
We’ll meet in the backroom at Moxies Bar and Grill
1730 Cooper Road, Kelowna, BC

Did you know???

Did you know that we currently have 30 people subscribed to the OSM monthly newsletter? Thanks to everybody who’s helped keep the magic scene alive in the Okanagan!
(Please forward this email onto anybody with an interest in magic!)

edit: the newsletter subscription has been taken out. I’m moving the newsletter service to a different company.

Download the files of pictures from the 2008 Valley Wide Afterhours

This past week I performed some mingling magic at the Valley Wide Afterhours event at the Cove Lakeside Resort. Once a year all the Okanagan chambers get together and host a networking event with trade show style booths, wine tasting, and entertainment. This years theme was “A New Beginning” to mark the birth of the newest city in the Okanagan Valley.

As you can see by the photo’s below, it was gorgeous out with approximately 600 people!

I also helped setup for the event, which was fun because I got to help people bring in their equipment with a golf cart. I had never driven one before, so it was kind of exciting.

This week I was fortunate to perform on Kelowna’s Executive Houseboat The Boardroom once again. I was hired to perform some mingling close-up magic during the cruise on Okanagan Lake for a group of Lawyers and Accountants from all over Canada who were in town for a conference.

As soon as I started performing I knew it was going to be a great group. Everyone was in such a great mood since it was absolutely gorgeous out. A perfect day to be out on the lake for sure. Right at the start of the cruise we went up along the new bridge construction and I took a few photo’s for my dad to see. He loves that kind of stuff. These photo’s don’t really do it justice. It was a perfect day to be out on the lake.

Here’s a testimonial from the event coordinator, the event manager, and some of the guests.

What a great show. I’m looking forward to working on Kelowna’s Boardroom again!!

Back on may 8th I posted some questions for Celebracadabra’s Chris Martin to answer. To listen to the podcast with all the answers to the questions check out the iTricks website for the full interview.

It even looks like he’s going to send me a limited edition DVD of all the Celebracadabra episodes! woohoo! I’m super excited, especially because only 200 copies were made. I feel so special.

If I had a picture of Chris Martin I’d make a wallpaper for him too. I wouldn’t set it as my wallpapper, thats still reserved for Kim, but, still.. I’d make one.

I decided to create a Kimberly Wyatt wallpaper, with a Celebracadabra theme. Well, I searched online and I couldn’t find any, so I’m the first! woohoo.
(more…)

Derren Tries to get a girl to kill a cute little kitten!

Part 1 / 4

2 / 4

3 / 4

4 / 4

I forgot that all this week its been “Magician Week” on David Letterman’s Late Show. Tomorrow night is Pen and Teller. If I come across any clips of the magic acts I’ll try and post them.

I’m a huge fan of Derren Brown (Who isn’t?) and he’s just come out with his new season of “Trick or Treat”.

Trick or Treat S02E01 Part 1

Trick or Treat S02E01 part 2

Trick or Treat S02E01 part 3

Trick or Treat S02E01 part 4

I’m glad I found it online, this show only airs on Uk’s “Channel 4″.