Last month I got to spend a full 12 hour day shooting segments with Summer Rayne Oakes for Planet Green. We here at ReadyMade are big fans of the network (and their partner site TreeHugger) so we were more than happy to work together to come up with a few ways to spread some holiday cheer. That's us above, about to spend some quality time making chocolate covered fruit cake truffles, the ultimate in edible re-gifting. (And yes, I was pretty excited to be in a kitchen that resembled the one Giada de Laurentis uses to tape her show. Apparently I have inner yearning to be a food network star.) Here's the story on the segments:

Planet Green encourages everyone to stop and smell the mistletoe with “New Traditions”. Ed Begley, Jr. and Rachelle Carson Begley, Philippe Cousteau and Alexandra Cousteau, Bill Nye, SuChin Pak, Summer Rayne Oakes, The Fabulous Beekman Boys Josh Kilmer-Purcell and Brent Ridge, the editors of ReadyMade magazine and others will help set the mood for a meaningful holiday season.  From fire house care packages to caroling via video chat, it’s all about looking forward and giving back.

Now, you should remember that I'm an editor, which means I get to sit behind a screen most days. And usually that's where I like to be, especially since my only pre-magazine "acting" experience was when I didn't get a part in my high school play. Anyway, back to the shoot. Planet Green doesn't fool around—we had a lovely makeup and hair person who decided to have her way with my locks, first curling them into movie star barrel rolls, then straightening it for the third scene. Above we're wrapping up some Dulce de Leche sandwich cookies in leftover pieces of fabric. The idea in that segment is to bake an extra batch and spread some cheer around the neighborhood, like to the firemen who might need a sugar rush as they are working over the holidays. (At one point, we'd talked about actually going down to the local firehouse to deliver some cookies. Alas, it was raining and that didn't happen. Sigh.) For the final segment, which we didn't start taping until about 6pm (each one took about two hours once we did all of the angles and takes that the director wanted, with time between each to reset lighting and cameras, and um, to do my hair). We were tired and fumbling our words so it took us a while to get going. But thankfully, we had some help from friends who came to help us do our bit about hosting a clothing swap where you not only trade clothes, but you also trick them out with embellishments. You must be wondering, who is that lovely lady caught in the action of swinging her hair? Why, that's Becky Wisdom, ReadyMade's ever intrepid publicist. Once we wrapped the segments, we did a series of still shots. Summer is substantially taller than me (she had to go barefoot while we were taping so she didn't soar over me) and here is the attempt to balance out our heights. It made me feel like I was in a booster seat, so I was happy that they immediately took it away—and that the crew got a big kick out of it. It was a long day but it was really fun, and slightly surreal, to spend it with a full production crew. Special thanks go to Virginia for letting me wear her dress and to Summer for being so laid back and natural that any nerves I felt were immediately squashed. Make sure to tune in to Planet Green through the month of December to see our segments and for more ways to celebrate, and create, some new traditions!

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