Yep, our final one of 2012.  We typically don't hold an event in December as the fourth Thursday of the month is awfully close to the holidays, and let's face it:  December is awesome enough without us.

This month's event was special.  Not only was it the last one before the end of the world, but it was held in partnership with the Calgary Public Library's One Book, One Calgary program, a project that encourages all Calgarians to read the same book in the month of November, then join in the city-wide discussion.  Events relating to the program have been held at branches all over the city and will continue until the end of the month.  The book chosen for this year?  The Book of Awesome.  Which is awesome.

And as always, your super-awesome AF-Calgary Social Media team was ready to bring you all the juicy details from the night's events.

One of our faithful social media volunteers, Crystal, had to watch from the sidelines in Toronto.  We miss you Crystal!  But did you know that Toronto has its own Awesome Foundation chapter too?  In fact, they were the inspiration to start up one here in Calgary!  Check them out at AwesomeTO.org.

It was a great turn out at the library.  We had some of our faithful fans and followers show up, many past Top4 Finalists and Honourable Mentions, some newcomers as well as a lot of walk-ins who have never heard of The Awesome Foundation before, which is always something that pleases us.

In fact, the crowd kept building during the event that the library had to increase seating.  Twice.

Because this was the final Thousand Dollar Thursday of 2012, we wanted to do something special and different.  So we invited a bunch of former Top4 Finalists and Honourable Mentions to showcase some of their AWESOME SUCCESS, whether or not they won the $1,000.  The team from ZEDS Communication, Top4 Finalists for July 2012 were on hand to talk about some of their success in their comic book project.

Tyler Longmire, winner of the January 2012 micro-grant, was on hand to demonstrate a prototype of his Projection Bomber, a bike-drawn mobile projection unit which will allow people to paint non-destructive graffiti on the sides of buildings using lasers, among other things.

Also on hand was Caitlind Brown, winner of the August 2012 grant for CLOUD showing off highlights from her highly successful art installation that debuted at Calgary's first-ever Nuit Blanche festival in September (it'll be displayed in Moscow for the month of January, plus will find a permanent home at the TELUS Spark science centre!), and Susanne Alexander-Heaton, Top4 Finalist for October 2012 displaying her Gratitude Rocks! project.  Also in the audience were Kiran Somanchi, the May 2011 winner for AudioMob YYC, and Vanessa MacTavish & Elizabeth Buchanan, Top4 Finalists for June 2012 with Eureka Lost & Found.

Matthew Hamel, winner of the August 2011 grant for YYC Mobile Movies and now a current AF-Calgary Trustee started off the evening recapping some of the projects we've funded over the last year and a half.  By the end of the night, we will have funded our 20th project, $20,000 worth of no-strings-attached micro-grants in total since April 2011.