The story behind my first Emmy

Winning my first Emmy Award was such a memorable experience. I had never been so shocked in my life! It’s not because I didn’t believe in our nomination, it’s just that it was the first time ABC News Digital had ever been nominated.

The awards

Yes, I had hopes (but they were low). I was just excited to be nominated. I was working with ABC News and had been living in New York City for almost a decade. But just before the awards, I moved home to California. My boss flew me back (thank goodness or I would’ve missed it!) to attend the awards that September of 2016. Keep in mind these are the news awards, not the TV Emmys so they take place in New York.

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Many Emmy nominations are for big groups of people. I won a second while working for Good Morning America and was nominated as a television correspondent for a third with a team covering the Solar Eclipse.

But this nomination was for a project that was worked on by just a few people, including me, a few other journalists and our supervisors (such a great team of people, some pictured above!). Three of us were nominated and the category was Video Journalism, which is part of the reason I got to attend the show.

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The nomination

It was for a story I’d found years earlier about a place called Dead Horse Bay in Brooklyn. I pitched the story as soon as I started working at ABC only to find out another journalist (and a very talented shooter) had sent the same pitch! We ended up working together to tell the story which you can watch here.

So, I flew out for less than 24 hours. I had to go shoot another story on a marijuana farm in Northern California right after. I also didn’t have much time to go shopping or do my hair. Plus, I really didn’t think we’d win due to the unit having never been nominated before.

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The dress

Here’s the best part: I WORE MY PROM DRESS!

As I said, I didn’t have much time to prepare so I took my dress from 2007, threw it in a suitcase and wore it to the Emmys. My plane landed early evening. I ran to the hotel, threw on the dress, barely did my hair and makeup, and then hightailed it to the show.

The show

Before the show, food and drinks are served. You get to mix and mingle, which was a lot of fun. Once we got to the show we were seated pretty high up (this is important to note). The awards take a few hours, so by the time they got to us we were definitely excited. When they announced ABC News we all jumped up and ran for the door. Not wanting to waste time waiting for the elevator, we had to find the stairs! We raced down and onto the stage (much to the delight of the patiently waiting audience members!).

Afterward we celebrated and then I caught an early flight to Northern California to keep reporting on another story. Now you know the story, and the story of my dress!