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News 12 Staff

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This is the past year where Vin was crowned as the 2025 queen, and these are all the contestants for 2025 in the dressing room. This is me with some of the administration. Uh, Terry Meade is the director on the left there, and this is some of our past contestants and past queens at La Rita Winery and our New Jersey Star dancers. So we perform for the pageant. This is our state administrator at the Fourth of July parade with Finn. And these are the court for the 2025, so it's Vin and the 3rd, 1st, 2nd runner up. And again, Lo Rita Winery was an open event, and these are some of the other women. So the queens at the end of the pageant get to take a picture with the current queen. So all the past queens get together. So that's what you saw in that picture. If you're just tuning in, we have Lenore Sabelli Lambert, Ms. New Jersey Senior America 2024, contestant coordinator, and Queen Van Iyer, Ms. New Jersey Senior America, 2025. You have four components to this competition, yes, and they are components that we don't want women 60 and over to get nervous about. So the actual competition of the pageant consists of evening gown. Evening gown of your choice and it doesn't have to be expensive. It just has to, you have to enjoy wearing it on stage at Harrah's in Atlantic City and then there is a 35 2nd philosophy of life that you memorize and you tell the judges and the spectators your philosophy of life and then there's a talent which could be anything. It could be a story, a poem, a recipe that you love, just speaking could be a musical instrument. I'm a singer. Vin is a belly dancer, so there's a lot of different components to talent, so it's not specific. And then there is a group of 5 judges that each contestant will meet with in the morning, and they are asked only information that they have put on their application. There's no religious information. There's nothing political. It's strictly how their life and what they've put on their application that the judges will expand on as to why they should be the next Ms. New Jersey senior America, and you felt comfortable with all of that vent. Well, I don't know. It's still a little stressful to be up on stage, to get on the microphone and talk about your philosophy on life. And also, I think the lovely thing is that every person on stage gets a little spotlight on them and they get to show off who they are, what their talent is, and you know, I loved everybody's talent there. I was really amazed by the spectacular singers I saw. And the artwork some of, some people had, it was really, really amazing that, and you start connecting with these women that unexpectedly I never thought I would and they're, they are very good friends like Lenore.

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We're putting the focus on the New Jersey Senior America competition. Lenore and Ben are here in studio. Tell us about your experience and what attracted you to this competition. Well, I'm a pageant girl from the 1976 era, and, uh, then I was a young teen and I joined a local Miss America pageant and I've kind of been involved. Uh, on and off throughout the years and 3 years ago, almost 4 years ago, I saw on Facebook that a friend of mine had been at this Ms. New Jersey Senior America pageant. And so I messaged him right away and I said, what is this all about? Tell me about this. And he goes, oh my goodness, he says, I didn't realize that you lived in New Jersey. He said, you'd be perfect. Call the director Terry Mead. Call the state administrator Johan Santori or Joanne Gordon, and he gave me all these phone numbers and I did. And so in 2023 I competed and I was eager to compete because I hadn't done something like this for so many years. And I was gracious enough to be the first runner up and then I re-entered again in 2024 and then I won the title but I worked very hard to bring the graciousness of pageantry for senior women back. It doesn't always. Come forth when you tell women what you do. They're not always accepting, oh, I could never do that, oh, that, you know, that's for young kids. But it's not. We actually have a lot more knowledge to give than a younger contestant. We have years of experience on what we've done in our life, whether we have a degree or not, whether we're a doctor or a secretary. We have so much information to share with the nation, which is this becomes a national competition after New Jersey that we just want or I wanted to personally. Let people know that I have still a lot to give after the age of 60. Yes, I'm 68. I'm 68 years old. Well, you look good, girl, and I just wanted to do everything I could to still feel like I was in my thirties, and I did, and I wear the bling and I get dressed and I don't, never went out of my house without hair and makeup, so it wasn't anything. That I found difficult to slide into. I found that it was a really rewarding, fun experience for me.

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My guests are with New Jersey Senior America. We have Lenore and of course we have Queen Van Iyer, who is Ms. New Jersey Senior America 2025. Let's talk about your experience and how you got involved in this pageant. OK. Well, luckily, I knew someone who was a pageant, who was a contestant in one of the pageants, and I happened to run into her and she encouraged me to fill out the application and join the pageant, which I have never done before. And I just even felt to myself, well, are they going to be wanting to see my talent or is it going to mean anything? And how will I write my philosophy on life? How will I get up there on the microphone in a dress and high heels and not fall down, make it to the microphone and say what I want to say. So all of that got together and I entered the pageant and I got to meet these fabulous ladies who have amazing talents, all of them. So I was really happy to meet Lenore. She did intimidate me a bit in the beginning, but she's like my best friend in the group. She really is, and I couldn't do all of this stuff without her. I'm really happy to be with her. She's with me today. What is your philosophy? My, well, I have to, you know, as a lifelong fitness trainer and instructor, I've found that I am not just addicted and obsessed, but it is my lifelong career and I believe in it. I believe that we don't need to stop all of that. All of the stuff that we do in our lives don't have to stop when you reach 60 because you're just beginning the next best chapter, and I will not be in the back seat and let some 2030 year old get in front of me. So that's what I want other 60-year-olds and older to feel. They do not have to step back. To allow other women to be in front of them, they need to line up with them. Is that what you share with people that you meet and greet when you're out and about? I tell them, keep yourself healthy, keep yourself that will keep you wealthy and fit, and you will be able to be in pageants. You'll be able to do all the things that you want to do, but we need to keep ourselves. Get some exercise and eat well and make sure that we are. Out there alive, vibrant. I love that and viable.

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So the off wing of the New Jersey Senior America is our cameo club and the cameo club is actually the most important part of this whole component because contestants and. Queens become a member of the Cameo Club once they compete and the Cameo Club is important because we are a service wing and we go and entertain with whatever talent we have shown as a contestant and we go to memory care centers nursing homes, um, senior centers. 55 and over communities any place that will have us we even do public events at some of the libraries we've done Tom's River and Ocean County and so the Cameo Club is a very important part of not just competing as Miss New Jersey Senior America but to continue after that and stay within the organization. And know that you have something to do for the senior women that can't be where you are and you can bring them entertainment and let me tell you we fill a lot of hearts when we go and perform and um in fact one of the memory care um and senior centers has their own little pageant and they they. Crown a queen when we go and perform for them so we're always available to perform. It's a small fee because we're a 501c3. This is part of our cameo club. We were doing a dance this year for, um, the 2025 pageant. So these women are part of the cameo club, but they're, we have about, I don't know, I'm gonna say. 85 members a lot of people. Yes, and we have a quarterly meeting, um, 4 times a year, and we all get together in, uh, Manahawkin, and we don't always have everyone come, but it's a rotating, um, event. And it's a membership that we keep up and we do a lot of things for keeping senior women excited and happy and you love that too, don't you, Ben? Oh, I loved watching the dancing. I'm waiting to be part of that dance group. It's a lot of fun. I'll tell you. We have um a great choreographer, uh, Betty Jean Pace, and she was the queen in 2022. And then she became the choreographer for uh the New Jersey Star dancers we call ourselves so it's we also have a chorus um the uh chorus sings with uh uh Josephine and she teaches us a different, um, number every year for the pageant. It sounds like your queens give back a lot. Uh, our queen's job is to work that year. I didn't have a job. I was retired. Vin has a job and it's very difficult for her to get to every event. So sometimes we have a stand-in queen. Um, somebody will be called and say, Can you appear here? Vin can't make it. And we do have a lot of queens that will step up. So it is a great thing because we want women to know that you're special. Your days are not ended. It's not over. It's actually just beginning.

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Don't you just love those adorable sparkly tennis shoes? Vin Iyer is wearing them and tell them why this means so much to you, Vin. Because once you are part of the cameo club or join the pageant, you must wear bling. That's the bottom line. So I am now out there researching and looking out in stores for accessories with bling, and I actually I'm loving it. I am loving wearing those giant earrings along with my crown, along with my bangles and bracelets and earrings. I love it. How do people get involved with this competition? So Word of mouth has been what we've done until you graciously had us on today, so hopefully this will reach a lot of women, but we have a website it's Ms. New Jersey Senior America actually it's New Jersey SeniorAmerica.org and you could go on that website, review all of the aspects of not only the pageant but the Cameo Club, how you can get involved, and there's a pageant, um, application. There's also my phone. Number and several other numbers where you can reach out um or email and we would be happy to talk to you about all of the components and this year we're have decided to put contestants with a mentor someone that has shown um. The organization in good standing who can help a new contestant learn the aspects of what she should do or what she can do and there's always. Something that they never realized they'd be able to complete until you start talking about it and we share gowns and jewelry and things we give lots of tips to women who never expected to do something like this and I will say that although it's this estate there is a national pageant that happens at Tropicana every year around. Um, September, October, October then this past October was one of the top 12. 0 congratulations finalists. Yes, so she got into the top 12 and she did such a wonderful job representing New Jersey that we were all very, very proud of her and your pageant happens in. In what month? Our pageant is May twenty-eighth this year. It's usually always the Thursday after Memorial Day, so it's at Harrah's May twenty-eighth, and it happens about one o'clock in the afternoon. So you can take a ride down to Atlantic City. You can get a ticket at the door, or you can buy a ticket in advance through our website. And it's a small fee, um, like a $30 ticket fee, and you go into the Grand Theater at Harrah's Casino and you'll have just a wonderful, wonderful time.

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Vin Iyer and contestant coordinator Lenore Cibelli-Lambert joined News 12's Della Crews to talk more about the competition. 

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