About the CEO and Founder
Among a host of different words that can be used to describe Donna Terjesen are survivor, mother, teacher, leader, lecturer, and optimist. In November 1992, Donna was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. She was treated with a number of synthetic drugs, which resulted in weight gain and continuous lethargy. Unfortunately, Donna was offered little support from her neurologist so, she decided to take matters into her own hands: She attempted to regain control of her life and health single-handedly. She began by devoting countless hours researching alternative medicine and natural therapies. With time, she learned to change her diet to whole and natural foods, opening the door to an increased energy level and a newfound spirit within her, eager to come out. By 1997, she (and those around her) noticed a dramatic improvement in her health. Donna’s successful weight loss and revitalized strength had her feeling like her old self again, yet with a much brighter outlook on life. She knew then that anyone could accomplish anything as long as they set their mind to it! She was living proof!
Amazed with Donna’s health improvements, her friends, family and co-workers suddenly began seeking dietary advice from her which led her to enroll in a nutrition school in 2001 where she became certified as a Health Counselor. In addition to gaining a wealth of information on good health and nutrition, Donna also discovered something even more important about herself…she realized that she could be an effective teacher and lead people to make healthy lifestyle changes and became passionate and fully committed to supporting other parents and children with their health and nutrition needs.
As a wife and full-time working mother of three daughters, Donna understands how families often times may opt for the quickest and easiest meal solutions, which typically are not the healthiest, e.g., fast food, late night dinners, and/or unsupervised consumption of snacks and junk food. She herself, a professional with over 20 years of successful sales and management experience in the corporate world, knows first-hand how easily it is to fall victim to unhealthy eating habits not only for children, but also for working adults who succumb to client dinners or business travel that requires eating out all the time. Given the limited information and services that support a healthy, balanced lifestyle and family, and aware of the fact that most families consist of full-time working parents, Donna wanted to develop a program that enabled her to reach out directly to children of all ages. The ideas here were two-fold — to foster and instill in children a healthy, balanced lifestyle with wholesome foods and regular exercise, which in turn, will give them the education to prevent childhood obesity and to pass that education along to those parents who may not have the time or access to these resources. These ideas have since then turned into reality in November 2003, when Donna founded Nourish Our Kids, Inc.™, a company dedicated to educating parents and their children on ways to maintain a more natural, healthy diet and lifestyle.
Since 2003, Donna and Nourish Our Kids, Inc.™ have made a vast impact in the lives of many children and parents. Through the years Donna has made an impact and contribution to school lunch programs, enacting positive local legislation, working in education with non-profit organization, community afterschool programs and her local community. Seeing the transformation in these families’ lives has brought such an tremendous amount of satisfaction and personal reward to Donna that she is even more motivated and determined to help make a difference nationally and is excited to share NOK’s new media products including a children’s storybook, music, iPhone and iPad game and enriched website.
Check out Our Experience to learn more about Donna’s past speaking engagements, workshop and work with the Children’s Aid Society and I Have a Dream Foundation.
About the President
As Nourish Our Kids, Inc.™ continued to flourish and receive more widespread attention, Donna Terjesen, CEO and Founder, realized that she needed someone to assist her in attaining the company’s goal—someone who was both business savvy and interacted well with adults and children alike. In October 2004, Nourish Our Kids, Inc.™ named Angela Pariselli Velez its President. Angela’s strong marketing, management, and legal background complement her responsibilities for business development, marketing and customer intelligence, administration, finance, and legal issues.
Shortly after 2004, Angela also found her creative side when she joined Donna in co-authoring NOK’s first children’s storybook, The NOK Rockers: Trouble in Slowville. In addition, Angela has worked tirelessly in outreach and marketing and has been actively involved all business management, design and product development for NOK’s 2012 newly released media products including the iPhone and iPad games, character 3D illustrations, music and video.
Nourish Our Kids, Inc.™’s mission hits close to home with Angela. Since early childhood, she has faced challenges with weight issues. As a result, she is a strong proponent of Nourish Our Kids, Inc.™’s children’s platform and hopes to help other children avoid many of the challenges she faced growing up, which were simply due to a lack of information and available resources. Today, more than ever, Angela clearly recognizes the importance and the need for nutrition education and early intervention. She is quite certain that if such programs existed when she was a child, she would not have the health problems and weight issues she is faced with today.
About the Illustrator
Mark Biddison had an early love of comic books and monster movies that ignited his passion for art and drawing. Illustrating a children’s book has always been one of Mark’s lifetime goals. Mark has worked in all phases of commercial art for the past twenty years, including freelance illustration, graphic design, fashion drawing and visual merchandising. As a father, he has a personal connection with the mission of Nourish Our Kids, Inc.™ to teach health and wellness to kids since one of his sons lives with the challenges of autism.
