When you can’t drive, there’s always the portable hot spot in Calgary

By the time she’s 20, Michelle Smith has already learned how to cook and serve dinner at home, and now she’s also a professional hostess.

She’s a hostess at the home of a friend’s parents, who live in rural Newfoundland, and she spends the mornings cooking for them at the backyard bar.

“We go in there and do everything we need to do, but also just enjoy the moment and not worry about how it’s going to go down,” Smith said.

For Smith, hosting has been a dream of hers for years.

When she was 13, she met a boy she met on a cruise.

They hit it off, and by 18, they were dating.

They met again a year later, and soon after, they got married.

“It was a dream come true,” Smith recalled.

“But, as the years went by, I noticed a lot of the things I needed to do to make it work, and it became hard to focus on just being a host.”

Smith hosts at home for the first time in October.

She said she likes to prepare a meal at home before she goes out and hosts.

“I don’t want to be too overwhelmed by it,” Smith explained.

“Because it’s a bit of a challenge.

But it’s really fun, and I’m enjoying it.”

While Smith is enjoying the challenge of hosting, she’s still working towards her Master of Arts in Marketing from St. Mary’s University.

Smith plans to start her career in marketing, but she hopes to eventually go into hospitality.

“Right now, I’m kind of looking to make money, and, you know, if you get a job, you can just go out and do your thing,” Smith joked.

“That’s all I’m thinking about right now.”