1 Sexy Boot

I would love to say that I successfully finished "7 Brides for 7 Brothers" without any major injury. I mean, I almost did, does that count? The first show of closing week, I rolled my foot when coming down from a lift/jump and instead of landing on the bottom of my foot like you're supposed to, I landed on the top of my foot. I wasn't about to let myself fall and ruin the show, so I made myself remain standing. No one in the audience could even tell anything had happened. Way to go me :)
The downside was that my entire weight landed on the top of my foot. Not good.

I finished that show and then did 3 more shows to finish up closing weekend. No one could tell I was injured during a show because I still did everything full out.

After it happened, my foot immediately swelled up and grew a huge goose egg. The next day, the bruise came out and now more than half of my foot is a very ugly greenish/brown/blue/black color.

Because Jeff loves me very much, he was so worried about me and he's making me take care of myself. So I went to a podiatrist to see what is actually wrong. Turns out I tore a couple ligaments in my foot, gave myself a Level 3 sprain, and possibly a stress fracture. I am stuck in a boot 24/7 for the the next few weeks. He says if I'm lucky, I might get to take it off for my wedding. Seriously, I could cry right now.

7 Brides Update

So if you haven't heard yet, I got the best part in the entire play. I get to be Dorcas! Haha I am so excited about that because she gets to be such a flirt and play it up the entire play. My brother-in-law says that name is going to haunt me the rest of my life because he's not ever going to let "Dorcas" die. Oh I just love brothers :)

We just completed our first full week of rehearsals. I had to overcome my paralyzing fear of lifts really fast because within just 1 minute of choreography there are 8 lifts. Holy smokes. Some really crazy ones too including the "BONZAI!!!!" I feel like I've been man-handled. Oh wait, I have been. The number we just finished is the social dance scene and it has so many lifts and tricks! I've been grabbed, flipped, dangled upside down, fallen, nearly dropped, thrown and more. My arms are bruised and my rib cage is so sore from being grabbed and squeezed from so many different directions and fingers accidently jammed between my ribs (oh nelly that one hurts the worst!) and I've pinched a nerve in one of my arms (ouch!).

But let me tell you, this show is going to be incredible!! It is very high-energy the entire time. The trick and lifts just get bigger and bigger as the dancing goes on. Seriously if the choreography for this show doesn't win a 'Zoni I will be shocked (like a Tony but for Arizona Theatre).

Even though I will most likely look like an abuse victim by the end of this show, it is totally worth it :) It is sooooo much fun. I love my cast. My director/choreographer is amazing and all around this is just a great experience for me.

Anyways! I'll try and take pictures of rehearsals so you can have a sneak peek as to all of this amazing-ness.

In the mean time, you can buy tickets to see my show :)

Living Up My Dreams at the Hale

About 4 years ago I saw my first Hale Theatre play, "Fiddler on the Roof." I was so amazed! Ever since, I've wanted to be in a show but I was scared I wasn't good enough so I never auditioned. Even though I was too scared, my younger brother was not. Over the past 3 years, I've gotten to enjoy watching him in many plays there and having the time of his life. (They shows they put on there are incredible!) Every time I went to see one of his shows, I secretly wished I was down on the floor singing and dancing with them.
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Well this past week, I finally worked up the nerve and auditioned for Hale Centre Theatre's upcoming show, "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers."

The first night was dancing and singing a prepared solo. I'm a dancer, not a singer, so I rocked the dance section (if I do say so myself ;) ) and only did so-so on my solo. Amazingly enough, I got called back!! During call backs I felt once again that I did well in the dancing part, but I didn't think I did well in the other areas (learning and singing a solo from the play, readings, partner work) so I was sure I didn't make the play. I was down the rest of the night and it carried over the next day.

However, the morning following auditions, I received a call from one of the producers offering me a part as a bride!! Oh my gosh!! I am so excited. I'm not sure which bride I will be yet, but I'm sure I'll find out during out first read through next week. It still hits me at random times that I will actually be fulfilling one of my dreams to be in a Hale musical!

The play runs from Oct. 15-Nov. 28. I hope you all can come see it!! It'll be amazing.

P.S. I can't believe I'm in a Hale musical!! HAHAHA WOOHOO!!!

U.S. National Amateur DanceSport Championships

This last Dancesport, Brenton and I decided to give up competing Latin and instead dance Standard and Smooth. It was kind of rough, because in 2.5 months we had to learn or choreograph 7 routines, ok so really 5 because we used 2 class routines. Anyways...a lot of routines! We didn't make it as far as we would have liked, but we did have several successes we were quite proud of. One of the times we danced our Standard Waltz we got called back by every single judge :) !! That was awesome. But my favorite by far was with our Smooth. We had choreographed our waltz completely from scratch and we got called back by all 7 judges for that dance as well. Wow! We were pretty stoked :)
Anyways, here are some pictures from competition and some random ones we took afterwards. We had such a blast doing it. I'm so glad I had the chance to dance once more with my best friend.







Let me just add... He is so dang good looking. Wow.

25 Things You Probably Didn't Know About Me

Being jobless I get really bored (as evident by my last post!) so sometimes I do random things like this to keep me from going nuts.
Here are 25 random things about me. I wonder if anyone actually knew all 25 before they had read this note. Hmm....

1.I have big brown eyes which I’ve learned to use to my advantage ;) and I have naturally curly hair that fits my personality to a T.

2.I hate being ignored. When I was little I would go out of my way just to make sure people, especially my dad, would pay attention to me.

3.That leads me to my next point. I am such a daddy’s girl. I love him so much! He is my number one fan. He only ever missed 1 of my dance performances when I lived at home and he’s even flown up to Utah to see me compete in Dancesport.

4.My mom and I are SO much alike on the inside yet look completely different on the outside. Pretty much if you know and like one of us, you are bound to like the other one. And, we both think we’re pretty much amazing ;)

5.I just love my family!! They are my best friends and I love spending time with them. Even though it can get crazy at my house, it is still one of my favorite places to be.

6.I can’t sit still. That’s probably why I love dancing so much! I took my very first ballet class when I was five and I haven’t stopped dancing since: ballet, jazz, hip-hop, lyrical, tap, clogging, folk, and now ballroom.

7.I am lucky enough to have my best friend double as my amazing dance partner.

8.Without even realizing it, I will start playing songs on whatever my fingers are touching as if I’m playing the piano.

9.No worries, I actually do play the piano and I love it. I love playing fast. I once had a group piano class (pointless class!) and my teacher told me I would never be able to play very fast the way I held my fingers when I played. I was the only student in the entire class who could play faster than he could—Ha! in your face slowpoke piano teacher. ;)

10.I love to teach. It doesn’t matter what it is, piano, dance, the Gospel, everything.

11.I am a very happy, positive person. You can’t get me down for too long. Besides that, smiling is so much better than sulking! I just love life! I love sunny days, walking in a light rain, dancing in the snow, rainbows, music, smiles, happy movies, musicals, pink!, happy things!

12.I have a lot of faith. Everything is in the Lord’s hands and I just know things will turn out for the best.

13.A child’s giggle is my favorite sound ever

14.I regret never learning how to play sports

15.I love going to concerts and to the theater. If I could afford it, I’d go to at least one performance every week.

16.I sing really loud in the shower and I wish I had the confidence to sing like that in public

17.I go on random cleaning sprees where I clean everything around me and if you make a mess after one of them you better watch out!

18.I love learning! I want to learn as much as I can.

19.My friends span a range from 4’9” to 6’4” so it kinda looks funny when we’re all together.

20.Speaking of, my friends are amazing and I am so grateful that they are always there for me

21.Ice cream, Ice cream, Ice cream!

22.If I had the choice between living in a huge house and owning cool things or traveling the world, I would travel. I want to go everywhere, see everything. My dream is to go to Paris and try to speak French with the people there (the key word is “try”).

23.I was homeschooled until college and people are surprised at how “normal” I am. (If they only knew!) I started college when I was 16 and just graduated from BYU in Business Management.

24.In one month I got hired on at my first real job and laid off from it because it had to close down

25.I am a very goal oriented person. I love checklists and sometimes I add to the list just so I can cross more things off. I love making goals and pushing myself to reach them. I hate it when someone tells me I can’t do something because I know if I put my mind to it, I can do anything.