Whirlwind!

It's been quite a while since I've posted anything, but that is because since Thanksgiving came around the corner so quickly, my life hasn't slowed down! After Thanksgiving break there were finals, moving out of my apartment, Christmas break and all of the craziness that it brings along with it, and finally moving down to Florida!

It has been about a month and a half since I started my college program here and I absolutely love it!
Quick re-cap:
-I have 7 roommates that I absolutely adore. It's amazing! We have 8 girls from the ages of 19-21 and you would not believe how great we all get along.
-I am a StarTours Agent at Hollywood Studios. Basically, my job is to show up at Hollywood Studios everyday and spit out every bit of information I know about StarWars, be a StarTours Agent, and assure everyone that asks questions like, "Is this a roller coaster?" or, "Is this a movie?" or last but not least, "Is it a walking tour of the StarWars Galaxy?" Some might get tired and annoyed of these, but I love them because every time they're a little bit different and it's always fun to see the reaction on their faces when they realize that it's been updated... to a 3D-Movie with a motion simulator! (In case you were wondering...)
-I don't miss the snow, but I do miss my family and my dogs.

I love every bit of this so far! Yeah, it gets tiring, but who doesn't get tired from walking around for 8 hours a day? It's wonderful and I would recommend this program to anyone!

Tyler and I at Magic Kingdom on Valentine's Day 

Some of my fellow cast members at StarTours

A Little Late On The Thankfulness Train... But here it goes!

For me, I think there are seasons to life. Times of happiness, times of thankfulness, and times of celebration. My life has been so incredibly blessed to have all of these aspects to them lately and I couldn't feel more loved.

About 2 months ago I applied to Disney's College Program and recently I found out that I was given the chance to be a Disney worker starting in January until May. I can't tell you how thankful I am for this opportunity. It has been a constant dream of mine to work at the happiest place on Earth. My family and I have joked about me being there for years and now it's all coming true. And because of that, it feels so surreal. I will be working and LIVING at Walt Disney World... WHAT?! It's sooo awesome and crazy, I've known about it for a little while now and it still feels unreal to me. -To top it off? My best friend got a professional internship with the architecture program at Disney World... Weird how God works sometimes. We will both be in Florida together and working at Walt Disney World (pretty much) and living in the same city for the first time in our relationship. How awesome!

I couldn't be more thankful for the people I've had around me throughout this whole process; my roommates, my family, my best friends, and all of my GV family (that have known about this a little longer than most and have been able to keep it quiet until I was ready to tell the FB world) have been incredible. This is something I couldn't fathom doing without them. Their constant encouragement to follow what I've always wanted to do has been so motivating to do my best as I went through the application process.

Rachel is someone that has been a big influence on my life in the last year and I couldn't be more thankful for her. She is going to Israel this summer on a 15-day trip. She is taking pictures and the money she earns doing that is going towards her trip, since Tyler and I haven't ever had pictures taken by someone, other than pictures after performances, I thought this was a perfect opportunity. I am so thankful for Rachel and her ability to catch some really fun moments of Tyler and I and the random things that make us laugh, or just me laugh, so hard.

So many things to be thankful for this month and being able to spend time with my friends in the dance department is a big one. Especially since this is my only semester with them this month and that I'll have to be saying goodbye to a lot of the seniors earlier than the rest of the department. Luckily, I get they know I like taking pictures of my friends and they're taking advantage of that, in a good way. A few nights in the last couple of weeks, I had the chance to take pictures of my friends and here are some of my favorites.

© images copyright mlads photography
© images copyright rachel goddard photography

Dancing Through Life

I've been dancing since I can remember... but more specifically, 17 going on 18 years. Thankfully, there hasn't been a time in my life when I thought to myself, 'I hate this, why am I doing this?'. Which I think is pretty amazing because, also since I can remember, I've been scheduling my life around dance classes, rehearsals, recitals, and competitions and so on... Whenever I am invited somewhere and can't go, the response is always, "I can't, I have dance." I have missed out on things like family dinners with my best friends, graduation parties, girls’ nights, school functions.... But when I think back on it, as much as I wanted to be there and still wish I could've been there for some of them, they don't seem like major things that I missed out on, the biggest ones were probably 3 of my best friends' graduation parties this spring. But they understand, they always have.

I can't imagine my life without dance. When I'm tired and don't want to go, as soon as I get there everything changes. My day does a complete 360. I know it's a cliché and as a dancer I hate using this saying, but it's so true! When I'm dancing, I dance my emotions. If I'm in a bad mood, I dance my feelings. There it is. That's it. I dance my feelings. When I'm in a good mood I swear my dancing is better, when I'm having a terrible day, I dance better because I'm getting out the frustration of the day.

When I dance I can see it happening my whole life, in a company, as a teacher, but more than all of that, at Disney. My most recent dream, as of 3 or 4 years, is to dance at Disney World in FL. I want to be a performer. Every time I perform, I'm living! There is nothing better than performing. My favorite part is the feeling that makes you want to smile the whole time. It's a feeling that I still haven't nailed down, I can't tell if it's the music, the movements, the people watching, the people I'm dancing with... I've got nothing. But I know that I seriously love that indescribable feeling!

Dancing is the only thing that I'm, both, incredibly confident and incredibly shy about. I like to think that my love for dancing shines brightly when I'm dancing, because when I'm talking to certain people, I'm instantly self-conscience about my dancing career. That is something that I've been working on because of how much dance has become apart of my life this year.

Dancing is something that will always be apart of me even if it never amounts to a career. It will be something that I will want my kids to try, that I would always gladly recommend to friends to try, and something that I will always be doing. 

It's been a while...

The last time I posted was November 11 which is exactly 5 months ago today and that was right before exams, which is why it was the last time I posted. I got stressed out and didn't have the time to keep writing. Because of that, I got out of the flow of posting and I've really started to miss it! All day today I was thinking about writing another post, but I didn't know what it should be about. Nothing beats Disney, right??

Dancing at Disney has been my dream since I was little. The first time I remember a Disney parade was when I was six and my little sister and I got pulled out from the crowd by the Beauty and the Beast dancers to help with the cake or something. I was so excited! Every time we go to Disney I make my family get ready for the parades with plenty of time beforehand that way I have a good seat to watch the dancers. I always used to critique the dancing because I knew I could do what they were doing someday.

Soooooo.... On March 18th I set out hoping to make that dream a reality. It was a very spontaneous thing. My friend, Shelby had told me that Disney was holding auditions somewhere in Michigan but she didn't know where at. I got online and found out it was about an hour from my hometown and I decided that if I could get a ride home, I was going to that audition. Luckily, I have awesome parents that came to get me from the east side of the state and drove me to the west side of the state for the audition. My mom and I did our normal audition prep, starting with Starbucks and singing Disney music the whole way. When I got there I wasn't nervous until I saw people I knew. Thankfully, my friend Amber, who also dances at GV was there and she told me exactly what to expect and made the whole audition feel ten times better!

I loved everything about it. That was the first audition that I think I actually tried with every bit of me because of how badly I want to dance for Disney. The waiting process has been the worst. For the first couple of weeks I was super confident. I felt awesome about how I did, dancing-wise, I felt like I made a connection with the choreographer, and I had so much fun while I was doing it. Except, I'm not supposed to find out until April 20th. April 20th is the Friday before finals week and it is also the opening night of Grand Valley's Dance Department's Winter Concert... After realizing all of that, I started getting worried... If I don't get this dancing job, that week and that night is going to suck.

Although, I've thought about it more. Yes, I do want this more than anything, I want it so badly that I would consider dropping out of school to do it all of the time. But I have to prepare myself for what I don't want to hear and for some reason I keep forgetting that this was my first opportunity to audition... I have 3+ years to audition still! If I don't get it, I'm going to be seriously bummed, but that just means I go back stronger next time and keep trying.

I'm determined to be a Disney Character Performer and I'm so anxious to hear back!!

Thankfulness Days

Day #9: I'm thankful for such a small campus. From where I live, it's a 4 minute walk to the bus stop and a 12 minute walk to the dance studio on a bad day.

I'm lazy. I know it could be a lot longer of a walk, but as the weather is getting colder, I'm very thankful for the short distance between everything!

Day #10: I'm thankful for snow!

Even though it leaves you wet and cold, I can't help but be happy about the first snow fall today! It made my day so wonderful and it put me in such a great mood!

Day #8

Day #8: I am thankful for snail mail.

There is something so special about having mail when you open your mailbox. I can't really explain it, but if you get mail from people you love and miss, you understand exactly what I mean.

Happy Tuesday!

ps. I might start posting what I'm thankful for every couple of days. Just a heads-up :)

Day #7 ....

#7: Today I am thankful for J.K. Rowling and her wonderfully magical books along with Warner Bros Studios for making such amazing movies out of them.

This one is pretty self explanatory. I love all things Harry Potter and that is all thanks to J.K. Rowling. Thanks to her, many think in other ways and see things differently than they originally appear. Because of 'Jo' I try to find the magic in most situations and I relate almost everything that happens to me to something that happened in one of the HP books/movies.

If you haven't read the books, you're seriously missing out. They're all on my favorites list and I would recommend them to anyone.

Thank you J.K. Rowling.

The UK versions of the covers are so much prettier :)

(I copied this picture from google images)