I cannot believe another month has already flown by! That means only a few more until I am no longer Miss Fulton County--it is so weird that this year is flying by so fast! It seems like I was crowned not too long ago! Now we're already planning this coming year's pageant! I am very excited about the upcoming pageant--we're working really hard on it, especially with it being the 40th anniversary of the Miss Fulton County Scholarship Organization. It is going to be an incredible show, and I am working on my dances to see if the ideas I have are actually going to work! Just too many ideas floating around up there sometimes.
This past month has been really busy for me. I volunteer every Thursday with the SOAR program, and it is so much fun! Alice and I get to help the children with their spelling words and their reading. Last week we even got to help with math a little bit! They are great to work with and their teacher is amazing; you can see that he truly cares about them learning and understanding the material he gives them. We've also been busy at practice. We have almost half of our nationals routine done! So exciting! The team is doing so well this year and I cannot wait to put the rest of the routine together! Tonight is a big night for the team because it is Hoops Hysteria at Elmira College. Hoops Hysteria is equivalent to a pep rally to kick off the start of the basketball season. The men's and women's basketball teams do short scrimmages against each other, Dance-line performs, and all three cheerleading teams (JV, Game, and Competition) perform routines. This is the first time many students will see us perform together as a team this year, so it has to be a perfect performance.
Aside from the school activities that I have been doing, I also found a day to go home and to make an appearance. Yes, a day; actually, less than 24 hours. Last weekend the city of Gloversville had a Veterans Day Parade, so since our practice for saturday was cancelled, I was able to drive home to attend. It was chilly, of course, but it was a great parade. A lot of people came out to watch it. I also rode with this year's contestants for Miss Fulton County. There are 8 young women competing for the title, and I was able to have some time with all of them. There are 6 veterans and 2 new contestants. It was great to see everyone that I knew again, but it was also nice to meet the new contestants that I did not know as well. Each one is a great candidate for Miss Fulton County, and I cannot wait to see the outcome of the pageant this year!
After the parade, I stopped into my old dance studio to say hi to my dance teacher, Sue Dygon, whom I have known for many years since she started teaching me when I was around 3 years old! It was great to catch up with her for a little while. During my visit, she told me that in a couple hours a dance instructor from Saratoga was coming to teach a traditional ballet course and that I should come back to take the class. I, of course, did since I miss taking dance classes all of the time. That dance instructor whipped me right into shape! I had not taken a formal dance class in 4 years, since I had graduated and gone to Elmira College. I did not realize how much I truly missed taking classes until I attended this class. It was great! We worked on technique A LOT, which I definitely needed. It was a lot of barre work and then we did across the floor work, but it was amazing. I hope that I am able to take the class again when I am home during breaks!
After the class, I was only home for a couple more hours since I had to drive back to Elmira that night. My team hosted the Elmira Fall Cheer Classic the next day, and I had to be there at 8:30am, so I did not feel like waking up super early to drive back. I hosted the cheer competition as Miss Fulton County, which was a lot of fun. A lot of younger girls attend this cheer competition, so they loved seeing me in my crown and were asking me many questions on how I became a "princess." It was very cute, and I loved it. The team also did an exhibition of our Hoops Hysteria routine, and my standing tuck was solid, which I was incredibly happy about. The only thing that was wrong with my parts of the performance was that my double did not make it all of the way around, which did not feel good. Hopefully that will not happen tonight! I like pretty doubles, not ones that do not make it!
Enough cheer-talk. I just wanted to say thank you to all of our Veterans for the service they have done for our country. Also, thank you to those that are currently serving. You do so much for our country. It is because of these people that we have the freedoms that we do. They have done so much for us. Please take the time to reach out and thank the Veterans, and those currently serving, for their work. To those currently serving, please come home safe!
Unfortunately, we had to cancel the Mr. Fulton County pageant due to lack of participation. We did not have enough contestants to make holding a pageant worthwhile. We loved the idea of this pageant, so hopefully it will be able to happen next year. We just need the participants for it actually to work.
I am not sure when my next appearance is. Maybe we will be able to have one while I am home for Thanksgiving Break in two weeks. I have to continue to study and to write papers right now. As always, if you have any questions or comments, feel free to contact me =)
