Happy Halloween!

It's Halloween! I can't believe that October is over! I was online last night and I came across this....http://radiocity.shop.musictoday.com/Product.aspx?cp=1040_4551&pc=6RAM80
You can actually be a Rockette for Halloween! I couldn't believe they had a costume and everything! They have a kid and teen size too! Funny!! You know you're big time when you have a Halloween costume after you! haha! :)
We did our second dress rehearsal last night. It went much better then the first one, but still some of our costume changes didn't happen. The good thing is that stage managers and the head of the wardrobe department listened to our concerns and suggestions so hopefully things will get resolved soon. I messed up on the countdown- we actually open a week from today, so the official countdown is 7 days!
I'm super exhausted!! Hopefully Halloween will bring me some energy!! Hope you all have a fun and safe night!

First dress rehearsal

We did our first dress rehearsal yesterday and it took about 7 hours to complete! We have to get that 7 hours down to the 90 minute show in only 9 days! Yes, the official countdown has begun...we are only 9 short days away! Some of our costume changes have to be made in as little as 2 minutes!!! (Between you me, I'm a little doubtful that we'll make some of the changes unless they switch our dressing area.) I don't have a ton of time to finish the costume drama story before I have to dash to rehearsal, but because we were going at such a slow pace yesterday I was able to grab some pics!

It's attack of the Ragdolls!! These are such silly costumes! I'm on the top right.

This is our part 1 of our NYAC costume. We do all the bus-ography in these jackets and hats, then take them off right before we step off the bus to start dancing! This hat royally messes up my hair after i take it off! :(

Cincinnati here we come!

We made our second bus travel of the tour today, a 10 hour adventure from Hershey, PA to Cincinnati, OH. The "on the road" lifestyle is just beginning, and I think I over packed for it! I found myself today with 4 pieces of luggage, my bus bag that has all my travel essentials; magazines, books, snacks and pillows, plus my purse! It's too much! This week I must find my way to a post office or UPS store and send a large box home. I'll definitely be able to send a good chunk home now that we are getting into dress rehearsals because I don't need all of my dance shoes and rehearsal clothes. My whole goal with this tour was to edit my wardrobe and to simplify my life by eliminating the need to shop, but I think it's had the reverse effect. I already hate all of my clothes that I brought with me because I'm tired of them, so I find myself wanting to shop for all new stuff......this is particularly bad because Macy's, Saks 5th Avenue and a mall are connected to our hotel!!! Speaking of our hotel, it's pretty awesome. It an old historic hotel with beautiful details and a grand elaborate lobby. Something felt very familiar about it, so when talking with the concierge tonight I learned that the architect for our hotel is also the person who designed the Empire State Building. He designed this hotel in Cincinnati first, then went on to build the Empire State Building!
Quick recap from my last few days in Hershey.....
We ended the week of rehearsals doing 2 run throughs with our hats and shoes. I was exhausted by Saturday, which is funny because I felt great up until Friday night. When we left the arena Saturday I told my friend I felt like a washcloth that had been wrung out. The other thing we got to see in rehearsal last week was our video footage from the LED shoot. There are about 8 "billboards" that show different kicklines from all different angles with all different people. There are a few times where you can see me....it's funny to see yourself on screen that big! I got to do some pretty fun stuff outside of the show. On Friday morning I went to the Central Market in Lancaster County where Amish families bring their goods to sell. I got all sorts of treats, my favorite was a slice of shoofly pie! The Central Market is the first indoor farmers market in the US. On Saturday night after rehearsal my friend Beth and I went to the Spa at the Hershey Hotel for some much needed relaxation. This was amazing! I sipped hot cocoa and indulged in Hershey Kisses and chocolate muffins all evening as I waited for my appointment. I got a peppermint scrub with a cocoa massage, so when I was done I smelled like a peppermint pattie! Sunday the girls and I did a cute brunch at the Hummelstown House, then went to the Hershey Park for some coasters. Somehow Beth convinced me to ride this crazy one that went straight up at 90 degrees then inverted as it plunged down! And we rode front row! It was crazy when we where climbing straight up because all we could see was blue sky and nothing else....I definitely closed my eyes for a little part of that! I've got some funny pics from the weekend that I'll put up once I get situated in Cincinnati.

Pictures from last week

Here we are at the TENT! We are doing a bad kick leg to show our dislike for the tent!! Ok, here is the skinny on the tent....Basically we are sent to the tent when we are messy and need cleaning or we actually get a break in the tech schedule and they don't want us sitting around having free time. I think our first time we went to the tent was the worst because it was later at night and about 45 degrees or colder outside and the tents heater wasn't working, in fact I think the air might have been on. We were all bundled up with our coats, sweatpants, gloves and scarfs....we looked a silly. The other thing to picture is that the tent is located in the middle of the Hershey theme park, so we are surrounded by rides...in fact one of the wooden rollercoatsers whooshes right over the tent making it wonderful when trying to hear our dance captain. On the plus side, like I said in the last posting, we did get to ride the fun slide on our 10 minute break on my birthday! The good thing is we are done with the tent! We will never go back there again! My friend Jenny and I are racing down the fun slide. Yes, the day I turned 24 I raced down a big pink slide, I'll always be a kid at heart!
The girls and I are being silly, it's like we cant go anywhere and not take a dorky Rockette picture! Our Gettysburg adventure was great! I had idea that there was so many things there! There was over 14,000 historical landmarks! I'm really starting to appreciate being on tour because it's been so wonderful being able to visit all these neat places that I would have normally never gone to. I'm looking forward to all the adventures to come in the next 2 months!
Look! We are twins, down to the tall boots and long jacket.....I guess certain fashion does come back around! haha! :)

Still kicking in Hershey....

Ahhh! What a crazy week, I know its been a whole week since I blogged! We are actually almost done teching the show, we will finish up today with the nativity and then our curtain call. This is good news because we are way ahead a schedule....they planned on us getting done on Friday! There are many things I'm sure we could go back over, like the Santa number because it has so many elements to it; there are 3 turntables, trap doors, elevators, the bells....its a slight chaotic! I cant wait to add costumes! I actually got to wear my "Shine" costume yesterday for lighting while we teched the number. Usually 3-4 girls wear their costumes for each dance so that the lightening guys can get the look they want with the colors of our costumes. You all know I've talked about this costume before, its amazing, we are just dripping in diamonds!
I celebrated my 24th birthday last Saturday! My first birthday to ever be celebrated in a Rockette season! The girls were awesome! They totally made my day! My friends surprised me with a cake at the end of rehearsal and they all sang "Happy Birthday" to me and I got to blow out candles! We ended up in a circus tent inside the Hershey Park (long story....may have to save that one for another day) to clean sections of some dances....anyway, on our 10 minute break we all ran out to the fun slide that was right next to the tent and slid down! It was hysterical to think of riding an attraction on our 10 minute break! The birthday celebration continued to our day off on Sunday, and my friends and I went and visited Gettysburg! It was really interesting, I enjoyed learning about all the different people and battles and experiencing it in person. I've got some pictures from the weekend that I will get loaded up here in the next day or two! Miss you all and hope everyone is doing well!

Day 2 of tech

It's only been 2 days of tech, however it feels like much longer! Our schedule is much different in tech then rehearsal....we don't start till 1pm and can go up until 11pm. So far its a lot of standing around so that they can get the lights and special effects all cued up in right time. We starting working on the bus today. (We start NYAC riding on a New York City tour bus, and we have all this bus-ography that is totally strange now that we are actually on the bus because we've been practicing it in regular open air, now we have all these handles and railings and things to worry about.) The fun thing is we are teching in the old Hershey Arena, which is on Hersheyland property, and I'm not joking when I say that we could totally go ride a roller coaster on our dinner break because we are that close!!!!! I think we may try it on the weekend, try to sneak in! The other awesome thing about this tour is our caterer. We have a caterer that just met up with us in Hershey and will be traveling with us on the road. I had heard all these great stories of how good this caterer, Gordy, really was but I just wasn't convinced. Well, let me just say that I had duck tonight for dinner and gelato out of a coconut for dessert. It is gourmet fancy food!!! We have a peanut butter and jelly sandwich station, a cappachino machine, fresh bread for our salads....it is bananas!!!

I'm in Hershey, PA!

We had our first of many travels today...we are now in Hershey, PA for our tech rehearsal! 9am this morning we loaded up the buses and said goodbye to New London and hello to the open road! :) We finished up last week at our rehearsal studio in Connecticut with full show run throughs, Friday and Saturday were 2 show days! It felt great to finally bring the show together with the whole cast and do it from start to finish! But this is the hardest show I've ever done.....the first time we ran 12 Days I honestly had flashes in my head of passing out before the kick line!!! I need stamina!! Yikes! Today we got photos from one of our assistant company managers who saw the stage today and sent us the pictures, so you are all getting a sneak peek! I can't believe how HUGE the stage is!! It looks so cool! Can't wait to see it tomorrow!

Part 2

So I'll finish with all the fun details of Tuesday, then fill you in on whats new!

Tuesday was truly great! It was so much fun to put a costume on and preform! I cant wait to see what they actually use for the show...it would be fun to see myself on a huge screen, or scary?? :) Our director and dance captains were happy with us, which is always a good thing because that means everyone is in a good mood! After rehearsal a bunch of us went to D.F. Clyde's Cider mill, which is the only steam powered cider mill left in the US! It was absolutely beautiful there, it had a small pumpkin patch and the cider was delicious! The drive up to the cider mill was fun also. We passed many large historic homes and drove through the Mystic seaport area where all the boats are docked. I put some more pictures from Tuesday up....and I might have some more coming later.

The last couple days haven't been so nice, it's like everyone in charge saw that we only had a few days left in rehearsals till we moved to Hershey, PA (where we start tech rehearsal) and they totally freaked out! We've been working crazy hard, kicking like crazy...everyone is exhausted and my hamstrings are hard as a rock and don't want to do anything!! I sat on a heating pad today before we got started thinking it would loosen things up before I started to stretch....nope, nothing! Tomorrow we do our first run through of the show. These are always fun because we get to see how everything fits together, plus it will give me a good chance to see where and how I can pace myself within the 90 minute marathon! At this point, the two numbers that may kill me are 12 days and NYAC. These are the longest time wise so it's crucial I start building my stamina now!! After rehearsal today our hotel threw us a farewell party. That was so sweet of them! Everyone on staff has been so great to us, and they said that they loved having us! They had a bunch of games, plus chips and dip, candy, and desserts layed out for us in the lobby when we got home. It was fun! I'm a little sad to be leaving Connecticut already because I feel like I just started to enjoy it, but Hershey, PA comes next and I'm really excited for that!

Part 1

I don't have a ton of time tonight, but I will leave some fun pictures from yesterdays LED film shoot! I counted, and we did 481 kicks, which actually was a lot better then I was expecting! Some positions we only had to shoot once because we were fantastic the first time! :) Not only did we have a great day of filming, but we got out earlier because we had to go in a few hours earlier then we normally do, so we got to do a little sight seeing which was soooo much fun!! This is truly the first time I've done anything touristy in the area. We went to an Old Cider Mill for a apple donut and hot cider, then we went to the Mystic seaport and then had a wonderful dinner in downtown Mystic! I'll describe in better detail tomorrow, I just wanted to share a little today and then I'll finish up later...because I got to get to bed and maybe start some packing. (because we leave on Monday!!!!)

This is some of the girls before costumes...but we do have our french twists and red lips!

Below is Nita, Me and Amy in our costumes!! Its beginning to look like Christmas! :)

This lovely picture is taken at the Old Cider Mill....it was a perfect autumn day in Connecticut!

I forgot one thing....be sure to watch Dancing with the Stars tomorrow night (Tuesday) because the Rockettes will be preforming live!!! I won't be there because I'm already in rehearsals, but it's sure to be an amazing performance!! Tune in! :)

Week 4 begins!

I've been so scatter brained today...maybe it's because it Monday and my week is restarting so I've got all this stuff to think about, plus my hotel room is a mess! (I didn't know what to where to rehearsal today so its dance clothes everywhere, plus my NY weekend bag is unpacked with stuff all over too!) So, I'm hoping tonight to gather myself because tomorrow is going to an early (8am call!!!!) day plus I've got the rest of the week ahead of me! So tomorrow we are actually filming one of the kick lines in a dance so that it can be played on the huge LED screen behind and up above us while we are actually preforming it! On the LED screen it will look like we are kicking in Times Square and other NY sights, plus right there in front of the audience! It's for the NYAC number. Anyway, we are filming from 8:30-12:00 tomorrow...all kick lines....on blue painted cement!!! OUCH!! I can already feel the hammy and knee injuries that will occur tomorrow! There are 8 total positions we have to film, if we get them perfect the first time then we don't need to do them again, however the chances of that happening are slim to none!! Keep your fingers crosses though! I think I will try to keep track of how many kicks we do tomorrow...my guesstimation is going to be around 500 kicks!?! We'll see! The day will be fun regardless because its the first time we get to put our costume and show make up on. I'll take some cute pics! The picture I have today for you is a picture of one of the rehearsal studios being set up for tomorrow's shoot. We are dancing in a blue room so that they can take us and put other graphics behind us, like a green screen.

It's October!

Yay! It's October, the best month of the year!! The leaves are turning to all shades of oranges and reds here in Connecticut and its so pretty! To celebrate the 1st of October yesterday, the girl's and I went to Starbucks after rehearsal to get our pumpkin flavored thing of choice! It was yummy! The last two days of rehearsal have been devoted to the Rag Doll dance. The Arena '08 version is sooo different then any other version yet, so of course it's totally different then the NY one I've done.....for me, I had to reverse the entire dance onto my left foot because each side of the stage is in opposition. Also, I get to do the entire dance on the runway, along with 5 other Rockettes...so we have to be "on" every show! No lazy Rag Dolls! The dance looks really cute. Before we start the dance, we climb out of every part of the stage to get on; I enter from one of the top towers near the orchestra, others come out of secret staircases and trap doors in the floor! Today was also the day of the dreaded jump split!! (At the end, we all do a right leg jump split...yes, that's right...we jump into a split in the air and in one fast gravitational pull we smash to the ground in the splits!) So it's safe to say my hamstrings are going to need a nice hot tub to relax tonight. I've included some pics of other fun events today....a Santa beard wig fitting and flu shots! Here I am with Tony, our wig guy, as he fits me in my Santa beard and hat! My wig wasn't actually curled yet so I look like hippie Santa! Next you can see I'm getting my flu shot. I had to have one of the other Rockettes distract me as I got the shot because I HATE to get shots! But, if this will keep me healthy during the season then it's worth it!