The Lion King

Me, Saskia, Lili and Kelly

The show went really really well, the lighting was amazing and apparently we sang really well. Click here for the link to the video that Daddy made on his iPad. Mommy and Daddy say that it doesn't give justice to our real performance, but at least you'll be able to hear it. 

Lizzy and I

Ashlynn and I

The masks

Being Cheetah-fied

The animal that I choose to be was a cheetah. Here is me being cheetah-fied:

Step 1. Orange face wash and white beardy thing

Step 2. Dots. Lots of them. All over my face, on my neck and even a few down my arms

Step 3: Looks awesome. :)

Showstoppers Makeover

For months Ashlynn and I went to Showstoppers rehearsals every Thursday where we learned to sing and dance to a ten minute Lion King Medley. On the Wednesday of the last week of school we finally got to perform at the Summer Concert. The first step was the makeover. Everyone in Showstoppers had to get their whole face painted, or wear a head mask. As there were only about 6 head-masks, almost the whole group had to get their face painted as African animals or African women. 

Saskia the Lion

Lili the Tiger

The 'African Ladies' had beautiful designs on their faces and wore leopard print costumes 

Once again...one of the best!?

Again, I have to say that ours may have been one of the best. Some of the other groups tried to involve the audience like we'd done last year, but everyone still loved ours. The audience in the first performance were much more interested and clapped along as well as laughed and oohed at the appropriate times. 

To see the movie click here

Met a girl crazy for me!

For the last song in the medley, Summer Lovin', Ashlynn and Lauren danced and mouthed the words in the middle of the stage while the rest of us were the chorus and stood off to the side snapping our fingers or twirling our hair. 

Tell me more....tell me moooooorrrrrreeeeee!

Go Greased Lightning

The dance was mostly choreographed by Ashlynn and Lauren, with some help from Nick. We practiced in my English classroom at school during lunchtime, and we very rarely had a full cast until the day of, and yet it still turned out really really great. Unlike previous years, the evening performance sold out almost immediately and so an afternoon performance was added. 

I got chills, that are multiplying....
(The person behind Ashlynn to the left was my partner, Teddy)

You're the one that I want, you are the one I want, oo oo oo honey! 

Go Greased Lightning you're burning up the quarter mile....
GREASED LIGHTNING! GO GREASED LIGHTING!
(From L-R: Teddy, Ashlynn, Bernie, Nick, & Zita)

The International Event 2012

Daddy's Birthday was once again the day of the International Event. Trying to stay true to the whole 'American' thing, we did not have any Brits in our dance to a medley from the movie Grease (including Summer Loving, Greased Lightning and You're the One that I want). In the picture above, the five 'Pink Ladies' are arranging Ashlynn's big hair. (Ashlynn and one other girl had to play boys as there were more girls than boys)

Last minute touch ups under half an hour before the performance

Goodbye Middle School, Hello High School!

There were many hugs and goodbyes at the end of the Bye Bye Blue. It had been an amazing night and I will remember it my whole life. Thanks so much to Madame Chantal who organised the whole thing and to all the volunteers who helped out. 

 Goodbye Middle School, Hello High School!  

Squish Pics

From L-R: Me, Ellie, Hannah, Lizzy, Adelina, Emilie, Ziyoda, Nora, Amelia

Daddy was amazing. He took beautiful photos and everyone thought that he should become a professional photographer. Throughout the next week people told me to thank him and tell him that he was brilliant. 

He put the best photos together onto a video which you can see if you click here, and I put them onto a blog so that people could print them off if they wanted - www.byebyebluepics2011.blogspot.com. 

Lucky me, I had a sleepover with a friend so I didn't have to help stay and clear up. Mommy, Daddy, Ashlynn and Buddy were at the school till midnight packing up the backdrop!

Ashlynn and me

Ellie and me

9JN class photo

Bye. Bye. Blue! *Release Balloons!*

Another tradition that is repeated at each Bye Bye Blue is the letting go of 120 blue helium balloons at the same time. Each balloon had a small letter attached that someone had written near the beginning of the evening. 

Bye Bye Blue.... 

Group Photo

After many squish pics and lots of dancing we had the annual photo where Madame Chantal gets up on a ladder and takes a group shot. We were very lucky that the weather was good, not sure what we would've done if it had been raining...

Me and my friends...

My friends started showing up, all looking lovely in their dresses. We spent the first half hour getting our photos taken by parents, eating food and drinking blue lemonade. I was surprised to see that there were already people lining up to get squish pics and Daddy was already hard at work. 

From L-R: Nora, Hannah,  Lizzy, Fiona, Amelia, Emilie and me. 

Me and Wendy, both in red.

My group of friends

Bye Bye Blue Begins!

Adorable cookies

Madame Chantal, who arranged the whole dance, putting a Bye Bye Blue  bracelet on me.

Me and Mommy at the entrance to Bye Bye Blue.

Mommy had volunteered to help out, so she would be staying at school as well.  This meant that my whole family was there. Mommy, Daddy, Ashlynn, Me and Buddy. 

Before the Dance...

 

After helping with the preparation of the squish pics, I got changed into my dress (that I bought in Curacao) in the bathroom. I wore high heels that I'd got at V&D, a purse that had been handed down from Mommy and a necklace that had been given to me by Memmie. Ashlynn and Buddy were there to help set up the  squish pic sheet, but they stayed for the whole evening. Lucky Ashlynn is the only kid that gets to have 2 Bye Bye Blues.

Setting up for Bye Bye Blue

July First: Bye Bye Blue. The school dance that all the girls in Y9 had been looking forward to since the end of Y8. It was a celebration of getting rid of our blue jumpers and going to black in Y10. So, basically it was our graduation party. 

Daddy decided that he wanted to help out by setting up an area to do squish pics. And for that he needed: a massive backdrop, lights, ladder and mats to go under the fabric. Here are some photos from the setting up of the backdrop for the squish pics. 

We had helpers in 4 windows of the 1st floor to pull the massive piece of cloth up. 

Ashlynn and I pulling on one of the sides.

Pull!

The concierges throwing down gymnastic mats to go beneath the cloth

The Best by Far!

 I know that I'm not really meant to say that our performance was the best, but I think it was.....as was ours last year as well. 

I think everybody who participated had fun and so did we. 

I hope that Lizzy and Katy will perform with us again next year. 

Getting the Kids involved

During one of the verses, (which we didn't feel like coming up with a dance for) we went into the crowd and threw candy to the kids.

Point of interest : Kids love food

After another chorus Ashlynn and Katy stayed up on stage doing the Can-Can and other random dances, while Lizzy and I went down and tried to get some of the kids up on stage. It was a massive success and great fun!

To view the dance go to : http://www.youtube.com/user/BSNmarketing#p/u/7/in8DTop7B5k

Ashlynn and Katy doing the Can-Can. Ashlynn holding down her beads so they don't fly everywhere

With all the kids on stage. A few of the kids were told before hand  to come up like the Russian girls who had practiced with us during the dress rehearsal.

Y-M-C-A

You know the moves, you know the words, so stand up and join in!

For the American performance we did the YMCA. Because it was a last minute thing, (like the British one) we had Americans and British people in it. Lizzy, her sister Katy, Ashlynn and I. 

We had started off wanting to do something from the film Grease, then Wicked the musical. In the end we had 1 week till the dress rehearsal and Ashlynn said, "Why don't we do the YMCA?"

So we got Mr. Lowe to teach Lizzy and I the dance moves after Frisbee one Friday. We had 2 chances to practice before the dress rehearsal.

The performance was a major hit........

Katy and Ashlynn - dressed up as what I think are DJ's

I was dressed up as an Indian from the original  song  the  Village  People. 

Lizzy was a cowboy also from the Village People. 

While at dinner at Lizzy's house, we came up with the entire dance and we made big cardboard signs that had the letters on for us to hold up.

Consider yourself....

International Festival Time!

I was performing in 2 countries performances. The English one and the American one. 

For the English one Kelly and I sang 'Consider yourself' from the well known musical Oliver. 

We had to sing in cockney accents!

2 days before the performance, I was off school with a soar throat! I couldn't talk, which would be bad for Kelly if she had to sing it all herself. At the dress rehearsal I sounded really bad, but by the real performance I was feeling okay. 

To watch it go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_2Atdv6m0s

Before the show, Kelly and I went outside, got hand fulls of dirt, and smeared it all over our faces, necks, arms and legs! 

This was the first time that I've ever used a microphone to sing in front of a large audience!

Consider yourself our mate
We do't want to have no fuss,
For after some consideration, we can state
Consider yourself
One of us!