Miss Hemisphere Pageant

When we were living in Utah Emmy and I saw a show that I believe is called "Toddlers and Tiaras". It shows all these pageant moms and their tortured little children being forced onto stage to parade around in the hopes of winning trophies, ribbons and most of all crowns! I was horrified by it, but Emmy was absolutely fascinated. Ever since then she has been begging me to be in a pageant.

We were at a local mall when Emmy saw a flyer for a pageant and was so excited that there was going to be one close by. Grandma Rae got wind of her plight (hmm. . . wonder how that happened) and agreed to pay her entry fee so that she could compete in the pageant. We spent the better part of this morning doing her hair and getting her pageant ready. She wore the pink dress that was made for her when she modeled in the fashion show in Pocatello, thank goodness she got her crazy teeth pulled two days ago, so instead of a pumpkin smile she had a beautiful 8-year old toothless grin!

When we arrived the people running the pageant had the girls and boys walk through the steps they were supposed to take on stage. Emmy did a great job smiling and posing. I took some video, but it didn't turn out too well. Anyway, there were different categories they could enter and Emmy was in the model search and cute pageant portions. After all the kids took their turn on stage and then went back on stage together to say their name and age, they took a short break while the judges chose the winners. Emmy won the model search for her age division and also "best outfit". She got to go on stage by herself to receive her two trophies. After everyone else received their trophies etc. they were all gathered on stage and we thought the pageant was over, then they announced that they were going to name the over all winner of the entire pageant and wouldn't you know it was our little Miss Emmaline! She got her crown and her sash and a pin to go on the sash. She also won a cruise to the Bahamas and $25 dollars plus her entry fee. Because she was the over all winner she received in invitation to compete in the national finals in Ocean City, NJ in November. We haven't decided if we are going to do that yet or not, but Emmy sure had a good time today and she is really enjoying feeling like a "supermodel" (I said Princess, but she read this and she said supermodel).

I have to admit I was hoping that we would do this and she would find out it wasn't all it was cracked up to be and then be ready to move onto the next thing, but it turns out it has only wet her appetite for more! Oh boy!