Costume Malfunction Madness! HAHA

Marty Allen, Karen Kate, Tait (dancer) and myself after their amazing show.



Marty as "the wine taster".
Horseback Riding in Costa Rica.
Some of the cast as well as some cruise staff getting ready to ride horses!

Well the past week or so has been wonderful.  I had the best day in Costa Rica last cruise because we got to go horseback riding.  It was absolutely beautiful and we were actually able to get the horses up to a nice gallop! I wouldn't consider myself an experienced rider, but it was definitely great to feel the wind in my hair and have the chance to really play with the horse a bit. To top it all off, it was CHEAP! Sweet!! haha Like $35 for 3 hours and transportation.  Can't beat that with a stick! 

Then, we had a "Mac Party"...about 4 of us from the cast got together and shared info and programs to help us with our Macs (computers).  This was especially helpful for someone like me, who has always been a PC person until Christmas of this year.  So, I learned shortcut commands, how to use some of the basic programs I wasn't 100% sure about, and was also able to re-format my external hard drive to be Mac friendly.  (This may not mean much to some of you, but I know my Dad is right there with me on all of it! So, you can skip a bit if this doesn't interest you...hahahaha) Now I have like...150+ gigs of storage space between my computer and my external drive.  YAY!

Does anyone remember Marty Allen the comedian?  He's been on Ed Sullivan, Johnny Carson etc etc...knows all the big performers from back in the day. Well, he and his wife were guest entertainers on our ship this past cruise.  The show was fantastic!  He's 87 and still performing! Can you believe that??? And his wife, Karen Kate, is a singer/pianist who is very talented and a great performer as well.   I took a few pictures because I recognized him from some re-run of an old talk show...I can't even remember which one...but I was just amazed that he's still alive and doing what he loves.

Oh - then the costume malfunction!  This is great.  SO - we did West End to Broadway Wed. night.  The first show I had a few word glitches so I wasn't happy with my performance, but the second show was going great! I felt much more relaxed and focused, the audience was a little more attentive...everything was good.  Well, I have this 40 sec. quick change on side stage into a purple corset top, skirt, gloves, necklace and wig.  It's not impossible, but it is rather fast I must say...then I jump onto one of the set pieces and I'm wheeled onto the stage where I come out of a door for the next number...so usually I'm able to do last minute adjustments from there if need be.  This time just seemed to take longer so I jumped onto the cart with approximately 1 sec. to spare and was still fixing my gloves and wig as fast as possible.  Got it ready and walked out just in time to start singing...sang the first line and all of the sudden I felt the zipper in my top pop wide open!!  Thank GOOODNESS for hooks!! I had a hook in the top of my dress that managed to stay together through the entire song. I pranced around on stage praying that it would hold as I felt it flapping in the wind behind me.  I had to change choreography and blocking so that I never turned my back to the audience. I still have to wonder if people on the far sides saw my flapping dress and panicked right along with me! It was HILARIOUS! Well, at the time I was going crazy in my head!!! BUT looking back now, it's hilarious. :)

Soooo those are my latest stories. Not much has changed. I'm starting to get a little more comfortable with everything as time goes on.  I really love all the shows and the more intimate sets that we get to do in the Centrum and Safari Club.  I can't wait to have family on board to share things with! You are all going to have the time of your lives!!! It'll be here before we know it!  I'm off to bed~  Going to see a monastery in Cartagena tomorrow.  

More soon!  Blessings~*

The best day!!!

This is Labadee - where John lives/works!
The view of the island from the 500 ft tall zip-line.

Riding up to the zip-line...

Ok, I just had the best day I've had in a looong time!! I got to spend about 4 1/2 hours with John today on Labadee!! I can't believe it worked out so perfectly.  Security agreed to let me off the ship on the very first tender at 7:30 (we're not supposed to get off until open tendering, which is usually around 9:30ish) so I was on the island by 7:45 am! Then, John's buddy Tony offered to take his 8 am zip-line tour so that John and I could spend the morning together! I had rehearsal at 10:30, so we were together until then, and I was straight back off the ship by 12 pm to spend the afternoon with him. :)  He did end up having to do a tour at 2:30, but that actually worked out well because there were only 3 people on it so I was able to go too!  I ZIP-LINED from 500 ft up!!!  That's right - ME - who's scared of heights!! It was actually AMAZING. I loved it! I zip-lined the longest line that goes over water in the WORLD! - and it was 500 ft up! Geeeeeez ~  Anyway, it was soooo good to spend some time with John again. Just reminded me of why we care so much about each other.~  

Other than that, the shows went really well tonight.  Tomorrow night is my "summer breeze" set, so once that's out of the way the pressure will die down a little bit!  Finally - it'll be about polishing everything I've learned, and no more learning anything new!  

Let's see, OH - Mrs. S, the Jewel goes to: Miami, Florida; Oranjestad, Aruba; Cartagena, Colombia; Panama Canal (Cruising Canal); Cristobal Pier, Panama; Puerto Limon, Costa Rica; and George Town, Grand Cayman until May.  Then we transition and go to : Kings Wharf, Bermuda; Lisbon, Portugal; Vigo, Spain; Cherbourg, France; Harwich, England, Copenhagen, Denmark; Stockholm, Sweden; Helsinki, Finland; St. Petersburg, Russia; Tallinn, Estonia; and Oslo, Norway.  Isn't that amazing?? It's gonna be GREAT that last month!! I mean, it's great now because it's warm, but I can't wait to see some of those places.  

Well, that's all I know for now.  I'll keep you posted!  More to come of course~

Creative Jazz~

Can you find me?? :)

Our production manager took these...what do you think?  Susan Foster Photography~

So, I had my debut jazz set last night...the final night of the cruise...saying goodbye to all those people that have become fans throughout the cruise...at least the ones that didn't go to bed at a decent hour.  The one problem I've already figured out about this set is that it's not until 11 pm on the last night! SO, everyone's tired - packing - just doing whatever it may be to get ready to go HOME.  The last thing they're worried about is stopping by the Safari Club to hear the same singers they've been hearing all week long sing a few more songs.  So, we started out with about 40 people - and by 11:15 we'd lost at least half of them...I just have to believe that if it were earlier in the evening, or even on a different night then we would have a packed house! I mean, the ones that stayed seemed to really love it!  But alas, we did not.... :)

Even better than this was the fact that I had to learn 9 songs in about 3 days time...those of you that know me know that I don't have a problem learning music - notes and all that good stuff...it's the words that hang me up every time!  Well, this time was no different! I'm beginning to think that the problem with doing a replacement contract is that you take on so much new material that it all begins to pile on top of each other and there's just no more room in your short term memory to store anything else!  

So my story...I won't say that the set was terrible.  It's like I told my parents - when I was on I was really on, but when I wasn't - oh boy did I crash and burn...haha  I started out doing really well - made it through the first...5 songs with no problems.  Stumbled here and there, but to the average audience member they probably didn't catch my switched up lines or little mistakes...so at that point I'm getting more confident and thinking "Hey, I'm gonna make it through this without a hitch after all!" Well, you know that old saying 'don't count your chickens before they hatch"...yeah - I should've stuck with that mentality because around song number 7 I went completely BLANK.  Now I'm not talking - missing a few words - or even 1 line.  I'm talking - couldn't even get the first line out!!  SO bad - and SO SO obvious that I was clueless!! There I am - on what I would've considered the easiest song in the set because I knew it before I ever began learning the set...and I'm at a loss.  

The song was "Cheek to Cheek" - a classic that most everyone recognizes...of course it had to be one of those...well the first line clicks in - "Heaven, I'm in Heaven and my heart beats so that I can hardly speak" - then NOTHING else.  I just went blank and stopped singing...I couldn't help but laugh out loud because I saw the faces as everyone realized I'd definitely missed my line. SO, I try to joke about it - haha Ok guys lets try this again! Here I go...and yet AGAIN still BLANK!  I've got nothing...so this time my lyrics go from emptiness to "Heaven, I'm in heaven...etc....OHHH that gamblers silly, silly, silly streak"  hahahahahahahahahahahaha  (come on, you know that's funny)  So, then I make a joke about creative improve lyrics and how trying them in front of an audience pushes me as a performer...or something like that.  HA  People laughed at least...but even better I never could remember the most recognized verse of the song which I was supposed to go back to at the end - so I finally popped out the 2nd verse about love vanishing like a gambler's lucky streak and then ended it!  The line should've been "Heaven I'm in heaven, and my heart beats so that I can hardly speak AND I SEEM TO FIND THE HAPPINESS I SEEK"....so easy - so familiar - came to me on the last chord...a bit too late!!!

So, that's my embarrassing story for this cruise.  Oh well - over all it wasn't a bad set and the audience still cheered...some even stood at the end! I guess it must not've been too terrible. :) Just hilarious to watch! I would love to see a video of it!  Wow...hilarious.  

Other than that, I have a "summer breeze" set in 3 nights...a little nervous about getting that one ready after the last time...I think this time I'll request a music stand for lyrics as a back-up plan.  Then at least I'll feel more confident, even if I don't really need them.  BUT - once that's out of the way I'll be done learning new things, and it will just be a matter of polishing everything up!  YES!  ALMOST THERE!!! 

And - I'm really excited because in less than 30 hours I'll be on Labadee with John!!! Can't wait! We do have a show that day unfortunately....so I have rehearsal from 10:30-12.  BUT I plan on being the first one off the ship at 7am and then I'll get back on for rehearsal, and run right back off again until 3:30!  And, hopefully John will be able to take off in the afternoon so that we can spend some time together away from the water slide or the zip line. :)  

Let's see...I don't really have any other news.  Just wanted to share my funny story! Hope all is well at home! I miss everyone!  XO

Random...

I'm just using free internet in Grand Caymon so I thought I'd add this link. I can't remember who all I've sent my promo video to so here's the link if you haven't seen it!

Kristian's Promo Video  click on this link and there it is!

Almost There!

Valentine's Day  - Britne, Amber (dancers), myself & Andrew (Boy 2) with Steve (cruise staff) and Brian (sound guy) popping his head in at the back.
I love this guy!! Andrew, Amber and I~
Check out my opening costume for City of Dreams!!! Isn't it amazing?? hahahahaha That's Nicki, my girl 2 with me. That's right, we don't wear wigs for this, just that awful hat...in fact I only have 3 wigs for this whole show because I wear so many of those things!!!

Well, I don't really have a lot to add right now. Just wanted to post a few more random pictures from the past week.  

The shows are going GREAT! I absolutely love performing in all of them! I'm finally installed into all 3 shows, which is a huge load off my plate.  Now all I have left are the 2 jazz sets that I'll do with Dwayne (my Boy 1).  It's a good thing I recognize most all of the songs, so hopefully it will be fairly easy to pick up the lyrics because we'll being doing at least one of them at the end of this cruise.  

I still haven't really gotten off the ship a lot during port days...I've just been so focused on trying to learn everything, that I've been afraid to really get out and enjoy each place. I really wanted to get the shows under my belt before playing!  But, I will say that I got off for a little while in Aruba and had an amazing day on the beach as well as laying out on the ship.  So, I'm no longer pasty and it gave me a chance to bond a little with the girls in my cast.  

Hope everyone had a great Valentine's Day.  Mine was nice - we had shows that night, but still hung out afterwards so that no one was alone on V-day!  OH - and I'll be seeing John one week from today! Well...technically yesterday because it's like 2 am here...but I can't wait! I only hope he's able to get a little bit of time away from work so we can spend a little of it together.  We shall see!!!!

Ok, I'm off to bed. Just wanted to write a quick note and post a few pictures. Hope all is well back home!