Bomb diggity

Happy Friday!
I do believe I've come up with a plan. Fridays will be the only day I write on my bloggity blog. That's it. No sneaky posts with just pictures throughout the week. I'll just wait until Friday so I can explode here. :)
Can I just say how awesome my days are compared to when they aren't? haha And the main reason is whether I've read my scriptures or not. Dude. Like huge difference in EVERYTHING. I can't quite explain it, but I've been down both roads (no, religion vs. yes, religion). I've made my decision on how I'd like to live my life. Seeing as I only have one life to live, I am doing all I can to make happy decisions and remain true to them. What's wrong with that mindset? To me, that sounds like a life worth living. :)
Today was/is the bomb diggity because:

• I woke up with only 4 and a half hours of sleep and read my scriptures (Alma 26...seriously, it just made me sit back, ponder, and really apply what was relevant in ancient times to my life in the present. And I became very aware of how one person can do so much with a humble objective).
• Noelle and I did our preview in stage combat this morning and WE KICKED EACH OTHER'S BOOTIES ALL OVER THE FLOOR. Oh, my word. I felt like I was in Mortal Kombat. No joke. Maybe sometime we can get someone to film our fight? Hopefully!

Would I be Jade or Kitana? I've always wondered...

• My lit class had a field trip to the MOA (museum of art) on campus. We talked about this giant pentagon of books stacked on top of one another and what that meant. Dude. It was inspiring and intriguing.
• I had rehearsal for "The Stronger." The show just keeps getting better and better! Can't wait for it to go up next Friday! Wah!
• Zac and I went to the gym to work out after we were finished with classes and rehearsal. I ran a 5K at 25 minutes, so like a 8:15 mile pace. :) Guess who's getting back in shape? :D
• We're going to The Slab for a date night. I think I'm finally ready to challenge my dislike for stir fry and get a Thai chicken pizza. Pretty pumped to eat super cheap but AMAZING pizza with my dude. :)

• Getting super excited for General Conference tomorrow! :D Zac accidentally signed up to donate plasma tomorrow afternoon from 11:45 to whenever it ends...so probably like 3. :( I wish I had someone to watch it with...Boo.

Last night we had Leah, Veronica, Tim, and Emily over for some board game fun. :) We played Quelf, which is the most random fun board game I've ever played! I don't normally dig board games, but this was amazingly refreshing! I didn't feel like I was at an old folks home or desperately trying to understand the rules. Hooray!

How's your Friday?

Dear Theatre, Love Chelsea

As I'm getting more in touch with my character in "The Stronger," the more I'm realizing this role is a dead-on 1950's version me. And sometimes that's really fun! And sometimes, not so much. Only because I'm so vulnerable and real, if that makes any sense? :)

I love acting. I didn't know I'd love it so much while I was growing up until my sophomore year in high school. I'm so grateful for that first show and the many that followed. I'm grateful for all the shows I didn't make. I'm grateful for the directors who patiently endured with me my auditions and rehearsals. I'm grateful for the friends I've made through theater. I'm grateful for the drama queens. (haha) I'm grateful for the lessons I learned after being a drama queen: shut up and be humble. :)

Senior year of high school, Into the Woods. Rapunzel.

But most of all, I'm grateful for the changes I've made personally through theater. 

Theater has taught me to be open minded.

Senior year of high school, Into the Woods. Rapunzel.

Theater has taught me to dig deep, find levels, find reasons, find objectives. To never stop fighting.

Humorous Solo from senior year of high school. I was Eloise. :)

Junior year of high school, I Hate Hamlet. Deirdre McDavey.

Little Shop of Horrors, FIRST SHOW! Nurse Nancy. :)

I love Saturdays! :)

How amazing is a Saturday morning?
Recent happenings....
:)

We had Emily and Tim over last Sunday for dinner and FHE. :) It felt so wonderful having a full table!

This morning, we made breakfast together. Scrambled eggs, turkey bacon, toast, apples, and orange juice. :) Good way to start a Saturday!

[Scene Break!]

Last night I went straight to work on my play. Before I collapsed into bed, I finished 7 pages of the second draft! So today I may even finish it. Maybe. Obviously, I am going to nit pick the whole thing endlessly until it's due this coming Thursday.

Today, I am memorizing lines. And doing theatre and English homework.

What is your Saturday looking like? :)

A pyromaniac poem, stage fighting, and first flurry of a 10 min play :)

Happy Friday!
Zac just popped me a bag of popcorn. Now, I am popping the buttery, salty, and warm popcorn into my happy mouth. :) ohemgee. so om nom nom.

Words cannot describe just how relived I am to be sitting on my love seat, on a Friday afternoon, blogging.

From a pesky Psych paper, to red ink slashes all over my 10 minute play, to strenuous rehearsals, and the ridiculous poetry unit in my lit class, I AM EXHAUSTED. Not to mention my "grad plan" meeting with George Nelson...

In order to graduate by April 2013, I need to take 17 hours next fall. :O. I sure hope I have it in me to get a high GPA that semester. The biggest hindrance to any grade, by far, is attendance (for me). It's so crazy how absences and tardies add up so quickly! So far this semester, I've done really well. Granted, it is only the beginning of school. But I really want grad school. HIGH GRADES IN THE BAG. BADDA BING.

Yesterday, the first draft of my 10 minute play was read out loud in class...after we got them back corrected from George. Hearing people read my glaringly red obvious mistakes was so embarrassing. But, luckily, everyone else in class had the same thing happen to them. George told me at my grad plan meeting right before class that "we're a team, we're in this together." I just moaned and laughed. After that hurdle was cleared, I went to my play last night and erased EVERYTHING I had. "First Draft 10 minute play" is on my task bar, begging me to write. The plot's gonna be a lot simpler, so my characters have more room to grow and show depth. I am throwing out one of the three characters. I am cutting out exposition almost entirely so I can get to the "meat" or the action of the play. Yes, good things to come. :) Hard? Definitely. Rewarding? Undoubtedly.

I've had rehearsal for "The Stronger" every night since Tuesday. Today, though, we had practice at 2 pm in a study room at the library. A previous study group was quite put out with us when we informed them we had the room until 2:30. But they were wonderful and let us have the room that was rightfully ours. haha I wasn't so sure I'd do amazing, awe-inspiring work today because as I put it to Hannah, my director, I felt like I was "in a dream." But, to everyone's surprise, I reacted off of Taylor (my brilliant co-star :]) and Taylor reacted off of me and today's run through of the show went splendidly! I learned the blocking for the my first couple of monologues last night. So in this afternoon's rehearsal, I did the blocking and inflections up to what I've learned and then "improved" what I felt appropriate for the rest of the show. All I thought the entire time was, "Focus." And great, new, and powerful emotions and tactics were found! Ah, the gift of revelation and listening. :)

Along those same lines, I've been working with a wonderful girl in my Beginning Stage Combat class on a choreographed fight scene. Her name is Noelle Houston. My, goodness, is she amazing! We were good friends before this class, but being paired with her has made a whole world of difference to our friendship. This week, we met up on Monday and Wednesday afternoon to "fight" outside the HFAC in the bee-infested grass. She is so talented, you guys. She's a sophomore and already been a part of so many theatre projects here at BYU. Even right now she's taking 17 hours and involved in...2 shows if I remember correctly. Anyway, I love her to pieces. It may seem odd to say, but I love fighting her. We laugh and talk and repeat the fight until we are just exhausted. And our conversations are so intense and heartfelt. There are times, however, when I do a move wrong and she tells me flat out I need to fix it. It also took us a while to get the timing of her flipping me over her shoulder down. But we're in a great place for our first preview next Friday. :)

My lit class is highly frustrating at the moment. Poetry. Is. So. Hard. To. Grasp. Bah.
I keep applauding myself for not being an English major. haha I love English, but I think sometimes it's just a little too out of my sphere. :) We just read a really intriguing poem that was extremely difficult to decipher because of it's free form and content. But, oh, how beautiful it was.

How amazing is it to find you aren't perfect?
How amazing is it to find that you still have so much to learn from others?
How amazing is it to find you can learn from helping others?

I am just in awe at the many people in my life who've taught me something about living. Who've shown me I am not perfect. Who've shown me that perfection may not be necessary, but a desire to do the best I can is all that I need. Who've shown affection. Who've shown hard love, when needed.

Race to the finish! GRADUATION.

while I do have quite a bit of psych reading to do tonight, I just need to blog. :) back in high school, I worked hard and applied myself and took 51 college credit hours onto byu. now I am technically a "senior" with credit, but in my junior prime. :) recently, I've been getting ahead on homework and I did some very important math today. GRADUATION. SO CLOSE. seriously. no, really. let me show you. :)

Fall 2011 (this semester)
Psych 111 (3)
Fundamental Lit. Interpretation (3)
Drama Perf. Antiq-Ren (3)
Playwriting 1 (3)
Beginning Stage Combat (1)
13 hours

Winter 2012 (this coming semester)
Directing Fundamentals (3)
Drama Perf. Ren-Present (3)
Playwriting 2 (3)
Dramatic Lit. 2 (3)
Performance Studies Intro (3)
Directing Fundamentals (2)
Theatre Production 2 (1)
15 hours

Summer 2012 (get gen-eds done)
Dinosaurs (3)
Stats 121 (3)
History of Creativity 2 (3)
9 hours

Fall 2012 (last 200m of the race!)
Writing for Children and Adolescents (3)
Writing Fiction (3)
Playwriting 3 (3)
Dramatic Lit. 1 (3)
Makeup 2 (2)
Theatre Production 3 (1)
15 hours

now, there is one class that I need to take to graduate that's an upper level class (Contemporary Performance Practice). I just found out it is only offered in the winter and after you've taken several pre-reqs:

• Dramatic Lit. 1 (Fall 2012)
• Drama Perf. Antiq-Ren (Now)
• Drama Perf. Ren-Present (Winter 2012)

bah. so Winter 2013 will have my last class for my major but I'll take a ton of other theatre classes and extras, so it won't be so bad when I graduate in....

April 2013 with a Theatre Arts Studies major emphasizing in Playwriting and a minor in English. :)

Graduate school- UCLA with MFA in Playwriting? Yes, please.

I take no prisoners.

I'll be graduating byu with (approximately) 163 credits.

only 120 are needed to graduate. I am a super senior :)

AW YEAH!

Quick update!
I got into the third show I auditioned for a week ago. :) The show is called "The Stronger" by August Strindberg. He's Swedish. And awesome.
The play is a one-act, women-only cast, just two parts. One woman, Mlle. Y, is single and doesn't say a word the entire time. The other woman, Mme. X, is married and talks for the full 20 min-30 min one-act. Guess which role I landed?

I AM THE TALKER, BABY. I have three pages of single spaced lines to learn in oh...3 weeks? Yeah, the show goes up on OCT. 7TH. Crazy soon! Memorizing lines=my life.

We had our first rehearsal yesterday and did the first read through. Well, I read through the script and everyone listened. Hannah, my director, even jokingly asked if we could get me a glass of water. :)

As I read, I was so deeply touched I almost lost my composure. You guys, this show is possibly going to be the best work I've done to date. It's that powerful. :) Words cannot express how amazed and happy I am I got this part. I even wondered if my "fire" for acting distinguished...But, oh, how wonderful it feels to be wrong. :D

You guys...I still got it. :)

The Ladybug Audition

Today did not start out as "good." I woke up extremely emotionally exhausted (so many "E's!") and did not want to face the day. Two nights ago, I went to my first two auditions in about 8 months. The first one was pretty rocky but I had hope for a callback. I was pretty confident I rocked the socks off the directors during my second audition. Last night I received an email informing me I didn't make callbacks for the first audition. I was pretty mad at myself because I knew the exact reason why I didn't make it. But Zac reassured me that I was just getting back on the horse. I still have time. Time slipped away from me and I tossed all night long.
Then came my 6:30 alarm this morning. Groggily, I fumbled out of bed, got ready slowly, and stumbled to my Beginning Stage Combat class. It felt like I was swimming through class, not really here nor there. The only thought on my mind was the second audition and callbacks.
No email came saying "Yay" or "Nay" to me making it.
No sign was posted in the HFAC saying who made callbacks and who didn't.
I was going crazy and poor Zac. He put up with all of my spewing anger and confusion. I knew callbacks for the second play were from 3 to 5 but had no idea where they were taking place. Eventually, I decided to just let it go. And as soon as that happened, a woman and her college-aged daughter asked for our help.
"Is this the HFAC?"
"Yes it is! Do you need help?"
"We're trying to find room 400."
"Hmm. That will be on the fourth floor. I can lead you there, if you want."
"Oh, would you! Thank you so much!"
And so we marched to the room. On the way, I was surprised at how readily I asked questions about these strangers and totally forgot about my "horrible-no-good-very-bad day." We found their room and Zac and I left the HFAC.
Another audition had started just moments before these strangers asked for our help. Zac and I walked to the MOA's garden and found it already underway. I decided to go for it. Zac waited patiently for me on a bench as I cold read with the directors and another girl. I have no idea what will happen with that show, but let me tell you: It's not the end of the world whether I make it or not.

[Scene Break!]

A LADYBUG LANDED ON MY NOSE TODAY AND STAYED THERE FOR FIVE MINUTES. NO JOKE. I was walking to my last class of the day and ran into a guy from my Beginning Contemporary Dance class from last semester. We chatted about dance and then I awkwardly asked if he got engaged to the girl he was dating in class. He said they talked about it but no, they are just friends now. I then told him that the night I went to pick up my wedding dress, I saw her trying one on! He laughed and I felt like a silly girl. And just then, a ladybug flew in between us and landed right on my nose! We counted the dots and the ladybug only had two. He dared me to keep the ladybug on my face while in class and I said my nose was starting to feel tingly. Then we laughed and I headed on my merry way. :) The ladybug did stay on while I walked through the hallways to my last class. Many heads turned. My nose tingled.
And I suddenly knew everything was gonna be alright.
No matter what happened: No callbacks or Yes callbacks.

Funny how a little ladybug can remind you of how small you really are. :)