Brownell Elementary Visit

Friday afternoon I walked into Brownell Elementary and had such a warm welcome!  I had the opportunity to speak with the entire school, K-5th grades and all their teachers.  I spoke about who I was and why being a part of pageants is important to me.  I really wanted to stress the importance of my platform to these kids and they responded so well!

And of course they were very curious about many things, like why I was wearing a "thing" on my head and a "ribbon" and if I was married or not.  But it really struck me when they were asking a lot of questions that actually dug deeper into my platform and career.  They asked things like what appealed to me about pageants and how did I deal with the people who made fun of me for being in music, it was a great time!

And before they went on their way in anticipation of the snow storm on Saturday we all agreed to sing "Jingle Bells!"  I am so happy that this gets to be a part of my job!

Glad to see snow on the ground,

Kayla 

Miss Nebraska 

All the kiddos!

Festival of Trees

My beautiful little sister Brooke!

The day after Thanksgiving and after the Husker win (yay!), it was off to North Platte for the third annual Festival of Trees lighting ceremony.  In its' third year we had 26 trees and 10 wreaths and it's an understatement to say they were only beautiful, they were so wonderfully decorated it was unbelievable.  Menards provided most of the trees for the event and then businesses in North Platte donated their time and creativity decorating trees to different themes.  There was a snowman tree, wine tree, cake tree, rhinestoned tree and trees with homemade decorations!

I really, really liked this tree :)

We spent that Friday evening walking around to each tree with a description and lighting them one at a time, it was really an unbelievable experience.  Such beauty came from lighting them.  Brooke and I had the opportunity to entertain as well which brings me to a funny story.  Darrell had specifically requested that we sing Christmas songs and out of my stubbornness to wait until after Thanksgiving to listen to Christmas music, I didn't practice until the car ride from Alliance to North Platte.  I had decided that I was going to sing "The First Noel" and "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas."  I sneakily brought the words to "The First Noel" in with me and cheated a couple times while singing that one, never thought to bring words for "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" because everyone knows the words to that song.  Well, because of my lack of practice and the first day to acceptably be listening to Christmas music day, I forgot the words.  Oh, ya.  I even looked around the room for help and felt relieved at the people there who didn't remember them either!  I wasn't the only one in that boat...unless they just weren't listening to me sing, therefore not knowing where I was in the song which is a good possibility as well.  Either way, we made it to the end of the song with some laughter (I'm good at that) and closed the evening with a few thank you's.  

This one took home the most awards!

Miss Douglas Co Meghan Thalken, Brooke and I

The wonderful Darrell who's short tie is part of a costume :)

I was back Sunday afternoon for the auction of the trees (with a real live auctioneer!).  It was amazing to see the community coming together again to purchase/donate the decorated trees.  I guess I forgot to mention until now that this event is a fundraiser for the Miss Nebraska Scholarship Pageant as well as the Children's Miracle Network Hospitals.  So 100% of the funds went towards both of those organizations!  We successfully made around $10,000 on the event which is a HUGE success!

Jay really captured this photo.

One of the Husker themed trees.

The incredible Wine Tree!

I even took one home with me!  Not that I have a place for him but I now how a tree and a Keurig (which I've been wanting for months)!  I am so thankful for all the donors and volunteers that made this event happen!  It is always an incredible feeling watching a community come together for something so great.

This little guy came home with me along with a Keurig :)

Tis' the season,

Kayla

Miss Nebraska