So how did it go for you?

Hey,

By now most of y’all most likely know that I have been in pageants for 10 years. A lot of you might be wondering, how do you think of yourself, what did you get out of it and etc. Well…..

Pageants were really good to me. I am a plus size woman. I have been plus size since I started pageants. I am very proud to say that I have won over 120 pageant titles in my 10 year period. I will admit sometime it was hard to be with all of the girls who were skinnier than me but as a teen girl don’t we all judge ourselves that way? I have a friend who is a size 6 who thinks she is to fat (I am a size 16, ya she is skinny). I never heard during my pageant career that I was too fat to win. I did once have a pageant couch who wanted me to diet but I remember telling my mom if I have to lose weight to win a pageant I am out. She agreed. We were in pageants for fun, it wasn’t a life or death thing for me.

10 comments April 8, 2010
Tags: beauty, child, crown, Eileen O'Neill, former, fun, kid, mom, pageant, pageants, queens, tiara, tlc, toddlers and tiaras, travel

So how did you get involved in this sport anyway?

Hello once again,

So by now you probably wondering, with all of the negative attention pageants have received, how did you get involved with pageants? Well to be honest, it was by per chance.

Sometime around 1999, I received a flyer from my school telling use girls about the local town pageant that was coming up. I literally had to beg my parents a whole month before they said yes.

Anyway, I did the pageant and I won. It was a great feeling but what I got of the pageant the most was friendship. I made a lot of friend and one of the was into pageants big time so I went with her to some of her pageants and I was hooked. 🙂

4 comments April 8, 2010
Tags: beauty, child, crown, Eileen O'Neill, former, fun, kid, mom, pageant, pageants, queens, tiara, tlc, toddlers and tiaras, travel

One Bad Apple Ruins It For All

Hey hey hey,

In my last post, I started to talk about tlc’s tv show Toddlers and Tiaras. As I have stated before and will be starting many many times more, most pageant family’s are very decent people and the show (using the power of editing and yes I know how to edit really well so I do know how it can be done) makes them look like total jerks. In all fairness, I feel that I should talk about the one exception to the rule.

There is a pageant mom who was recently on the season finally of Toddlers and Tiaras who wants her daughter to win pageants at all cost. Now generally when I watch Toddlers and Tiaras I get a sence of which kids love being in pageants and which ones don’t. I guess it comes from being in pageants for 10 years. When I was watching this pageant family’s episode of Toddlers and Tiaras, I could tell right away, the kid did not want to do this at all. She was honestly getting pushed by her crazy mom and today I happen to find this little article.

http://www.examiner.com/x-233-Entertainment-Parenting-Examiner~y2010m4d5-Toddlers-and-Tiaras-mother-looses-license-over-abuse

This article talks about this pageant mom losing her daycare licence  over allegations of child abuse. Honestly, I am not surprised at all at this mom. Look all kids get upset, don’t want to do what they are told and etc (heck I still don’t at 21) but you can just clearly tell by this episode of T&T (it is the season finally) that this kid was forced. I really hope that this mom will wake up and start to care about her child.

So maybe y’all are thinking, why are you posting the negative when you want to show the positive? Well my reasoning is that I want to be credible in my words and I feel that I need to show both sides of the argument (even though I am 100% for child beauty pageants). Plain and simple.

Add a comment April 6, 2010
Tags: beauty, child, crown, Eileen O'Neill, former, fun, kid, mom, pageant, pageants, queens, tiara, tlc, toddlers and tiaras, travel

The bashing with child pageants continues

Howdy,

Since the tragic death of JonBenet Ramsey, child pageants have been under fire ever since. There have been several documentaries about child pageants that haven’t shown us pageant family in a great light. Some of them are Baby Beauty Queens (the one made in the United States and the United Kingdom) and Living Dolls: The Making of a Child Beauty Queen (all can be seen on YouTube).

In 2008 a tv show premiered on tlc called Toddlers and Tiaras to very high rating. The premise of the show is that the show will follow three pageant family’s prepare and compete in a pageant.

Now sense is this reality tv and we all know how real it is, tlc seems to pick some of the most competitive, mean-spirited people on the face of the earth. Now, I do know some of these families on Toddlers and Tiaras. They are not like that at all. It is amazing what the power of editing can do.

Now I will say this for all fairness, yes there are some pageant family’s that are like this but they are in the very small % of pageants family’s. My example will be up shortly.

5 comments April 6, 2010
Tags: beauty, child, crown, Eileen O'Neill, former, fun, kid, mom, pageant, pageants, queens, tiara, tlc, toddlers and tiaras, travel

JonBenet Ramsey

Hello Hello,

In my last post I started to talk about how child pageant bashing began. I personally feel that this part of the topic needs to be handled with great care since I will be talking about the death of a child and no, I WILL NOT be talking about how her death accord or any details about the investigation, if ya wanna know look it up.

This very sweet little girl was found murdered on Christmas Day 1996. She was just six years old. JonBenet was also a fellow child pageant queen. Very quickly after her death accorded, people in the media started speculating on a motive for her murder and they found out she was a beauty queen. Since child beauty pageants are not as main stream as tap, soccer or whatever. People just assume that some random guy was following her around from a pageant and killed her. Worst of all, since our outfits are different from ballet, tap or whatever the public started to think that her mother focussed her into pageants and started to assume that her parents killed her.

I really don’t understand how people could have come to that conclusion. First of all, the outfits in ballet, cheerleading, gymnastics are just as reliving and we were just as much make-up as they do. Heck, in cheerleading you have little girls jumping around in short skirts wearing very heavy make-up. People were “shocked” that JonBenet had big hair and make-up in her pictures. News flash, the make-up she was wearing was not very heavy at all (see above picture) and I have several school pictures of myself with big curly hair (and remember I wasn’t in pageants untill I was nine years old and by then I was home schooled).

Do I think that her death was a result for her involvement in pageants? No. I think that is just a very sad event. So please people, let her and family rest. They have been through enough.

6 comments April 6, 2010
Tags: beauty, child, crown, Eileen O’Neill, former, fun, kid, mom, pageant, pageants, queens, tiara, tlc, toddlers and tiaras, travel

How it all started, a pageant history

Hey everyone!

The last time I made a post, I talked about what this blog is about. I think that now is a good time to talk about how pageant bashing began.

Adult beauty pageants have been bashed since the 1960’s when the woman’s movement started. There have been child pageants since the 1960’s but it really didn’t hit scrutiny until 1996 with the documentary Painted Babies. This documentary was filmed in 1995 and followed two “rivals” Asia and Brooke on their road to Southern Charm Beauty pageant. To see the full documentary, search it on YouTube it is there. This showed the girls practicing and getting ready for the pageants and the “rivalry” between them (spoil alert it is between the parents not the kids) this got some flack because people outside of the pageant world thought it was weird that little girls were in make-up and did their thing on stage.

Unfortunately, after the documentary happened, the tragic death of JonBenet Ramsey happened.

I feel that I should deadicate a full post to her so stay tuned.

Add a comment April 6, 2010
Tags: beauty, child, crown, Eileen O’Neill, former, fun, kid, mom, pageant, pageants, queens, tiara, tlc, toddlers and tiaras, travel

What the heck is this about?

Hello Everyone.

I am a former kid beauty queen. I started competing in pageants when I was 9 years old and “retired” from the pageant scene in 2007 but I can out of “retirement” to compete one last time in November 2009. I was NEVER skinny as a pageant queen. I was ALWAYS the biggest girl in the line up. Did this stop me? NO. In fact, I have over 120 pageant titles to my name.

I personally think that pageants was a great experience in my life. I got to travel, met a ton of groovy people and my mom and I had a lot of fun together and really bonded (and NO she DID NOT push me to do pageants. I wanted to enter in pageants under my own free will, so PLEASE don’t even go there).

So what is my beef? My beef is with the TLC show Toddlers and Tiaras. I think that this show shows pageant kids and their families in a very bad and nasty light. It really bugs me when I see people that I really care about (for their sake, I WILL NOT post their names) and that are really sweet people, shown as rude, pushy, jerky people. This is NOT the pageant world I grew up in. I want the president of TLC Eileen O’Neill to stop showing pageant familys in a negtive light and show the TRUE side of pageants.

Thank you very much and have a blessed day,

More to come,

Former Pageant Kid

19 comments March 15, 2010
Tags: beauty, child, crown, Eileen O'Neill, former, fun, kid, mom, pageant, pageants, queens, tiara, tlc, toddlers and tiaras, travel