Children of Eden...

Wow... I cannot even begin to express my gratitude for the opportunity I had to be in "Children of Eden." It is literally an incredible show. A lot of people (including myself) had some issues with the portrayal of Father, but once I began to view him, not as the Heavenly Father I know of, but rather as an imperfect parent, the show touched me much more.

I had a hard time at the beginning of the play and had a very bad attitude, but one day, I changed. I said to myself that I was going to be positive and have a good attitude, and everything turned around. There were still frustrations and hard times, but everything was better after that decision. I know that my Father in Heaven put me in the place that I needed to be in at this time in my life. I have made some incredible friends and have had a truly fun, uplifting, and spiritual experience. I am so incredibly blessed and have grown and learned so much from this show. It is truly an inspired show. Just because it doesn't necessarily teach the doctrine that the LDS church believes in, it still has so much that one can learn! I hope the audiences that we performed for got a little taste of all of the things that I have learned over the past few months, though seeing the show once really can't do it much justice.

There were some really hard times during this show for me. It started with me getting my hopes up to play one of my dream roles of Yonah, then not getting that. One of my good friends quit the show, which made me question if it was really worth it. I almost quit the show myself. Some members of the cast had serious issues with focus. Two of my best friends got in a car accident during the course of the show, actually during a rehearsal one day. Early mornings, late nights, frustrating teachers, fake/in-genuine people, the list goes on and on, culminating with nearly all the lights going out in the school on Monday night, our closing night. We prayed and prayed for a miracle, but we didn't quite get the miracle we wanted. Our Heavenly Father knew better and we all ended up having the experience we needed to have on Tuesday night. People changed plans to go out of town and rescheduled appointments to be there on Tuesday. We got the chance to sing our opening number "Let There Be" for the hundreds upon hundreds of people that showed up to pack our auditorium on Monday night before we had to send them away with tears in our eyes and plead with them to return the next day. Someone really did not want this show to be performed. I believe that Satan did not want us to perform the show. But Heavenly Father is bigger than him. My Savior will always be bigger than him.

Guess what? We got our miracle the next day when the show went on without a hitch. Many of the people from the night before returned to see us perform this beautiful show one last time. All of the problems I had been dealing with were made worth it when I stepped on stage for the closing number of the first act with tears glistening in my eyes as I listened to a very talented friend of mine sing "Children of Eden." As we all joined in, I held in the tears as much as possible, as I knew that I would definitely not have time to fix my makeup during intermission as I had to make Noah and his wife gain about 600 years in about 10 minutes. The words of this beautiful song touched me in a way they never have before, especially the part that has helped me a lot these past few months: "You will know heartache, prayers that don't work, and times of bitter circumstances, but I still believe in second chances."

Before I knew it, it was time to walk onto the stage for the very last number of the show, "In the Beginning." Again, before I came on stage the tears had already begun to stream down my cheeks, and this time, I made no effort to hold them back. I let them fall as I began to sing the beautiful words of the song. My favorite part: "We cannot know what will occur, just make our journey worth the taking, and pray we're wiser than we were in the beginning. Now we begin."

This show has the possibility of being the last time I ever perform a show. Maybe I'll do community theater, but I don't know. It is, though, the last time I will ever perform a show at Mountain View (with the exception of Choir).

What a way to finish.

You can watch the whole show at these addresses:

Act I: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7I0c5Q8W3g

Act II: http://youtu.be/q5eAjAq8TTY

Yes, the capitalization is very important.

And for your viewing pleasure, I had my Madre video my two solos. Here they are!

Hope you enjoy! Thanks for reading!

Also, I totally did Dallyn Bayles' makeup. Boo yah. He's so great...he's totally down to Earth and very genuine. And his family is adorable! :) That's my piece about working with someone famous. :)

Oh, and Happy Thanksgiving!!! Don't let Black Friday or any other commercialism make you forget what this season is really all about.

With Gratitude,

~Ali