Competition! Camaraderie! Completely Fun!

A few weeks ago my friend Omar, who I used to cheer with at United Cheerleading, let me know he was headed to Charlotte to judge a cheerleading competition. They needed a few extra judges and he asked if I was interested. Of course I didn't even have to think about it, I was pumped! I so miss being a part of the cheerleading madness! Saturday morning I headed to my first cheerleading competition in like 8 years! The company is called Mardi Gras Spirit and they were a blast to work for. There were 3 general judges (1 being in charge of watching the dance, 1 the stunts/pyramids, and I was in charge of tumbling - we all judged overall appeal, choreography, spirit, etc), 1 penalty judge, and 1 legality judge (Omar). It was a really neat set-up with all the different judges watching different things and it was so easy to work with. In between every few events/divisions, they had what they called a Bead Blast. They would play Mardi Gras music and the judges and staff would throw beads to the crowd! It was crazy but so much fun! Everyone just danced around and got so excited about getting as many beads as possible. Such a great way to get the crowd involved! They had two separate awards ceremonies, 1 halfway through and 1 at the end. Before each, they'd invite the coaches whose teams had already competed up to the floor and split them up into 2 teams for relay races. This got the teams totally fired up cheering for their coaches, it was awesome! I competed for 4 years and never did any of the companies hosting competitions involve the crowd and teams! It was such a fun day! Not only did I have a blast being involved, also got paid pretty good on the spot and met some really cool people! Cant beat that! :) One of the judges lives in Charlotte and she's part of several young adult groups that she's going to involve me in which really excites me! I cant wait to meet even more new people in Charlotte. We also talked about being on an open cheerleading squad that a few of the gyms around here have, just to go once a week and play around with people our age and up who still want to stunt and tumble some. At this competition, there was one adult team that did a routine with minimal tumbling but lots of dancing and cute choreography and stunting! It was awesome and I so want to join that team! So anyway, Saturday was a long but very fun and exciting day and I even got to end it by hanging out with a few of my SC buddies who were in town for a wedding! Great to see everyone!