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 Time to play dress up! For some contestants, shopping for their pageant wardrobe is a highlight of the pageant process. Shopping can be either fun or stressful based on how much preparation time you allow. Trying to find clothing three weeks or less before a pageant can be a nightmare. Start shopping early and find a great seamstress that can hem and tailor your clothes a couple weeks before the pageant. Here are some helpful hints I’ve used over the years to make the most of my gown searching.

1. Set Your Price Range. In my special report, 10 Insider Secrets To Winning, I stress the importance of creating your pageant budget as soon as you decide to compete. Please don’t make the mistake of spending all your money on the gown. If you have $1000 in your bank account, look at all the pageant expenses and decide ahead of time what your limit is for your gown.

2. Know The Appropriate Style Of Dress For Your Pageant System. Research the pageant system in which you will compete. Is it a glitz pageant where the dresses are heavily sequined and beaded, or is it more of a natural pageant? Are the dresses more traditional or cutting edge fashion? Look at pictures from the past year of the top five. What do you notice? I’m not saying buy a dress just like the winner or the runners-up. Instead, notice the trends of the system. Are they wearing the ball gowns where the skirts are bell-shaped and stiff, or do they go for a more flowing look? Are strapless gowns and slit skirts appropriate for your age division? Take note of the details and ask the director for clarification.

3. Determine Your Body Type. The Pocket Stylist by Kendall Farr and Color Me Confident by Veronique Henderson and Pat Henshaw are two of my favorite books to educate oneself about color, body type and style. Your gown needs to highlight your physical strengths and diminish the areas that are not so flattering. A slit for example looks great if you have fabulous legs. Perhaps you have beautiful shoulders. Then a strapless or halter top neckline may be your calling card. If you’re thicker through your middle, a dress with detail at the waistline will only hurt your scores. Taking time to evaluate your body type is time well spent not only for your pageant gown, but for your wardrobe in general.

4. Choose The Best Color For You. Contrary to popular belief, not everyone looks best in white. I want to reiterate the importance of checking out the system in which you will compete. For example, some systems do not want to see black or red on children and teens because the colors appear too mature. In other systems, they want the contestants in white gowns; so you need to do your homework.

Your perfect color is one that goes with your skin tone and hair color. In pageantry, you are on stage under bright lights. In these conditions, colors look very different than they do up close and in natural lighting. As a rule of thumb, rich, saturated colors look best under the lights where soft pastels get washed out.

5. Go To More Than One Store. Educate yourself ahead of time by learning about the different designers, how their gowns are constructed, and what prices are listed online. Call the stores in your area to see if they carry your size and the labels you are looking for. Then, go to as many stores as you can. Shop for both quality and price point. Many designers are adjusting their wholesale prices to accommodate the economy, so see what’s out there.

6. Try On Everything. Don’t get hung up on what size is on the label or the price. Try it on. It’s all about fit. Some contestants get a better fit from a dress that cost $100 than the one that cost $1000. Every designer’s clothes fit differently. You’ll want to find which labels are your best fits and how their sizing runs on you. With more and more shopping taking place online, knowing this information before you purchase will be a huge advantage to you.

7. Get A Second Opinion. It’s very helpful to take a friend or coach with you when you go shopping. Choose one who isn’t afraid to be totally truthful. Someone who will tell you if the color isn’t right or if it makes your butt look big…LOL. Sorry, I couldn’t resist but every woman can relate to this comment. If your trusted person can’t be with you, take photos and send them to her/him to review. Study the photos yourself as well. Do you like the way you look in the dress when photographed?

8. You Need To LOVE It. Bottom line, when you put on the dress, you should feel like a million dollars. That doesn’t mean the dress needs to cost big bucks. This is your moment to shine and you need to feel totally comfortable and confident in your gown when you walk out on the stage.

Beyond The Pageant

Learning about your body type and which colors, cuts and styles most flatter you is information everyone can benefit from. In both business and everyday life, our outer appearance is a reflection of our inner qualities. Shopping becomes easier and more efficient when you know what to look for and what to stay away from. Think about how much money you have spent on clothing that you don’t wear. So take a few minutes this week to purge your wardrobe of items you don’t like, don’t fit and don’t wear. Donate them to charity. Become more aware of what looks best on you and buy wisely.

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I’m frequently asked the questions what is a good age to start children in pageantry and what are the benefits to kids so young.

When kept in perspective, pageantry can benefit children of any age by developing confidence in speaking and getting up in front of an audience. It’s been cited time and time again that the number one fear of people is public speaking. Having been on the stage since the age five, I can personally say getting up in front of people isn’t one of my fears because my mother encouraged me to do so at an early age. The ability to be very comfortable in front of large crowds has served me well .

Pageantry can be a fun extracurricular activity and potentially a great bonding opportunity for parents and their children. In many pageants there are cash prizes for the titleholders and the winners in the optional categories.

When to start is really up to you and your child. Some babies and toddlers’ personalities are very tolerant to wearing the dress clothes, the schedule, and being in front of a crowd. Some are not. Test the waters by entering a no fee local pageant or one with a low entry fee to see how your child will behave. If your child has a meltdown or it’s just too overwhelming for them, you may want to wait awhile before trying another pageant.

There is a time for everything. Some contestants are adorable babies. Others may bloom as a toddler, pee wee or princess. Or some women experience their first pageant as a Mrs. contestant. You’re never too young, or too old, to enter a pageant. There is something for everyone if you truly want to experience this hobby sport.

TIPS FOR BABIES

Typically, children under the age of three are escorted on stage by a parent. The appearance and presentation of the parent is just as important as the appearance of you baby. I’ve chosen photos that demonstrate the importance of focus, wardrobe and presentation for parents of babies.

• FOCUS – Look at your baby the entire time you are on stage. You want the judges’ attention to be on your baby, not you.

• WARDROBE-Whoever carries the baby on stage needs to be well groomed and dressed in colors that blend with the colors your child is wearing. Parents, you are a backdrop for your baby. You are part of creating the total picture. Flashy clothes or dressing in blue jeans and a graphic t-shirt, will draw attention to you thus robbing the focus from your child.  Mothers, make sure your tops completely cover you, and if you are wearing a dress or skirt, make sure the length is to your knees. Be certain your contestant number is placed in an easy to read location.

• PRESENTATION – The parent carrying the baby needs to hold the baby facing out towards the audience and walk in a side stepping fashion so your baby is facing the audience at all times. Don’t carry your baby on your hip. Notice in the pictures how the mothers are holding their children. You need to practice this at home so both you and your baby feel secure walking in this fashion. If your baby girl’s skirt is very full and frilly, you can prop it up behind her, like a peacock, for added flair.

Important general notes:

• If your toddler can’t easily and quickly walk by themselves, carry them. The child doesn’t receive extra points for whether they can walk or not. I’ve seen it all too many times when a parent starts at one side of the stage holding the finger of their little princess only to have her fall, get distracted, or sit down after a couple steps. The child gets frustrated and has a full blown tantrum right there on the stage. Just carry them.

• Excessive baby talk, kiss blowing, squeezing, tossing, having people in the audience calling out their name loudly, and tickling the baby brings attention to you and away from your child. A beautiful baby doesn’t need a gimmick to make them stand out. Put your child in her dress clothes and practice carrying her around for a while in your home. See how she tolerates that. If it goes well, try a pageant. If she keeps tugging at her hair bow or fussing when you’re carrying her facing out, you may want to wait and save yourself the aggravation.

• Give the judges their space. Know where the judges are sitting and respect their space. Don’t stand or walk in front of them to take pictures; or stand behind them calling out your baby’s name or making goofy noises in an attempt to make your baby look their way.

TIPS FOR PREPARING YOUNG CHILDREN

Following are some tips for helping your toddlers and young children develop the skills needed in the older age groups should you choose to pursue that path.

• Read to them. This will increase their vocabulary and knowledge base.

• Speak to them using proper grammar.
  

• Encourage them to talk with other people and express their opinions.

• Practice walking and speaking into a microphone every chance you get.

• Try different activities to see what your child is good at and enjoys doing.

As a parent, learn all you can about what is required of the next age group so you can start preparing. I highly recommend downloading my FREE special report, 10 Insider Secrets to Winning. Numerous people have thanked me for this valuable tool. I share important information that everyone needs to know about the pageant industry, and it will save you precious time and money. 

Keep pageantry fun, light, and in its proper perspective at this age.

I’m too old. I’m too young. The timing isn’t right. These are frequent excuses used from time to time to justify the fear of trying something new, or making a change. Where a certain degree of caution is helpful, being paralyzed by fear can keep us from experiencing opportunities that may lead to a wonderful place. Go ahead. Try something new today and see what happens.

Rhonda Shappert is a pageant expert, personal development life coach, and owner of Winning Through Pageantry™, a business she created that not only helps her clients achieve winning results in pageants, but helps them Succeed From The Inside Out™ in their lives. In the pageant world she has held multiple local, state and national titles. Rhonda graduated Cum Laude with a Bachelors degree in Musical Theater from The Ohio State University and has performed on stage in 15 countries on the Asian, European and American continents. This mother of three who has been married 21 years to her husband Stephen, is the former mayor of her community, home educates their children, and is on the Board of Trustees for the Ohio Virtual Academy. She and her husband perform original contemporary Christian music. Their music CD entitled Cana is available through www.cdbaby.com/cd/shappert or on her website. For more information on Rhonda, visit www.WinningThroughPageantry.com.

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What are three things that make you special? Last week I spoke about the importance of recognizing your gifts and choosing how to use them. When you have a clear picture of your talents and discover which activities make you feel completely alive, you can easily figure out where to spend your time.

As a titleholder, you will have less than 365 days to make the most of your experience. Having a plan ahead of time will greatly increase the FUN FACTOR of your year, and potentially open the door to future opportunities. The strength of your “why”, “purpose” or “platform” is the key to unlocking the door.

There are 3 keys to forming a solid platform in pageantry.

Key 1: BELIEVE: It must be something that you emotionally believe in.

No matter how impressive a platform may sound, if a contestant’s heart is not there, it will come across flat to the judges. This is one time when I say take it personally and make it personal. Find something that has emotionally moved you to take action in some way. A platform doesn’t need to come from some devastating event that happened to you. It’s about making connections. First it must connect with you, then with the judges.

Key 2: INVOLVEMENT: You need to be actively involved in your service.

A strong platform is one where a contestant can demonstrate to the judges a history of devoting time to her cause prior to the pageant. For example, a girl who has had an eating disorder as a middle school student overcomes her challenges as a teenager. As a result, in the past 3 years she has spoken to over 50 girls’ organizations about the importance of self-respect, health, and wellness. She volunteers one day a week at the local teenage health clinic and plans to become a nutritionist after high school. This platform clearly demonstrates active involvement and gives great insight to the judges about the character and goals of this young lady. The judges also get an idea of what she would do as a titleholder.

Compare this to the contestant who says her platform is for cancer awareness. On her bio she states that her cheerleading squad put together a Relay For Life team last month and raised $500. This was her first activity with this organization and was so inspired by the people, she says, she decided to become more involved with cancer awareness.

OK, I’m putting on my judge’s hat for a moment. First, I would acknowledge the second contestant’s efforts in raising money with her team. However, I would view this as a one-shot event and wonder how long her interest would last for this cause. The first contestant would get my vote in the interview round because of the depth of her experience, knowledge and personal conviction for her platform.

Key 3: INTEREST: Your topic needs to have a narrow focus but be broad enough for public appeal.

At first glance this statement may seem to contradict itself so let me go into some detail. Let’s start with the “narrow focus” part of the sentence. Would you agree that it is hard to hit a target when you don’t know where to aim? If the pageant’s focus is on a strong platform, a contestant needs to aim for the bull’s-eye and not let her attention get pulled by multiple distractions.

There is more strength in choosing one topic and totally exploring all facets of it than bouncing from one activity to another. Organizations, businesses, and people are more willing to support a cause when the message is clear and the benefits are obvious. It is your job to make your message as clear as possible, which means focus. The message will be diluted and vague if a contestant is all over the map with her activities.

However, your platform needs to have broad enough appeal so that many people are interested in having you make an appearance or speaking to their organization. Pageant systems want their titleholders out there making appearances and being in the public eye. Not only does this increase the awareness of your cause; but also it helps the pageant system continue to thrive from a business standpoint. So the judges are looking for the platform that will serve both purposes, advance the message of the titleholder and promote the pageant.

Even if your pageant system doesn’t require a platform, spending time developing your purpose and focus will benefit you and the pageant system. Because I feel so strongly that a solid purpose is the backbone to a quality pageant experience, I’m introducing my new A.I.M. Session. This session will include an in depth training teleclass, downloadable worksheets, an individual mock interview and a mini-feedback session with me at an awesome price. The session will cover in detail the Application, Interview and Mission parts of your pageant experience. At the end of this session you will have a solid pageant bio and vision for your platform that you can use in multiple pageants. The session is January 20th so don’t delay if you want to get focused and hit your target in 2010.

Click to register

Each week has 168 hours in it, subtract 12 per day for sleep, eating, and misc., you’re left with 84 hours. What will you do with those 84? Most people give very little thought to what they do weekly, daily or even in the moment. How about you? What purpose do you want your “84” to have? Which areas of your life do you wish were different? The A.I.M. Session will benefit not only pageant contestants but anyone who is wanting to gain clarity on their values, gifts and purpose. There’s something about seeing your life on paper that is very revealing. This week, think about your 84.

Rhonda Shappert is a pageant expert, personal development life coach, and owner of Winning Through Pageantry™, a business she created that not only helps her clients achieve winning results in pageants, but helps them Succeed From The Inside Out™ in their lives. In the pageant world she has held multiple local, state and national titles. Rhonda graduated Cum Laude with a Bachelors degree in Musical Theater from The Ohio State University and has performed on stage in 15 countries on the Asian, European and American continents. This mother of three home educates her children, has been married 20 years to her husband Stephen, is the former mayor of her community, and is on the Board of Trustees for the Ohio Virtual Academy. She and her husband perform original contemporary Christian music. Their music CD entitled Cana is available through www.cdbaby.com/cd/shappert or on her website. For more information on Rhonda, visit www.WinningThroughPageantry.com.

I love a brand new year. For the past three days, new hopes, dreams and goals have been flooding my mind. I have also become aware of a reoccurring theme I’ve heard from Veggie Tales, Epiphany and Desperate Housewives; and I feel compelled to share it with you. The message is about your gifts and what you choose to do with them.

Yes, we’ve just come off the Christmas season, and many of us received lovely gifts that came in shiny paper. However, the message that keeps presenting itself to me is not about material gifts. Let me explain.

Earlier in the week, we picked up a number of videos from Blockbuster. On Saturday morning, we popped in the animated Veggie Tales Lord of the Beans DVD. I didn’t know what to expect, but I was delightfully entertained by the wholesome parody of Lord of the Rings and struck by its simple and truthful message.

In the movie, Jr. Asparagus (aka Toto instead of Frodo) receives the gift of a bean. He doesn’t know what it is, why he has it, and what he’s supposed to do with it. Through his very entertaining journey he discovers the answers to these three questions. The story’s message is that we are all given gifts that belong only to us. We can’t return them but we can choose what we do with them. We can ignore them, use them in a selfish way, or share them to make a difference.

Afterwards, I sat there thinking, this is just like some pageant contestants when they’re choosing a platform. Some contestants look outside of themselves to find a cause that sounds impressive. Some haven’t yet become aware of what makes them special. Still others choose to ignore their strengths because they feel that the judges will never see the value in what they offer. And let’s not leave out those who know what they’re good at, but just don’t know how to package it in a marketable way.

Veggie Tales Lesson: Identify YOUR gifts and make a choice of what to do with them.

So a couple hours later, I was singing at a Life Teen mass, and guess what the homily was about?
Yes, you guessed it-gifts. However, this message had a little different twist to it. Since the Church was celebrating the Epiphany, the presentation of the Magi’s gifts to our Lord, the priest shared that every person is a gift. He proceeded to read a wonderful passage about how different “gifts” arrive.

Some are perfectly wrapped. Some are loosely tossed together. Some arrive via special delivery. Some are fragile. Some are so tightly wrapped, they’re hard to open. Some have been mishandled by the delivery system. But no matter how they’re packaged, every gift is a treasure to the person receiving it. Every time we interact with others, we are sharing the contents of our gifts.

Again, I felt myself saying, that’s just like pageant contestants. Every single contestant is different. The one’s that sparkle brightest and stand out are the ladies that recognize their own uniqueness. Think of how boring a Christmas tree would look if every gift were wrapped in the same size box and wrapping paper, or, if every ornament on the tree were identical.

Epiphany Lesson: Gifts come in all shapes, sizes, styles, and types. Each serves a specific purpose and is beautiful.

Ok, so it’s Sunday night, and I took a break from writing about the inspiring events of the day before to watch one of my favorite shows, Desperate Housewives. There was a scene where Gabby’s youngest daughter, Celia, survives a brush with death. Gabby tells her husband Carlos that Celia was saved by God because their daughter was destined for greatness. Cuddling her daughter, Gabby falls asleep and begins to dream about what great things her daughter will do.

In her dream, Gabby is determined that her daughter is going to be a great actress and she sacrifices everything in pursuit of this idea. Her daughter, however, has no desire to become an actress.

Suddenly, Gabby wakes up from her dream as Carlos is walking back into the room. When he asks Gabby if she’s figured what their four-year-old daughter is going to be great at, Gabby replies that she doesn’t have to figure anything out, because Celia is great at being Celia. Gabby accepts her daughter for who she is and wants her to grow and discover her own path.

Desperate Housewives Lesson: Self acceptance is a key to inner peace and finding your purpose.

What are your gifts? Take out a piece of paper and write down three things that are special about you. If you feel a little stuck, focus on times and events in which you felt completely alive and comfortable while you were doing it. What comes easily for you? Ask those people closest to you what they think your strengths and gifts are.

Next week I’m going to talk more about platform and purpose, but the foundation of a dynamic platform or cause is in knowing your gifts and what you choose to do with them.

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To know, be and share yourself with others is the greatest gift you can give. Just imagine what the world would look like if everyone lived a life with purpose and understood their own unique gifts. 2010 can be your great awakening. Contact me today for more information on how we can work together to gain clarity on your gifts and develop a plan to share them.

Rhonda Shappert is a pageant expert, personal development life coach, and owner of Winning Through Pageantry™, a business she created that not only helps her clients achieve winning results in pageants, but helps them Succeed From The Inside Out™ in their lives. In the pageant world she has held multiple local, state and national titles. Rhonda graduated Cum Laude with a Bachelors degree in Musical Theater from The Ohio State University and has performed on stage in 15 countries on the Asian, European and American continents. This mother of three who has been married 20 years to her husband Stephen, is the former mayor of her community, and is on the Board of Trustees for the Ohio Virtual Academy. She and her husband perform original contemporary Christian music. Their music CD entitled Cana is available through www.cdbaby.com/cd/shappert or on her website. For more information on Rhonda, visit www.WinningThroughPageantry.com.