Here comes Santa….slightly melted…
Kurt Browning
The Galleria ice show has a great line up of stars this year. This weekend had not one, but two very special guest stars. First is the amazing and highly entertaining, KURT BROWNING! For the Friday show he did a great number to “all I want for Xmas is my…” and changed the vocals to “..two figure skates” while he skates out on a pair of hockey skates! The guy slowly finds his “feet” and realizes he doesn’t need toe picks and successfully executes a double axel. For those of you who are unaware, a skater’s toe pick digs into the ice on the landing allowing the skater to find their balance without falling backwards or even worse, face planting! So for Kurt to do this successfully, he has to land pretty much straight down with a ton of control….a testament to his awesome talent.
Kim and Brent
The other guest stars were Kim Navarro and Brent Bommentre. I have enjoyed skating with them in Sun Valley, and then watching them kick some glice on America’s Got Talent this past season! Besides the smoothness and chemistry they have together, they have incorporated a bounce spin and some other cool adagio tricks that had the audience “oohhing” and “awwwing” throughout.
I was lucky enough to have my dad come with me and hang out this weekend. I must say one of the most enjoyable times during the weekend (besides seeing all the screaming children digging Santa!) is having dinner with everyone after the show and hearing stories from skaters’ past. Kim’s mom, a lovely woman, entertained us with stories from her show skating days. “You skaters have it easy! Back in our day we push started our tour buses up hill each way…” haha, just kidding! Not to mention hearing Kurt talk about first hand how it was to skate and be involved in his legendary Singing in the Rain. I am honored to have a career in show skating where I get to meet so many skaters who have influenced not only the skating world, but my skating as well.
This year Santa’s suit got an upgrade! But with upgrades, tweaks usually need to be made. So the boots sort of snuck down to the ankle. As you can see in the picture the fur cuff got a little bit too low! Well, when fireworks are shooting, they melted a nice path through those suckers!
Thank you Randy from Pyrotex that made sure my suit is always sprayed with a flame retardant. Santa may have melted, but he didn’t catch on fire! Till next week!