A Decade of Magic

Today officially marks 10 YEARS that I've been doing magic! A whole decade! I cannot believe it!

And to celebrate I'm not doing a show... which is a depressing thought.

It's also World Theatre day and all the theatres are shut down. Disney just announced they are staying closed until further notice. It's a weird time.

We all try not to focus on the negative at this time but it's weird just sitting at home doing nothing. But that is our literal jobs right now, to stay home and stay safe so I've had plenty of time to reminisce about my journey in magic and where it's taken me.

As I've explained in the past, Brandon did NOT want me to be his assistant when we were dating. But eventually I won him over and the very first show I went along with him after our verbal agreement that he was stuck with me even more, I only had one job. I just had to change his music for him once he was tied up in a straight jacket.

And man my nerves was out of control. I could have ruined the show. Spoiler alert, I did great marching my little happy self up on stage in my obnoxious zebra print top as I smiled and hit next on his little iPod Mini. Oh hey throw back.

And that started everything...

My first show outfit

The countless birthday parties and church events, that turned to magic conventions and library gigs, that one day turned into a theatre run, and then to hotel shows, to finally being where we are right now with Pure Magic.

Sometimes I want to get mad at this job for what it's taken from me. It's not been easy.

We don't get vacations whenever we want. It keeps pushing off my dream of a family. We don't really have a normal social life. We say no to a lot of things so we can use all of our money to keep growing the show.

I want to be mad somedays about what it takes away and what I've "lost" in the past 10 years. But I can't really because magic has given me SO much.

I mean first off, obviously I get to work with my husband. We spend pretty much every waking moment together (especially right now during quarantine lol) but even outside of this, we get to go everywhere together.

Crazy dressing room selfies are always the best

I've met incredible people I never would have thought I could meet like Jack Hanna and the band Kansas. I've made amazing friends because of this craft that everyone thinks only consists of anti-social dorks. Mentors turned into friends and those friends turned into family.

I've gone to cool places. I would have never gotten on a plane if I didn't have to. I still avoid it if possible, that fear of heights is not a joke. We've visited places I wouldn't normally go to for magic conventions and our vacations to fun places have literally all been paid for by magic.

I've grown so much as a person. I'm constantly pushed out of my introvert comfort zone by getting up onstage and speaking in front of thousands of strangers. I continually work on my fears of heights and tight spaces. #ClaustrophicMagicAssistant

Itty Bitty Living Space

I've learned to love humans more. For the most part, I don't like people. I have always been an animal person and I tend to be unapologetic about it. But seeing what magic can do for others and help them escape from what's going on. Hearing people pour their hearts out to us at meet and greet about what's going on in their lives and how our show affected them. That can't help but wear down even a cold heart like mine.

And my absolute favorite part about this job is how much of our lives I have to look back on. We have more photos and videos of us than most people get to have in a lifetime. I can watch us grow up and how much we change as performers and people throughout time.

For something that I hated for a while there growing up, I've certainly learned to love it!

I wish I could list out every single thing that's happened to us these past 10 years working together. I have so many fun stories I want to share but am planning to create some individual posts so I can better explain some. I'm most looking forward to sharing our audition stories with you guys! So stay tuned!

From the bottom of my heart thank you to everyone who has helped us in this journey. Anyone who has encouraged us, stayed up late on skype or facetime with us to improve a routine, given me hair and makeup advice, helped us choreograph a new illusion, find the perfect song, the list could go on endlessly. Thank you to the incredible performers that I look up to that continually inspire me. And most importantly thank you to the people who didn't believe in me. You pushed me most of all.

One decade down, hopefully many more to go!!