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The Ruby Slippers Worked!

Written on December 10, 2010 by Deb Chitwood in Encouragement, Gratitude

Tom, Chrissy, Chea, and Will in San Diego

My daughter, Christina, had her ruby slippers on … and they worked! She’s back home in the USA! Chrissy and her, husband, Tom, arrived Wednesday evening in San Diego, where they’ll be living. If you’ve been following my blog, you know that we were “Watching for the Open Door” in June. I’m extremely happy to say that Chrissy found it and used her ruby slippers to walk on through!

Because of Chrissy and Mark’s competitive ice dance career, Chrissy had committed to living in England and competing through 2018. That all changed when Mark decided to retire from competitive skating in June. The news came as a shock and brought with it the question … what now?

We had faith that things would work out, but couldn’t know exactly how they would. Here’s what happened. In the half year since Mark’s decision, Chrissy has had lots of great new experiences:

She started two blogs: Fit Body Full Life (with Tom, who’s a golf coch and personal trainer) and Christina Chitwood Performance.
She took Stott Pilates training courses in Matwork, Reformer, Cadillac, Chair, and Barrel. Chrissy loves Pilates and is excited to be able to add this to her personal training repertoire. As a competitive ice dancer, she couldn’t take the time away from her ice-dance training to take Pilates training.
She took three Zumba training courses and taught Zumba classes in Sheffield. Chrissy absolutely loves Zumba and loves teaching Zumba. She’s written four blog posts about Zumba:

Top Ten Ways Zumba Improves Performance in Everyday Life

Top 5 Ways Zumba Improves Your Fitness

Why I Love Zumba

Have Fun in the Water with Zumba

She took two glōminerals makeup training courses. She’s used her knowledge to write posts for Christina Chitwood Performance and has ideas for using her makeup training to help her skating students.
She and Mark performed as professional ice dancers in Kyran Bracken’s Ice Party Champions on the Isle of Wight and in Basingstoke, England, in early September – a great experience.
She enjoyed gaining more experience as a performance coach, choreographer, and personal trainer in Sheffield.
She choreographed a large group number, a number for the Oxford Freestylers, another number she performed in with the Oxford Freestylers, and her own solo where she was the headliner for the iceSheffield Christmas show four days before her move.
And – best of all – Chrissy was offered a position as skating coach at the beautiful Kroc Center in San Diego, the primary coaching rink for Will and the secondary coaching rink for Will’s wife, Chea. Chrissy and Tom have always loved visiting Will and Chea in San Diego and had hoped to settle down there when Chrissy stopped competitive skating. Coaching positions at the Kroc don’t open up that often – and the timing couldn’t be better!

Chrissy moved permanently to San Diego on December 8. Tom is actually visiting Chrissy right now because he has to return to England on January 11 for his final visa application appointment at the U.S. Embassy in London. But by late January, he, too, should be a Californian!

Will and Chrissy were always very close, and this is a wonderful chance for both of them to live and work closely together again. They’ll actually live in the same apartment building and can even carpool to work. And Chea and Chrissy are like sisters who are excited to spend more time together. Will and Chea and Chrissy and Tom have always had so much fun together – and are looking forward to lots of happy family time.

And as for Terry and me … it’s our perfect Christmas present and I’m overflowing with gratitude and happiness! I’m grateful for the amazing experiences both Chrissy and I had in England – and that Chrissy found her wonderful husband there! And I’m more than grateful for the many happy family times we’ll have in the future at Terry’s and my favorite place to visit!

“When One Door Closes Another Door Opens” Word-Art Freebie

There’s No Place Like Home” Word-Art Freebie

Tags: Christina Chitwood, gratitude, Kroc Center, open door, ruby slippers, There's no place like home

Watching for the Open Door

Written on June 11, 2010 by Deb Chitwood in Encouragement

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When one door closes another door opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.

- Alexander Graham Bell

Mark and Chrissy at the 2010 World Figure Skating Championships. (Photo by Antonio Calanni - AP Photo)

Right now, we’re living the quote about one door closing and another door opening. My daughter, Christina (Chrissy), has competed in senior ice dance in Great Britain for the last four years. Her partner, Mark, decided last weekend to retire from competitive skating. Chrissy always felt that Mark was the best match for her and decided to retire at the same time.

So now what? Even though Chrissy and our family are sad about the abrupt end to Chrissy and Mark’s competitive skating career, we have faith that everything will turn out alright.

Before focusing on the future, I think it’s always good to reflect on the past. Not too long or too regretfully, just enough to be grateful for the experiences and to review the life lessons.

Gratitude

Chrissy and Will at the 2001 North American Challenge Skate in Vancouver.

I asked Chrissy what were the highlights of her 14-year competitive skating career (from ages 6-20). She had a lot:

Skating with her brother, Will, early on. She’s glad she got to do that and that they had so much time together.
At age 8, her first year (and medal) in pairs at the 1999 Junior Olympics (which later became Junior Nationals).
Travelling with our family to competitions and meeting up with grandparents and other family members at various competitions.
At age 11, landing a throw double axel and triple split twist during a clean novice pairs long program at the 2001 North American Challenge Skate in Vancouver, Canada.
Competing at US Nationals.
Having some great memories and experiences with her skating partners (Will, Harry, Stephen, and Mark).
Living in England and meeting her husband, Tom (a life-changing highlight).
Working with top coaches around the world.
The off-ice aspects of being an athlete from discovering her passion for health and fitness to taking lots of dance classes.
Earning a First Class BA (Hons) Degree from Sheffield Hallam University at age 19 while training and competing in ice dance full time.
Being a skating ambassador at events such as launch events for SportsAid/Lloyds TSB.
Performing as a soloist in shows.
Interacting with skating fans. It always meant a lot to Chrissy whenever someone told her they were touched by a performance or said a performance brought tears to their eyes.
Being able to inspire younger skaters.
Meeting lots of people and making friends from different countries around the world.
Competing in 9 different countries (many states in the US, Canada, many places in the UK, 3 times in Germany, 2 times in Italy, Czech Republic, Finland, Austria, and North Korea).
Being a senior national medallist in Great Britain and representing the UK internationally.
Winning two international medals at senior ISU competitions.
Being one of the few Americans invited to visit North Korea, along with winning the 19th Paektusan Prize International Figure Skating Festival in Pyongyang, North Korea.
Competing at Europeans and Worlds and being a World Team Member in Turin, Italy.

Life Lessons

I think figure skating has to be one of the best possible avenues for self-growth. In an interview, 2003 USA World Team Member Ryan Jahnke talked about boys in figure skating. When discussing the benefits of figure skating, Ryan said:

For me, I think it was one of the most challenging and the hardest things I’ve ever done. . . . I’m at the point now where I feel like anything I set my mind to . . . I can do it. Because I feel like nothing I could possibly come across in life now is going to be as hard as figure skating was, as hard as the competing was.

Chrissy noticed that she was never nervous about performing in ballet recitals as a girl. The other girls were nervous. Chrissy said that it was easy compared to figure skating competitions. I truly think the difficulties and years of preparation needed to reach the top levels in figure skating are among the best preparations for life in general.

Chrissy performing at the 2009 iceSheffield Christmas Show. (Photo by David Paterson)

I asked Chrissy what life lessons/life skills she’s gained from her competitive skating career. She said her top skills gained were the ability to:

present herself with poise and confidence.
act, dance, and perform in general.
communicate with many different types of people.
be responsible from a young age.
manage time with a busy schedule.
make a commitment and stay with it.
handle stressful situations and perform under pressure.
set and achieve goals.
take risks.
know how to win and how to lose.
handle both success and failure.

Those are life skills that have served Chrissy well already in life and will continue wherever her life path leads.

The Future

Headshot by Adam Jay; Fitness and Personal Training Photos by David Paterson

So, now we’re waiting for the next door to open. Chrissy has a number of possibilities:

Chrissy and Mark are performing this weekend at the IceAct Chiller shows in Cardiff and Altrincham. Chrissy looks forward to any show skating possibilities in the future.
She already teaches performance classes and private performance and choreography lessons and plans to continue those.
She’s a personal trainer and enjoys building her business and adding to her fitness credentials.
She will start a series of Stott Pilates training courses in August to become a certified Pilates trainer in mat, reformer, and trapeze.
She’s taking a Glominerals training course (which she learned of almost immediately after hearing of Mark’s decision) to add to her performance knowledge and credentials.
She plans to start a FitBodyFullLife blog and a ChristinaChitwoodPerformance blog.
She hopes to produce and distribute fitness and performance ebooks and DVDs and promote products, like Silent Coach, that she has liked herself.
She has enjoyed past modelling experiences and now has more availability for modelling opportunities.
She loved her acting experiences during her BA degree and in the filming of the Sheffield 2012 video. Now she will have more availability for acting opportunities.

The exact direction of Chrissy’s life will depend on which door opens at the time. Now, with optimism, we wait and see. . . .

Tags: Christina Chitwood, ice dance

How My Daughter Made the Most of Her Experience at the World Figure Skating Championships

Written on March 31, 2010 by Deb Chitwood in Competition Help

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Mark and Chrissy with Centennial Worlds caps at their birthday meal in Turin, Italy.

Last Friday, Will wrote a guest post called “How to Get the Most out of a Skating Competition.” I used Will’s points to check that my daughter, Christina (Chrissy) got the most out of competing at the World Figure Skating Championships in Turin, Italy. By following Will’s three points, I believe Chrissy truly came away with the best possible experience given the circumstances.

1. Learn from the placement.

This was Chrissy and Mark’s first time competing in ice dance at Worlds. It was a wonderful experience to be in Turin, Italy, for their first Worlds, but Chrissy and Mark’s placement was not what they had hoped for. Although not as enjoyable as a perfect outcome, this created an intense, ideal learning environment. In his article, Will said:

A disappointing result makes you look at what caused the outcome, therefore motivating you to improve the areas of weakness that hindered your result.

Sure, Chrissy and Mark could have just blamed a bad original dance draw, the lack of a British judge on the judging panel, or that that specific panel was a blend of judges who didn’t reward their strengths like international judges often did. But the most helpful approach was the one advised by Will and reflected in a quote by renowned college football coach Knute Rockne:

Build your weaknesses until they become your strengths.

Chrissy and Mark had a meeting with their coach, Jimmy Young, soon after the competition to review what went well and poorly and to make plans for next season. Chrissy and Mark’s order for the new season will be to turn their weaknesses into strengths so that they will be ready for any judging panel and will hopefully make a leap in their international placements. My husband and I also helped Chrissy brainstorm ideas for making major improvements. Instead of dwelling on placement, Chrissy is excited and motivated at the thought of adding training camps, off-ice coaches, dance classes, and a new approach to each training session.

Chrissy and Mark on the Worlds Jumbotron at the end of their Scottish OD.

2. Look at what you did well.

A mistake in the compulsory dance could have ruined the entire competition, creating doubt and more mistakes in the next event. Instead, Chrissy and Mark put the mistake behind them to skate a clean original dance and to enjoy performing in front of an audience who gave them a rousing reception.

Chrissy and Mark placed higher than some teams who were ahead of them in the compulsory dance but were not able to move up overall. Still, they could take pride in skating a strong original dance and will always have a good video for friends and family to enjoy. Chrissy and Mark also can be commended for receiving the same technical levels for their OD elements that Olympic and World champions Virtue and Moir received in their OD. In particular, Chrissy and Mark received level four for their circular step sequence, something very few teams in the world receive.

3. Find something to celebrate.

Tom, Chrissy, Deb, and Terry on a tour of Turin, Italy.

Just being at the World Championships is something to celebrate. Our whole family finds celebration an important part of the competition experience. Although we can’t attend every international competition, my husband and I both attended the 2010 Worlds to celebrate the specialness of Chrissy participating in her first World Championships. Chrissy’s husband, Tom, also attended Worlds.

The celebration started the first day of practice, which happened to be Chrissy and Mark’s shared birthday. At Chrissy and Mark’s first practice, the ISU played the “Happy Birthday” song and gave Chrissy and Mark Centennial Worlds caps. We then had a mini birthday celebration with Mark, Chrissy, Jimmy, and Tom.

It was easy to find things to celebrate during the week. Chrissy enjoyed checking out Via Roma, the shopping district; we all enjoyed the authentic Italian food (which was as good as I had imagined); and we admired the architecture throughout the week in the beautiful city of Turin. On Saturday, we took a bus tour of the city to gain an overall, historical understanding of Turin.

There were also many skating events to experience, as well as the after-party Saturday night, which Chrissy and Tom attended. On their last day in Italy, Chrissy and Tom found time to visit Turin’s world-famous Egyptian Museum.

So even though the outcome wasn’t what Chrissy and Mark wanted, Worlds was an amazing experience and a dynamic vehicle for growth. As a result of the new focus Chrissy has gained, she will grow as a person and athlete and savor lifelong memories from her first Worlds experience.

Tags: Chrissy and Mark, Christina Chitwood, skating competition, Turin, Will Chitwood, World Figure Skating Championships