By Kirk Blad
Elbow, elbow, wrist, wrist, smile … and rattle? Wipe a tear and blow a kiss, BYU’s Baby Pageant is coming to campus Wednesday, Oct. 18, as part of Homecoming week.
“There is a married population at BYU with cute kids that need to be shown off,” said Amie Adams, BYUSA executive director in campus activities. “It’s all about parental pride.”
Students, faculty, staff and alumni will be able to show off their Cougar pride via their offspring in four different categories. The categories are ‘look alike,’ ‘Y-spirit,’ ‘crawl and walk races’ and ‘other.’
“The ‘other’ category is open to interpretation if the judges find a baby with a unique attribute or talent that needs to be rewarded,” Adams said
Adams said the pageant is a good family activity that has become part of BYU’s Homecoming tradition.
“This is not an ordinary baby pageant,” said Alisa Chung, pageant program director. “We are not focusing so much on ‘cuteness’ as we are individuality.”
Chung said in order to accomplish this, she has organized a pageant theme as well as a unique group of judges that are used to the limelight.
The pageant’s theme is “Castle on a Cloud.”
“We want every baby to be royalty for at least one night,” Chung said.
She said the panel consists of several K-BYU students and former beauty-pageant contestants.
“We are hoping to showcase the intangibles that attract people to babies,” said Brandy Murillo, current Miss Springville and pageant judge.
Chung said that although the pageant is geared to BYU’s married population, single students are welcome.
“We hope that single students attending will be motivated to get married, have babies and then get them entered for the future baby pageants,” Chung said.
Chung said every baby that is entered will get a prize and a Polaroid picture. The prizes include gift certificates and diapers.
The pageant is open for babies ages two and under and will take place on Wednesday from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Check-in begins at 5:30 p.m.
The pageant is limited to the first 40 entries and registration drop boxes are located in the Harold B. Lee Library and BYUSA, Wyview and Wymount offices.
