The cold of the ice rink becomes the least of your problems when behind the curtain for the Toy Story Ice Show. The pressure is on with friends, family, and strangers showing up to see the skills of each and every skater. As the time for the show to begin draws nearer, you begin to worry you might not land that jump or nail that spin, hoping you can pull it off in the end.

Once the lights dim and the rink goes silent, skaters get prepared to put all of their hard work to fruition. The show consists of characters from all of the Toy Story movies, with a script allowing the plot of the movies to be acted out on the ice. “Which character you play in the show is all up to your skills as a skater. We have tryouts for the show early in the fall to determine who gets solos, duos, trios, and quartets,” said Katrina Berbrich, the director of the show.

During the show, it’s a world of chaos as the skaters need to quickly change into the outfits for their next appearance on the ice. It’s a constant coming and going from room to room as skaters have acting scenes and other performances. Despite the craziness, the skaters still have a lot of fun together and “wouldn’t trade it for the world.” They have been skating together for years and have gone through the demanding levels of the figure skating universe with each other to lean on.

Once the show is over, skaters are either filled with relief or regret. “All of us want to be able to show people what we’ve accomplished during practice in the last year; sometimes we do and sometimes we don’t,” said Annika Wyffels, a freshman at NUHS. Whether they are satisfied with their performance or not, the show they put on is just one of the many memories they’ll make. The NUFSC is thriving now that they are making productions of well-known movies, and there’s no doubt that many more ice show productions are to come.