Although Celeste Blackburn considers herself a tomboy, she’s going out on a limb and entering the 2014 Miss Jr. Teen Seattle Pageant.

The 13-year-old Renton resident will take to the stage with a host of other local girls at the event at 4 p.m., Oct. 11, at the Burien Performing Arts Center.

Blackburn, who is an eighth-grader at Kent’s Northwood Middle School, was selected to participate in the pageant after an interview process. She will be competing for her share of thousands of dollars in scholarship money and specialty gifts.

Blackburn will be competing in the Miss Jr. Teen division, one of four categories that will have contestants ages 7 to 19 competing in modeling routines, which include casual wear and formal wear.

She will also be judged on her interviewing skills by a panel of Seattle judges.

“When we got the letter I was really happy that I made it,” Blackburn said. “I’m really looking forward to it.”

She considers this a bit of a stretch for her as she doesn’t really consider herself to be a “girly-girl” but more into sports. Though on occasion she likes to dress up in gowns, depending on the event, she said.

“I think it will be a good opportunity for her, give her some good confidence and help her understand more what it’s about,” her father Harlan Blackburn said about the pageant.

She’s been practicing answering interview questions with her grandmother, Jeana, and taking selfies of different expressions.

“The biggest part of the whole thing is the three- to five-minute interview that they do the day before the pageant,” said Jeana Blackburn. “The whole purpose of the pageant is to build confidence, make new friends and give them a way to…interview with other people.”

If Blackburn wins the title of Miss Jr. Teen Seattle, she would represent Seattle and the surrounding communities at the National Competition in Orlando, Fla. There, more than $30,000 in prizes and awards will be given out. According to the pageant website, more than 95 percent of the contestants have never participated in a pageant before.

For more information, visit http://seattle.2014missteen.com/about.