Dance 2013

The dance year began in August. Since then, AB has loved her weekly Beginning Combo I Class – which was an hour long ballet and tap class on Mondays from 5:30-6:30.

Mondays have also meant Mamie having a weekly date with my parents while I take AB to dance. Afterward, DW comes over and we have dinner at Grammy & Pop’s and we all love that!

AB has been working on her recital number for a few months now, and this weekend was finally show time!

We started the recital gauntlet with dress rehearsal on Thursday night.

We found our dressing room first. AB & I were both loving that it had a sparkly star on the door with all of the dancers’ names below.  :)

Mamie wasn’t a big fan of dress rehearsal. I kept her busy with snacks and my cell phone until Daddy got there, too. Then he took her to dinner and they spent a lot of time outside until it was time to watch big sister practice on the stage!

There were two performances of the recital, with the first being on Friday night. It was a packed house both nights!

On Friday afternoon, Grandma stopped by our house to bring AB a good luck recital prize – which was a purple ballerina to hang jewelry on. AB loves a “neck-a-lace” and purple, so it was perfect for her.

That night we all met up at the auditorium to see our girl in her first recital!

AB, Uncle Adam, Aunt Nen & Grandma

 

Grammy, Pop, Uncle Van, Elliot, & Taylor were all there, too, to cheer her on.

Mamie got to go on Friday night and we all passed her around and took turns trying to entertain her! :)

AB got to watch the whole first half of the recital before it was time for me to take her back to get her dressed and ready. She was so excited and even said, “I’m so just READY to get on that stage!”

At intermission, I took her back to get her dressed.

When the curtain opened after the break, she was standing on stage with the biggest grin.

Her class’ dance was to “When you wish upon a star” and was so sweet!

She was precious. Her class was the sweetest little group and the whole audience just “ahhhhhed” the whole time they twirled around.

We were all so proud!

After their dance, the girls went back to the dressing room to wait through the rest of the recital. I was a “dressing room mom” that night. The girls did so good while we waited to be called back to stage for the finale. I pulled out AB’s coloring book and gave them all a page and dumped the crayons on the floor and they colored, had a snack and then watched part of a movie on one of the other mom’s laptops.

The recital was LONG to say the least, but finally it was finale time and AB’s group came out and took a bow and blew kisses.

Her Daddy & Pop took flowers to the stage for her and she was so excited that they were pink and purple! She was so cute afterward holding them outside- you could tell she was so proud of them. The purple ones were from Pop and the pink ones were from DW. My mom totally saved the day when she called to see if I’d ordered flowers yet. I had thought about it, but hadn’t yet and Grammy even remembered to to get some for Miss Cyndal, AB’s dance teacher.

Everyone else had to leave after her performance, so we didn’t get pictures of all of them with our ballerina.

Saturday night, we got to do it all again!

This time, Mamie stayed with a babysitter. We’ve never had to get a sitter for AB or Mames, but Grammy & Nie-Nie (& Kels) would both be at the recital that night and Nen was going to Tampa…and since that’s the extent of the people who’s ever kept Mamie, we had to get a sitter. We got one of Kelsey’s friends who also used to keep the nursery at our church, so it worked out great and Mamie did wonderful. (& it was so nice not to have to try to keep her quiet and entertained for the LONG recital!) :)

Saturday’s performance was just as sweet as Fridays.

My favorite may have been though, when AB was helping the youngest tiny ballerina in her class know what to do. She kept looking back and trying to help her little friend and I was SO PROUD of her. It was so sweet.

The finale was the cutest on Saturday night, because the girls had to sit on stage a little longer than the night before. AB kept waving at us and smiling so big.It was precious. Finally, it was time for Daddy to get her off stage again and give her some more flowers! :)

Pappy, Nie-Nie & Kels brought her a bouquet, too…

Grammy & Pop with our dancer on night 2…

AB with her dance teacher, Miss Cyndal

We made it home around 10:00 that night and AB was still riding the ballet recital high. She loved everything about it and she can’t wait for the next dance year to start!

AB with her flowers from both nights

I put them in vases & she’s so proud of them. She has to tell me over and over who gave her which ones. :)

~amw~