The Big Show!

After approximately three long (to children) and intensive (not really) months of dance instruction, my daughters finally got the chance to perform in their holiday dance recital.  And it was a total success.  The pre-show preparations went off without too much anxiety or over-planning, and I am especially proud of the professional-ish updo I gave my six-year-old, involving over a dozen bobby pins culled from the corners of our bathroom drawers and my minimal freaking out.  (I only muttered angrily that I would have to start all over if she didn't sit still and also, why wasn't she eating her butter pasta, like, twice.)

The recital was organized into three hour-long segments with a half-hour in between each for one audience to clear out and another to jostle for parking spaces and auditorium seats.  Marley and Rudy were in separate segments, but I chose to convince myself that two hours of dancing toddlers and tweens was preferable to one.  Since Marley's show was first, Rudy got to help me escort her to the backstage area and check it out herself before she would be required to hang out on there on her own.  Then, Rudy got to watch Marley perform on the same stage where she would be less then a dozen dances later.  And I used the half-hour break to get Rudy into her costume and stage make-up, so she had her own private primping session, including a Rudy's-the-only-one-with-short-hair fancy hair clip.

And also, moments after Marley's show was over, I hustled away with our bags and called Todd over to some empty seats in the very front row!  When the curtains pulled back to reveal Toot and her classmates, I could clearly see that she was so pleased to see us there.  For the entirety of "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town," she kept up a proud smile with her hands on her hips, shaking her Tooty booty (with rare variation) for three minutes.  For the whole song, regardless of what her classmates, or instructors in the wings, were doing, Rudy was shaking it.  She knows, and I remember well from the days when dancing was an integral part of my nights out, if you have a move down, stick with it.