Dance Recital - This is New York

Up until last June, that month had meant a lot of things to us, including but not limited to, blueberry picking, the beginning of summer, perhaps a trip or two.  But now, June most importantly brings us DANCE!  That's right, it was time for the end of the year recital, Callie's second as part of the Diana Evan's School of Dance.  Here we see Callie and her entourage leaving the Opera House after a tough rehearsal session days before the big event.

Dress rehearsal is not only about getting the dances just right.  It is also a time when Sarah has the opportunity to do a dry run for the makeup requirements.  And this year it led to the wonderful exchange when Callie said, "Mommy, do you even know what you're doing?"  And Sarah replied, "Actually, not really."  Callie said okay and we carried on.  The results, by the way, were much better than last year.  The picture to the left shows Callie in one of three different outfits she had for her three different dances.  She was very excited about all of them.

The first dance of the evening was called Happy Helpers, where Callie literally led the way on the stage and we all watched with our mouths open wide, impressed with how much she had grown in the course of one year.  In her first recital, we weren't sure if she was going to go on stage.  And this year, she couldn't wait.  It was very cool to see.

Although Callie was unable to be in dance class with her friends Vivie Ann and Maya, they were able to be together on their performance night.  And that led to this cute encounter backstage between the ballerina and Minnie Mouse.  They couldn't wait to see each other's routines and complimented each other on their costumes.

Callie's third dance involved little munchkins and a dance techno version of Over the Rainbow.  This was a fun dance because the whole gang got to be together with their special someone on stage.  John was particularly proud of his dance moves.  And because Callie is only five, she was pretty impressed too.  Meanwhile, it is going to be tough to keep Reese out of dance class for much longer.  She was enchanted by the whole experience and well after the recital was done she talked about how much she wants to dance.

After such a great performance, a treat at Orange Leaf was well deserved.  And Grammy was happy to be a part of the whole evening.

However, there is one more great exchange that occurred on the car ride to Orange Leaf that we want to share in part so that we can always remember it.  During her ballerina dance, Callie had fallen during a leap, and much to our surprise and delight, she got right back up and kept dancing.  So as we were talking in the car about the whole night, John asked Callie if she knew what had made him most proud of her during the recital.  She just looked a bit confused and said, "When I danced?"  And John said, "No, when you fell, but kept dancing."  Without hesitation and in a matter of fact manner, Callie said, "I learned in soccer that if you fall down you just get right back up." And with that, John almost drove off the rode because of the tears in his eyes.  Not quite, but pretty close.  Who knows what next year's recital might bring?  Perhaps slide tackles.