Best thing from final week of dance class

One of the very fun things our dance studio does at the end of the semester is below. During the last week or so of classes, at the end of the class, they pull all of the students who are in class at the moment (so could be up to 5 classes at once) into the big studio and have them do their recital piece for each other. That's pretty usual for studios (LSB did the same)...but what CBA does that I love is that after watching each other, they then all take turns "dancing" each others dances!

The main group stays in the front to guide, while everyone else tries to dance along after watching. So you get an older tap group trying to do a much younger class's ballet piece... or in this case, older jazz dancers trying to do Henry's class's tap piece. I love this video clip so much - the older dancers all watching Henry to learn tap from him! And he's just doing his thing. All the feels!

And I find this especially relevant with the hubbub last week over comments made on GMA about "boys being embarrassed to take ballet". Dance, any sort of dance, is just as much of a sport as any other physical activity, and it should be recognized as such! I'm proud of my dancer, and this video shows that.

Contemporary on the floor

After Natalie's summer dance classes were over (they have a 6 week session prior to the 3 week intensive that she is currently 2/3 of the way through), Charlottesville Ballet sent us parents whose daughters were in the summer contemporary class a video of one of the floor routines they were working on. It's a bit repetitive, as they were really practicing getting the motions correct going both left and right across the floor. So, I cut it down to show just the movement, as I thought it was really love especially with the music.

As I said, Natalie has spent the past two weeks in a 7 hour a day dance intensive, and I know at the show this Friday they're going to show us multiple pieces, including a contemporary, that they've learned. I'm really looking forward to seeing it!

Backstage at Cinderella

Natalie's first big performance with Charlottesville Ballet was in March 2019. She had auditioned for a role in January, and got one of the 40 spots that over 70 girls auditioned for! We were so proud of her, especially for being new to the school.

They performed Cinderella, which was choreographed by the head of the Southwest Ballet Company (including using his costumes and some of his male dancers for a few roles). The girls worked very hard for 3 months, as did the company members, and then gave two performances in Charlottesville and two the following weekend in Lynchburg. I volunteered backstage both weekends, which let me get a lot of fun backstage photos of the girls!

The Charlottesville performance was at the Paramount Theater on the Downtown Mall. We had about 24 girls plus a couple of parents wedged into this small dressing room for the show, but they did great!

They were excited by the mirrors lining the room in which they could get ready.

 

One of the coolest things at the Paramount is that through the backstage hallways, people who have taken part in performances have signed the walls. It's so cool to walk through and experience! Even cooler, is at only 11 years old, Natalie's name is now there!

 

In escorting them to/from the stage, I was able to grab a couple of photos with my phone from the sidelines.

 

You'll see Natalie appear in the video below with her fairy friend in blue.

Like I said, the following weekend we headed down to Lynchburg for two performances there. Natalie and I stayed in a lovely hotel on Friday night, after dress rehearsal, and had plenty of time on Saturday morning before we had to arrive at the theater to go for a nice walk! There's a beautiful walking path over the river, and it turns out there was a St Patrick's Day 5K that we inadvertently took part in.

I have a lot of photos from Lynchburg that I took from the sidelines but they didn't all come out that well; this is a collage of the 3 I took that I liked the most.

I did take a bunch of photos with my actual camera during dress rehearsal in Charlottesville; I have gotten those edited and will next post my favorite stage photos of my girl!

5th Grade Honors Choir

Late this winter, I received an email from Natalie's music teacher, inviting her to join the 5th grade all-county honors choir. There was an opening, and she thought Natalie had the dedication and musicality to be a part of the group. We didn't even know this was something she could do, so we happily accepted the honor.

The all county choir chorus was in March, so after the kids had spent the afternoon at Monticello HS practicing, we 3 went over to watch Natalie and the other 5th graders perform!

 

The kids were really fantastic. I didn't know all of the songs, as you can likely see from the program above, but I enjoyed all of them!

And I think it's now a requirement that every choir do this song...but the kids are so cute singing it, I can't even be bothered by the fact that it's a bit trite!

WCDE 2019

Dance, dance, dance! We just finished up the kids' first recitals with C'ville Ballet Academy, so I've definitely got dance on the brain. So many amazing photos to share! But before that, a couple of other dance activities Natalie participated in over the past few months, starting with an oldie but a goodie: WCDE!

Even though Natalie couldn't compete, since her new studio doesn't attend this conference, and she isn't dancing with LSB anymore, we could still go so she could take part in the workshops and cheer on her friends. I have to say, I was really proud of her this year - picking up choreography quickly has not always been easy for her, and they only have an hour per workshop to learn each dance. This year, she was exponentially faster at picking them up, and she had a really great time in each class!

She particularly has started enjoying hip-hop (I think she might actually take it at her studio next fall), and I was proud of her for asking for clarification from the instructor, who came out on the floor to show her.

He was a favorite of all of our dancers!

There was also jazz (another favorite) - she's in the blue pants.

And ballet!

And finally, the routine that got this song stuck in my head for AGES (I seriously do not know how many times we heard this portion over and over again). But it was one of her favorite routines, and she still talks about it every time we hear the song on the radio!

We got to stay in the hotel with friends, and I was so glad for both of us to spend the weekend with everyone.

 

Henry gets a new axe

Henry has had an acoustic guitar for a while now (it was a Christmas present a couple of years ago), but he hadn't expressed much interest in it until recently. After moving, though, he started talking more about taking guitar lessons. I saw an ad that Music & Arts was having a sale where if you bought a month of guitar lessons, you got a guitar for free, so we headed to their open house for a trial group class. Henry was hooked from the start!

Music & Arts did their job - we walked out with the free guitar, but also needed to purchase an amp and a guitar case (shown strapped to his back below with said guitar inside)... but he was so excited about the whole thing that we just couldn't say no!

He immediately went upstairs and started playing the one chord/song he had learned. I've heard this multiple times already, and he gets better all the time! We are now about 2.5 months into lessons, and he's learned the main chords to quite a few songs.

I absolutely love the music side of his room - it shows his personality so well and makes him so happy!

Wiggle butt!

I stumbled across these two videos we took of Lucy in January and thought I'd share here. We've joked that her nickname is "wiggle butt"...I think it's pretty obvious why in these videos.

She just gets SO excited when she sees the kids, or knows that they're coming home.

She's even learned roughly when they'll be coming home from school every day, and about 20 minutes before the bus arrives, Lucy gets antsy and starts pacing around, staring out of all the windows for them. We've taken to putting on her electric collar and letting her have some outdoor fun time for that period, when weather permits. She's learned to stay up by the house, waiting for the kids to greet her as they get off the bus.

We've even started to walk Lucy up our street without the leash on; I want her to get to the point where she will listen and stay with us even when off leash. I did it this morning with both kids and she stayed with us quite well! Ran some with Henry, stopped when she got a bit ahead, and didn't wander off to sniff any other dogs. Very proud of her!

A second (smaller) winter snow

After our large snow storm in December, we had a smaller one in January that only kept us in for a day or so, and luckily it hit over the weekend so it didn't impact life too much! On Saturday morning, Natalie and I took a walk, trying to beat the snow before it started. We walked from the Downtown Mall to the Corner and back, and definitely saw some snow flurries along the way!

 

By the time we arrived home, the snow was definitely coming down, so we hunkered down for the rest of the day.

Sunday dawned cold, sunny, and covered in snow!

We weren't super snowed in, as it wasn't enough for that, but it was enough to let the kids sled again.

And enjoy another session in the hot tub to warm up afterwards!

Now that it's spring, we are enjoying our house even more - I like snow, but our neighborhood is so lovely now that it's in bloom, and I don't mind the warmer weather!

Natalie's 11th birthday

As I mentioned in my previous post, we had a really big snow storm in December that kept us all in the house for a couple of days. The snow fall started on the day we were supposed to have Natalie's 11th birthday party, so sadly we had to cancel that, but luckily her friend Kendall from our neighborhood was able to walk over, play in the snow, and have cupcakes with us.

 

The week before, Natalie was given this lovely card signed by all of the dance teachers at her studio, many of whom she's never even had! What a nice thing to do for the students.

On Natalie's birthday, although it was a Monday and Evan and I had to work, we wanted to make sure that it was a super fun snow day!

So we bundled up early and headed out. How lovely is my family in the snow?!

As we anticipated, Lucy REALLY loved the snow. I had to keep dragging her back in to pull the snowballs off of her fur (see photo above). Plus I didn't want her paws to freeze!

Our house and yard was just so pretty. I loved as the sun started to come out.

 

By mid afternoon the plows had come through, we had a neighbor kid shovel us out (with his fantastic snow blower!), and we were able to leave the house for Natalie's birthday dinner. She chose Bonefish Grill as she wanted seafood, and they gave her a small box of chocolates and a gift card for later use! She was one happy camper.

And since there wasn't going to be any school the next day, and it was her birthday, we agreed to some evening hot tubbing in the snow! It really is fun; I'd never done that before moving here!

And afterwards, was time for birthday singing and cupcakes. A pretty great birthday all around, I would say!

A December snowstorm in Charlottesville

On the day before Natalie's birthday, we got hit with quite the snow storm! Unfortunately for Natalie, that meant that her birthday party had to be cancelled (since no one could drive anywhere), but we managed to still make it fun for her (more on that in the next post).

It did mean that we had a very gray snowy Sunday together as a family! It really was a perfect snow storm - light weight, fluffy, and deep enough to have a lot of fun in. I think in total we got about 10" of snow; definitely the most we had seen in a couple of years.

The kids, Lucy, and I bundled up and headed out for some fun, even though it was still snowing. Can't stay inside all day!

One of Natalie's friends (who was supposed to come to her birthday party) was able to come over to play for a while, so at least she didn't totally lose that time with her friends!

Oh yeah, I did manage to drag Evan out in it for at least a little while :)

And we discovered just how much fun our yard is for sledding - just as much fun as we thought it would be!

Lucy loves the snow (no surprise there!), although I will say those giant snow balls that adhered to her fur were NOT fun to take off. But I couldn't keep her locked up inside, knowing how much she loved playing in it.

Holidays 2018

A quick overview of our 2018 holiday season... which frankly was a bit of blur, after having just moved! We moved into our house the week before Thanksgiving, so we were definitely in no shape to host. Luckily, Carrie and Chip wanted to host (since it was their first holiday since getting married!), and now it's an easy drive for us to get to their house - not even two hours away! This made for a really easy day trip there on Thanksgiving.

We had a lovely holiday with my parents, aunt, and Carrie & Chip. Henry was particularly delighted to spend some time in Chip's music room. Chip really enjoyed that too, and the kids and he had a great time jamming out. Henry and Natalie made up a song, and once Chip heard Henry playing "Feel it Still", they all played and sang together!

For Christmas, we wanted to host since it would be our first Christmas in our new house. Luckily, everyone agreed, so we had a full house - my parents, Evan's parents, my aunt, and on Christmas Eve Carrie and Chip. So nice to celebrate with so many!

We had to figure out how to put up the Christmas lights at the new house - turns out we don't have nearly enough, and will have to get more next year! But I think Evan and Natalie did a nice job.

We had the house all decorated inside as well - and while we've needed a new tree for a couple of years, our vaulted ceiling living room really reinforced that. Time to get a taller tree! Also, next year this will all look a bit cozier now that we have things on the walls.

The kids woke up Christmas morning to their new body pillows and stockings ready to be opened on the couch! I loved that for one more year, their matching pjs from Scott & Amanda still fit.

I think everyone really liked their presents - I loved my "big" gift from Evan. Friends Funko Pop set #2! Specialty characters. I think I'm going to need the original set now as well. But I do love these hanging out on the shelf behind me as I work!

Oh, and just after Christmas I finished my latest cross stitch project - Angels of Rockefeller Center. I have an idea for seasonal cross stitches in our foyer, so this one will be framed and ready to go for Christmas next year.