Life's Lessons: Dance rehearsal

Tonight was the big full dress rehearsal for the recital this weekend. Katherine is in the 3 year old class which is also the youngest class in the studio. All of the older kids take them under their wing and want to show them ropes, while Katherine and her cohorts follow them around with stars in their eyes. It's a match made in heaven!

Katherine's costume is a flower, and in the beginning of the dance the little girls pop out of gigantic flower pots. Everyone in the audience was ooooh'ing and aaaaah'ing over how cute they were. And I've got to agree -- they were absolutely adorable.

The rehearsal started with the finale dance. All of the girls in the studio do a dance together at the very end. The little ones (3 and 4 year old classes) are in front of everyone else across the front of the stage, and guess who is in the dead center of everyone??? My little Katherine! Wow, when she's up there, she's just glowing. She's got "I love dancing" written all over her face. I'm not sure what's wrong with me lately. My emotions are totally out of whack! Just watching her up there brought tears to my eyes. Literally, tears were running down my cheeks the entire time she was on stage. AAAAAHHHH..... Why is it hitting me so much lately?? My little girl is growing up. How'd I'd love to keep her this age forever.... Why can't time stand still???

Caleb put on quite a show of his own tonight. For the first 20 minutes or so, he sat on my dad's lap and cuddled in with him just watching all of the excitement around him. We knew it wouldn't last... it just couldn't! All of a sudden, Caleb decides that this is a great time to invent a little game we now affectionately call "chair diving". There was an empty chair between my dad and I, and Caleb would crawl up in the chair and start diving in our laps. He felt like such a big shot!! Every time he'd body slam either my dad or I in the chair, he'd let out this super loud belly laugh and scream "MOOOOR... MOOOOOR". About 5 minutes into his new favorite contact sport, he cracked his head on the wooden arm rests separating the chairs. WONDERFUL!! He yelled "Mamma, Mamma". I gave him a kiss on the head, he yelled "GAAANK YOU" and resumed chair diving into our laps. I would have cried, but not my little boy -- he was having the time of his life. As soon as Caleb realized that the people around him were watching him, he stood in the chair, and tried to lean over the back to give them a high five. He was wired tonight!! LOL!

Shortly before we were leaving, Caleb decided that it'd be a great time to throw a fit, so he had a full on tantrum right there. It was terrible. He was inconsolable, there was nothing we could do but watch it happen and laugh about it. Matt took him outside, and let's just say it was a battle of the wills when it was time to get in the car seat. Caleb fought it for all it was worth.... Thankfully Matt won! LOL!

Andrea called right as were were pulling in the driveway, and offered to watch Caleb Friday night during the recital. Given the fact that Matt and I would like to enjoy the recital, and make the night special for Katherine, I'm going to take her up on it... After the tantrum he threw tonight, there's NO WAY, he's coming on Friday night!!

Here's some pictures from Katherine's big night.

Katherine patiently waiting her turn to dance on stage...

All dressed and ready to go!!

These pictures are out of order, but quite frankly I'm too tired and lazy to fix them now!! This is Katherine at home getting her make up done. She got the works -- eyeliner, mascara, eyeshadow, powder, blush and lipstick! YIIIIKES!

Here she is at the beginning of the dance popping out of the flower pot. It's funny.... Andrea asked me if she had any stage fright, but that thought never crossed my mind. She couldn't wait to get out on stage and dance for everyone. I think she would have danced all night!