Nutcracker!

I haven't talked much lately about Julie's dance lessons, but I have a whopper of an update. If you'll recall, we signed her up for ballet/tap lessons in September after months and months of her obsession over all things dance. She especially loves Angelina Ballerina, and can get pretty into fantasies of performing on stage. The girl wanted lessons. And then we started lessons, and it was a little rocky for a while there.

For a while, we almost took her out of lessons altogether. Out of fairness to her, I think I'm going to leave out some of the details about why and how it went down. I'm just going to say that Joe and I did our best to balance our decisions about how to help her with this - we knew she wanted to do it, we knew it would be good for her, but we didn't want to push her to do something that was uncomfortable or traumatize her over something meant to be fun. In the end, it worked out and she has been enjoying her classes much more. And part of those classes has been practice for the Nutcracker recital put on by the dance school.

Julie's part was a small one in the party scene at the beginning, which meant that she got to wear her Christmas party dress that we already had. She was very excited to put it on for the dress rehearsal yesterday, and Sophie wanted to get dressed up, too, so I let her.



The biggest part of a dress rehearsal is waiting around for everyone else to rehearse. I could not believe how well my girls behaved - they sat in these chairs for almost two hours without complaint. It didn't hurt that I had tons of snacks and activities along for them. The raisins again - they are magic!



And finally, it was Julie's turn to get up on the stage and run through her little routine.



She did exactly what she was supposed to do when she was supposed to do it, and she smiled her biggest, happiest smile the whole time.



I can't begin to express how happy I felt for her. She had been saying earlier in the week that she wasn't going to be in the performance (for reasons only she knows). I had told her that she didn't have to perform if she didn't want to, but that she did have to get dressed up and at least be at the rehearsal and at the performance.



I stood in the wings, holding Sophie in one hand and snapping pictures with the other, and tears welled up in my eyes - okay, I actually cried a little bit. I was so. freakin'. happy. for her.

And this morning dawned, things were looking good. We went out to breakfast and came home and played around the house for a bit. The girls got dressed up and I managed to remember to take their picture in front of the tree before we left the house.



There was more waiting - back stage this time. That's Julie with Teacher Rachel. Rachel is so sweet, so nice, so patient, so wonderful. We love Teacher Rachel. I wish I had the time to knit her some leg warmers for Christmas. I'm actually tempted to try and squeeze a pair in, but I don't think it's going to happen. She will get a nice gift certificate instead.



Here they are just off the stage, waiting to go on. All the little girls love Teacher Rachel. Oh! and one of the little girls saw me with Julie and said "You cried yesterday!" and I said "Yep, sometimes I cry a little bit when I'm really happy." and she said "Are you going to cry again today?" and I said "Maybe. I hope not."



Julie smiled and sat where she was supposed to sit...



although this time she got a little distracted by the giftwrapped prop boxes...



But it worked out in the end, and she skipped right through the human tunnel when it was time, and took her little curtsy.



And they came off the stage, and all the little girls checked my face to see if I was crying - there were a few happy tears in my eyes, but none escaped this time. And we snuck in the back of the auditorium and watched the rest of the show, leaving just in time to get back on stage for the final curtain-call...



And the part that Julie was looking forward to all week...



She got her pink roses from Mommy and Daddy and Grandma Harmony. And life was good.