Kaylee's First Dance Class

In our house, in an attempt to not go COMPLETELY broke by having a girl, I made a deal with Kaylee(yes, I make deals with my 5 yr old). Once she was in Kindergarten, which is FREE, and I wasn't paying for Mothers Day Out anymore, I would let her take some extra cirricular activities. She wanted to take Dance, Gymnastics (pronounced by her as "JEWnastics") AND soccer. Wait, wait, wait.... you only get to choose one per year please....or it was pointless to make said deal since that would all cost me WAY more than her entire year of Pre-K. So, she chose Dance class for this year, gymnastics next year, and soccer the next. That,.... I can handle!

All summer long I have been getting drilled about when dance starts. I put it on her calendar, I showed her on my calendar, we went over the days of the week again so she would remember.....to no avail. Finally, the weekend before dance class starts, the countdown is on! She is literally counting down the days, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday!

Tuesday, she was at Grams house in the morning. She was so concerned that she wouldn't be home in time to get ready. She got home in plenty of time to change into her dance outfit, let me put her hair in a bun, and gather her tap and ballet shoes into a bag. (I think she looks absolutely adorable, with her cute little butt in the leotard, skinny legs sticking out from underneath her tu-tu, and hair pulled back softly into a bun. She suddenly looks so grown up too. I'm about to cry....my baby girl is growing up WAY too fast!) I can't help but smile.....and pinch her butt.

So, we go to the dance studio, and all the moms wait outside in the hallway while the little ballerina's all walk so gently into class with their ballet slippers on. (Again, she amazes me by how fast she has grown up.) They close the door and we wait outside for an hour. (Us Moms only get to peek in through the window on the first class of each month) When class is over, she gets to choose a piece of candy and she comes running over to me. (She asks if she can save her candy for tomorrow since it's already almost bedtime and that's way too much sugar before bed....she makes me so proud!) As we're walking out to the car I ask her about her class and the conversation goes a little something like this:

Mommy: "So, how was class?"
Kaylee: "Good"
Mommy: "What did you learn?"
Kaylee: "Dance"
Mommy: "What is your teachers name?"
Kaylee: "I dunno"
Mommy: "Did you have fun?"
Kaylee: "Yeah"
Mommy: "Do you want to keep doing dance?"
Kaylee: "Yes"
Mommy: "well, tell me all about it...what did you do first?"
Kaylee: "We Stretched"
Mommy: "then what?"
Kaylee: "freeze dance"
Mommy: "what's that?"
Kaylee: "Where you dance and when the music stops, you freeze"
(oh duh)
Mommy: "then what?"
Kaylee: "That's it"
(glad to see where my money is going)

(She got those conversation skills from her Daddy, apparently)

So, we get in the car and go back over to Grams house where she promised to show me the moves she learned when we get there. We walk in and she suddenly turns shy.....my 5 yr old social butterfly that has never met a stranger in her life, is hiding behind me! I am STUNNED! (as is everybody else who is reading this who has ever met my social butterfly) She didn't want to show the moves to Grams either. Grams, Aunt Casey, and Madison all sat down to watch Kaylee put on her show and she just stood there. She wouldn't even let Grams take pictures without a pouty face. Later I find out that she didn't want to put on a show because she was worried that people would make fun of her if she got a move wrong, or messed up. Geesh, sounds like her mommy! (That is why I don't dance, in case you were wondering, but I have NEVER said that out loud to her) She finally let Grams get a few pictures after all the rest of us left the room.

So, she loves dance, although you would never guess it from this post! Maybe next week, I'll get better answers out of her, and she may be a tad bit more excited and back to her normal bubbly self after class. Over the past few days, I have since learned that she jumped and "ballayed" across the floor, and learned first position and plia. Oh, and she stretched to Miley Cyrus....which she enjoyed!

She will also get to be in the local town Christmas Parade and she has a recital at the end of the season. I'm sure I'll have plenty of pictures from that one!