First Recital

My family is full of performers. My parents both performed with show choir and musicals growing up, and all three of my brothers love theater and performing.  As for me, ever since pathetically delivering two or three lines as Street Woman #3 in the sixth grade, I prefer to enjoy the performing arts from the audience.  I cried from nerves at every single piano recital I can remember. That "near meltdown" at my wedding?  Stage fright, more than anything.

In so many many ways, Elli is her Daddy's daughter.  Apart from her brown eyes, she looks so much like him (to me at least). Her creativity and artistic ability are surely from him, and when amongst those she is comfortable with, she is quite the little performer. I love seeing Daniel in her, but this afternoon, I was reminded that she takes after me as well, for better or worse! When Elli refused to enter the room to a chorus of applause, I immediately recognized my own reaction to performing in public.

I'm so thankful we chose this particular gym for Elli's first ballet/gym class. They had a very relaxed attitude about the recital. Elli stood by my side for the entire tap portion, hiding her head in my shoulder for most of it. I was so proud of her, though, when she changed into her ballet slippers and stepped out onto the "stage."  She was so brave, and I think she actually grew to enjoy the performance! 

Here is a video from my phone.  The performed the dance twice, so the first half is from the first performance.  At the end you'll see one of her classmates dances in front of her, so I used the second half of the second dance, even though a few of the classmates get a little crazy.  :)

Then we moved into the gym where they showed off some of the skills they had worked on.  We have quite a strong little monkey on our hands!

At the end there was a little award ceremony where each kid got a medal. Elli loves to play with our medals from the half marathons, so she thought it was pretty special to get her own!

One of my favorite moments of the recital was while the other kids were receiving their medals, Elli came and sat next to Cara and held her hand. I love these sweet sisters!