My dancers

Jan 07

The girls have been dancers since birth.  I love this about them.

Tomorrow, they both start new dance classes.

Maren’s in a hip-hop class: attire is “funky sportswear” with an emphasis on shirts that stay in place when they move and black jazz shoes.  It is testing my Cool Mom abilities to come up with the correct wardrobe for this class.  Wish me luck.

Greta’s starting a combination tap and ballet class.  Thankfully, her class attire is leotards; Greta in dance class without a tutu just would not do.  Our biggest problem there is to decide which of our dozen tutus is just right.  I’m allotting 30 minutes for tomorrow’s tutu selection.  No joke.

I told Maren yesterday, and she cried tears of nervousness.  What if everyone else already knows the moves?  What if she has to do something in front of an audience?  What if she’s not a good dancer?

I signed her up to tease out confidence.  I knew she would be nervous.  I’m so looking forward to her satisfaction when she realizes she did it: she learned the move, the routine, the dance.  And what I’m really excited for is for this to impact her confidence to dance freestyle in her room and at dances and at weddings and at parties all throughout her future.  She doesn’t have to be good, I just want her to be free of inhibition.

Freedom is perhaps the defining quality of a good dancer, is it not?

I told Greta about tomorrow’s class today while we tried on selections from our secondhand dance shoes.  Maren’s hand-me-downs fit (yay!); next in line will be my very old tap shoes, from which small black bits of something may have been sloughing off and sifting into the bottom of the Used Sportswear bin.  Greta absolutely glowed with glee, and hasn’t taken off the ballet shoes all afternoon.  I’ve been commanded invited to watch no less than five dance performances in the past two hours.  She’s tip-toeing around the house in her ballet shoes like she has never walked any other way.

I signed up Greta to allow her to radiate her Greta-ness.  She’s uninhibited and flaunts a wink when she knows she has an audience.  The grace of ballet and Greta’s inherent three-year-old beauty will compliment each other.  I envision even more dance performances in our house.  And what greater gift for Greta and for our family than to make our days twirlier?

My girls are so beautiful.  I hope they dance.

6 comments

  1. Patty /

    They learned Grace and poise by watching their mom and all the beautiful Divas in the Mathie and Anderson families. You are all stars!

  2. Nancy Zwolinski /

    Jen, thank you for this smile today. I love the way you love your girls.

  3. Christin /

    So sweet 🙂

  4. Christin /

    So sweet!! 🙂

  5. Christin /

    Precious!

  6. Love your vivid language of love – Keep up the great posts!