Ballerina School

One of Grace's Christmas presents this year was a semester of dance lessons, which include ballet, tap and tumbling. The night before her first class (she has had 3 now) we told her that when she woke up, she got to go to ballerina school. She loves ballerinas and princesses right now, so this was a very exciting notion to her.

When I went in her room to wake her up, she sleepily opened her eyes - then promptly closed them again and snuggled down in her blankets. About a second passed and her eyes popped open wide and she sat straight up and shouted, "Ballerina School!!"

I got her up and dressed and off we went. When we got there, I had to change her shoes. She was almost trembling with excitement. That is, until she saw another mom kiss her ballerina and say good-bye and then (horror of horrors) leave her child behind. Up until that day, Grace had never been left anywhere that she didn't know anyone at all. She clung to my leg and was quite upset.



I had intended on staying and watching for a few minutes, but I realized she wasn't going to participate if I was there. So, I left her in the capable hands of her teacher and left. She did cry, but only for a minute or 2. (I stood outside the class and listened).

I got there about 10 minutes early to pick her up. I stood where she couldn't see me and watched as she ran and danced and twirled in circles shouting, "I'm a ballerina!!!!" They were doing an exercise that they danced while music was playing, then would freeze when it went off. The teacher (Ms. Shawn) would yell, "Freeze" - every child would stop except for Grace...who would keep twirling and shouting to the heavens that she was a ballerina.

Grace has played that game before, but in Kindermusik and in play date, we would say stop, not freeze. So, she didn't quite get it. Not to mention, she was having way too much fun to pay attention.

The next 2 weeks, she isn't hesitant at all about going and is sad to leave when it is time. She likes to wear her ballerina outfit all day and dances for us on command. In fact, then only way I can get her to obey on Mondays is if I threatened to take her ballerina outfit away!