MELLADO: We're all at the Dance Recital!

 

The year-end Mellado dance recital (which we've been attending for 13 years) is always a highlight of the year. Here we are with Lauren, an incredible young dancer whose progress we've followed from the age of three.

Lauren and her Daddy, my son Jeff. Good-looking guy, don't you think?

Lauren and Grandma share a moment. There's always a theme for every recital, and this year it was Hawaii (can't you guess?)

Wallpaper version!

Before the show! Waiting for the elevator to take us there.

A couple of bonus shots: me and Bentley, and books.

💗BACKSTAGE at the DANCE RECITAL!

I hope to post some actual dance footage, if I can get around the copyright restrictions on the music. A fun time was had by all!

Those dancing feet: Caitlin aces it!

Flowers in her arms, stars in her eyes! Caitlin triumphs once again at her year-end dance recital, but with a difference. She really worked hard this year and had some private coaching from the owner of the dance company, an eccentric English lady in her 60s who still dances up a storm. Caitlin displayed a dramatic leap in skills and focus. It all came together for her. Tap is especially difficult to master, but she blew us away this time with her precision and exuberance. This was a good old-fashioned 1930s-style number a la Busby Berkeley, my favorite kind of tap.

Her other number was a hilarious thing from Legally Blonde called Omigod You Guys!. The thing is, you guys, my kids were (and are) incredible athletes, smart, funny, caring people, everything you could ever ask for. But they weren't into the arts. At all. This next generation overflows with creativity in dance and music, and Caitlin has her own YouTube craft/cooking show. Caitlin also aced her clarinet solo, Over the Rainbow, at her band recital, and Erica's choir has been invited to sing at various cultural events. What can I say? Sometimes you just have to wait it out.

Grandma's little bunheads: another triumph!

Could there be anything sweeter in  life. . . 

. . . than being a backstage Grandma to two little bunheads. . . 

. . . fresh from their triumphant return to the stage in the Mellado Dance Recital!

Jazz, tap, ballet, they did it all, they did us proud. . . 

. . . and they even kept their eyes open under a pound of makeup. . . 

(though we couldn't get shots of them in costume cuz they have to take them off right after the show. . . )

So what else is there to say?

YAY!

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Dancing Queens

They may look a bit like they've been in a production of The Mikado, but guess again - these little girls, Gunnings of my Gunnings, have just performed in a dance extravaganza in which each of them had two numbers in different genres.

Erica does not need those eyelashes. Already she creates a breeze when she blinks, but it was all part of the costume.

Grandma is proud!

OK, it may look like Lauren is about to swat her sister with her congratulatory flowers. But she behaved herself, and took her bows gracefully. Both girls did exceptionally well, excelling (of course!) at tap, acro (believe me, you couldn't do this) and ballet.

Try to imagine a four-year-old girl tap-dancing to Jailhouse Rock and you'll get the idea. The "awwwwwwwww" factor was very high throughout. This isn't high school gym stuff, but a real dance school that performs in a real theatre. Missed steps and the odd slip are all part of the path to professionalism, and a lesson in one of life's most crucial skills: getting back up again and carrying on.

Mummy is proud. Mummy is also tired, having supervised much of the performing, organizing the delightful chaos of little bunheads in tutus darting all over the place backstage.

Unfortunately I was not able to get shots of the girls in their various costumes because cameras aren't allowed in the theatre. (Can you imagine what the performance would be like with hordes of parents and grandparents holding up their phones and clicking away so nobody could see anything?) In spite of the attempt to keep the view clear, many an elderly person was heard to say, "Is that her? Is that her? No? Which one is her, then?"

Eventually we'll get to see the whole show on a professional video and experience the "awwwwwwww" all over again.

Mummy is proud, Daddy is proud, two little girls have danced their hearts out. My heart has wings!



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