The Tiniest Dancer

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A couple of weeks ago LilliAnn had her very first dance class! I started taking dance when I was two years old and have loved dancing my entire life! I started with Paula Smart, a family friend who had a studio in Seminole. As a little girl, dancing at Paula's was all about the parties! Paula would give us the most beautifully decorated sugar cookies and tell us that they were magic dancing cookies. She said they would make us dance when we took a bite! I remember this as one of my earliest memories. When Paula stopped teaching I began taking classes from Janet Combs at Shawnee Academy of Ballet. We were still living in Seminole at the time and we would drive to Shawnee two days a week for class. I took regular classes...tap, jazz, ballet, lyrical...and then did competition dance as well. My competition class even went to Disney World one summer to dance was I was about 12 years old. I still remember our "Janco Dancers" jackets that were bright purple with pink writing on the back! One of the girls from Shawnee that was in my dance class back then, Stacey Saunders, is now married to Chase Yott, one of Jeb and I's best friends from high school! 

When I was in middle school, Darana Davis opened up a dance studio in Seminole called Seminole Dance Company. I was involved in quite a few activities at that time...cheerleading, student council, as well as lots more homework...so I decided that it would be easier for me to start taking dance in Seminole so we wouldn't have to drive to Shawnee two days a week. I LOVED taking dance at Darana's! I was the only cheerleader that took dance, so I was in class with most of the girls on the pom squad. At Darana's I did tap, jazz, ballet, lyrical, and even added a technical class and clogging! Oh how I loved clogging! I kept doing competition as well, but instead of group dance I did solos. My very first solo was to Chumbawamba's "Tubthumping," also known as "I Get Knocked Down." I started the dance with a back handspring toe-touch, wore a red pleather outfit that showed my stomach, and thought that I was really cute. I danced at Darana's all the way up until I graduated high school...well, almost. We planned our senior trip to Cancun and then the recital was moved to the exact time that we would be gone. Senior trip with boyfriend or Senior dance recital when you've taken dance for 16 years??? I chose the trip. And to this day I don't regret it because that "boyfriend" is now my husband. We had a romantic, 1 year of dating anniversary dinner out on the pier during that trip that I will forever cherish. 

When I realized that LilliAnn could start in SDC's Mommy & Me class with Darana as soon as she could walk I could not have been more excited. I mean, this meant I would get to dance too, right? It may be "Little Bunny Foo Foo" and "Wheels on the Bus," but I'm so in! From the day she was born I already had it all planned out. She would be 9 months old in January and could start dance after Christmas break. And she WOULD be walking. I prayed that LilliAnn would walk before she was one, so that she would be able to stand on stage for the recital! Just as planned, LilliAnn took her first steps (four to be exact) a few days before she turned 9 months old...just a week before we started dance. 

The night before our first day I went out and bought several leotards/onesies and LilliAnn's first pair of ballet shoes. They were a little big, but I figured they would fit by the time of recital. I made the mistake of taking Reid to our first class because he's such a good boy and I just knew he would enjoy sitting against the wall at a new place, watching lots of little girls dance. I was WAY wrong on that thought! He cried the entire time, wanting me to "put sissy down" and "hold you, mommy." By the time I got him settled down, we had about 5 minutes left to enjoy LilliAnn's very first day of dance. She wasn't too sure about it at first, and she wasn't full blown walking yet so we just kind of observed. She didn't do much dancing that first day, but she sure did look cute in her little pink tutu!

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Getting her dance bag

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Having a little snack before it was time to go

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Tiny Dancer

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Practicing her plie

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 Crawling around at SDC!

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Miss Darana and LilliAnn 

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 The next week we went to dance for the second time and it was a much better experience. We left Reid with my mom, so LilliAnn and I were able to enjoy some girl time. She loved watching all of the other girls sing the songs and dance around. One little girl, Brynlee, even came and showed LilliAnn how to do the "goon face" during the Little Bunny Foo Foo song! Her favorite song was the firetruck song and she would shake her hand to ring the bell on the "ding ding ding" part of the song. We practiced all of the songs and dances when we got home that day and Reid even joined in! She was dancing a little more at home with Reid, bouncing her little bottom up and down.

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Lovin' those leg warmers! 

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 Practicing her moves at home

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We had to miss dance this week because of Snowpocalypse 2011 (more on that later), but I can't wait until our next class. LilliAnn is walking really well now, almost running when she starts chasing Reid, and I can't wait to see how she does now that she's around all of the other little girls. Dance class was something that never got old and that I always looked forward to each week. The blissful feeling of letting loose at the studio, the challenge of learning new steps, and the rush of performing in front of people and making them smile is still something I crave at times. If LilliAnn gets older and decides that dance isn't for her, then we'll find something else to do that she likes... but by the way her eyes light up and her booty starts bouncing when the music comes on, I thinks she may love dancing even more than her mama.