Homicide

(Not really. She just comes home from Cindy's really, really tired sometimes, and decides to lie down and fall asleep while I am making dinner. Usually she does this on the couch, and usually it's not so disruptive there - how am I supposed to get into the fridge when she is like this??)

So... Mallory's dance class. Mallory has been talking about 'doing her dancing' all summer long, and she has been busy showing us her 'dance moves', which mostly consist of twirls and a bunch of poses that are actually quite reminscent of things I have done in yoga class. Or maybe even things Madonna did in Vogue. Whatever the case, she was quite excited to put all these moves to music on Tuesday night.

I cautioned her before we went that she might not be doing the exact same dance moves in class that she has been practising all summer. The syllabus for the Pre-Primary Tap and Ballet Combo class reads as follows:

Ballet focus is on pointing and flexing feet, skips, walks and gallops, plies, point and close, bounces, knee lifts, posture and rhythm. Use of imagination is used to show importance of storytelling in dance. Tap focus in on making the proper tap sounds, and learning the terms of the different parts of the foot. The very earliest skills are taught, such as heel steps, toe steps, digs, jump out jump in, and learning the right from the left side of the body.

Pretty basic stuff.

But she assured me that her dancing would include some twirls. In fact, the morning before that first class she said to me, "I am going to do some twirls in my dance class, and I think my twirls are going to be faster than my teacher's twirls because she is big and I am small."

Well then.

She was acting a bit shy when we first got to the dance studio, and I don't blame her. It was completely chaotic, the waiting room was overflowing with parents and family members, and Mallory's class started almost 15 minutes late. Still, when the time came she marched into the room with all the other little girls and followed Miss Brittany's lead flawlessly. She came out halfway through the class so I could change her from her ballet slippers into her tap shoes, and then she was back in for Round 2. She really seemed to be enjoying herself. (Parents watch through a one-way mirror.)

As we left the studio and I was buckling her into the car, I told her that she did a great job and asked her how she enjoyed her first dancing lesson. "Did you like your dancing?" I asked.

Without missing a beat she looked at me and said, "I LIKED it... but we didn't do any dancing."

(Remember, her idea of dancing is very akin to what Olive does on stage at the end of Little Miss Sunshine.)

I do think that the class was a success and Mallory is already asking when she gets to go back for more. Part of me wants to remain a little bit cautious though. Her first swimming lesson at the Y was also a success, but the fact that she quit three weeks later after refusing to get in the water again proves that she can change her mind just like that.