Ballet Geeks

This summer while at our

home away from home

during a Ballet Summer Intensive,

my son and I found ourselves

watching many ballets

and ballet related shows.

We borrowed videos

from the studio that

my son was visiting

and watched

traditional ballets

by world famous ballet companies

almost every night.

On television,

we watched reality shows

 about ballet dancers.

My son watched and showed me

YouTube videos

of individual danseurs

dancing in traditional ballet parts-

which he paused,

rewound, and replayed

in order to take notes,
much like football players'
analysis and study of game clips.

As we sat
watching and discussing
Coppelia
on a Friday night,
realization dawned
that we had become
"ballet geeks!"

Pliés in a Restaurant

Last week

our family and some friends

from ballet were eating

at one of our favorite

local restaurants.

Considering the fact that
we were eating
Chinese Dim Sum,
which had a variety
of unusual food
for the American pallet,
everyone's behavior was
appropriate for the occasion.

The conversation was delightful
and filled with laughter.

The end of the meal conversation,
of course, turned toward
the subject of Nutcracker-

from rehearsals,

to how to do multiple parts,

to making up
a new Nutcracker story
that combines parts
like the Snow King and
the Mouse King
with a half-and-half costume.

Then we discussed
how best to exercise
while at work;
suggestions included-
exercises at a desk,
lifting bank tellers,
and ended with
one of the male dancers
standing up and
demonstrating pliés
as he would hand paper work
to a coworker at a bank.

The funniest part was
that there was no embarrassment
on anyone's face at our table-
just lots of laughter. 

Spontaneity, laughter, and friendship
among like minded people is such a joy....

Family Vacation from Ballet

For the first time in five years,

our family took

an extended family vacation

during a season of ballet.

While the kids

had ten (10) days

of no ballet,

a costume project

did make it into the car.

On the first day of vacation,

five hours of the twelve hour drive-

in between navigation duties- 

were spent taking off beads

from a couple of costumes

in order to reuse some

 of them in the beading rework

for the costumes.

My husband patiently helped remove

the remaining beads

while sitting

at Nutcracker rehearsal

the day after returning from vacation.

My son had thought

that he would have time

to do some stretching exercises

during vacation.

Alas,

this was a twelve hour a day,

go all day at full steam

vacation.

Of the six days

at Disney World, Florida-

two days were spent at EPCOT;

a midnight swim

and getting up very early

the next morning;

two days at Magic Kingdom;

a day in torrential rains

and at Downtown Disney;

a half of day of packing

and leaving.

Then a quick trip to put our feet

in the Atlantic Ocean

before continuing on toward

Savannah, Georgia.

A day in Savannah

included a Girl Scout Pilgrimage

to Juliette Gordon Low's Birthplace

and the Birthplace of Girl Scouts

in order to celebrate

100 years of Girl Scouts USA

and ten years of my daughter

being a Girl Scout,

as well as, my ten years

as a Girl Scout Leader.

A day in Atlanta

included the High Museum of Art

and a quick drive around

the Capitol building.

(On the way to Disney World,

there was a quick stop around

the Capitol building

in Tallahassee, Florida.)

The only ballet that was done

during this trip was a quick,

and a little reluctant,

pose in the Canadian area

at EPCOT

for our ballet family friends

who live in our hometown

but are originally from Canada.

(They gave us great advise from

their Disney World experiences.)

It has been a month since

we started out on our vacation;

reality is just now starting

to impose on my

vacation euphoria-

there is soooo much

to get done before

Nutcracker performances.

Family Memories

made outside of ballet,

imagine that....