Sometimes it’s hard to believe she’s been dancing for seven years and other days it feels like we’ve been doing this forever. I feel like every year, we learn a host of new things. We get better organized, more efficient and more confident with every day of the season we conquer. If there was anything new we learned this year, it was that these girls are our family. Dance moms and daughters alike. I never expected for Ella to fall in love with dance or for it to monopolize a significant amount of our time and budget. I certainly never expected to fall so seamlessly into a group of women who love my girl like their own and who step in at a moment’s notice to pick up my slack.
Recital day started like any other. I got up hours early and downed a pot of coffee while mentally cataloguing everything we needed to accomplish. I checked and rechecked Ella’s bag, confirming all costumes and accessories were present and accounted for. I wrote a check for the performance DVD, highlighted Ella’s dances on our printed schedule and left tickets and a quick note for Josh on the counter. I applied makeup and helped with tights and affixed a sparkly headpiece on Ella’s head before we left. I’m careful to build in extra time for travel, given that we live an hour from the venue. With plenty to spare, we pulled into the drive-thru at Chick-fil-A for a quick breakfast on our way. Of course, I got tail-ended right before we placed our order. My car wasn’t terribly damaged, but it’s certainly seen better days. More than the car and the headache of dealing with it, I was panicking about Ella being late for the show. As a competition team member, she dances in the opening act and it was looking less and less like we would make it in time. Emergency services were doing their best to get everything wrapped up quickly, the restaurant comped our breakfast and Josh was trying to get to me quick enough to lend a hand.
You know when you are panicking about the dumbest thing and God just shows up? Ella was eating her breakfast in the cool car. I was standing in the hot sun, pouring sweat and trying to chat with the driver of the other car, when my sister happened to pull through the drive-thru. I’m not kidding when I tell you that I almost cried. Her husband hopped out of the car and wrestled Ella’s enormous bag into their overflowing trunk. I slapped an extra backstage wristband on my sister’s arm and she whisked Ella off towards downtown, while her husband waited with me. She had to call me later to find out where she was going and what she needed to do and we joked that she applied lipstick on someone else for the first time in her life and did a spectacular job! Ella’s team was already lined up backstage when she arrived and while K applied her lipstick, two other mothers laced her tap shoes and slid super complicated shoe covers into place. The officer took my information quickly and then finished up over the phone so that I could get to the show in time. I slid into a seat with moments to spare and Ella lit up the stage. What I learned this year is that it takes a village to raise a child and entire team of dance moms to get them successfully on stage. I might not have gotten a single photograph during the first recital, but Ella was happy and her team took such great care of her in those moments before I arrived.
I spent most of the show running up and down two flights of stairs in between numbers. Ella danced six times in three different recitals, so we had eighteen costume changes and numerous touch ups to our hair and makeup. Eighteen sounds like an overwhelming number, but everything went so smooth and we never ran behind. All of our favorite people came for the early performance and we are so grateful since they managed to save the day with their arrival. We were able to squeeze in lots of love before grabbing lunch and having a quick rest before we got to do it all over again.
We don’t normally bring flowers to the recital since we head to the beach immediately afterwards. Sophie hated that Ella wouldn’t have any flowers in her arms, so she made her this beautiful drawing instead. I was already overly emotional, given our morning, so this little nugget was all I needed to start the waterworks. She loves her big sister so much and is so proud of her and Ella was so sweet and gracious about her gift.
Unlike the first show, for the second show we had plenty of time to get organized and on stage. I had a great system for prepping her costumes this year and everything went off without a hitch. Aside from her hair and makeup, she can pretty much get herself dressed and ready (I’m not quite ready for this to happen), so as long as I laid out everything she needed for the next number, she would be almost completely ready by the time I could get backstage. She’s even getting really good at touching up her lipstick in between dances.
A friend who she danced with for years, but has since left to pursue other things, came backstage to hug their necks before the afternoon performance and the team was so excited to see her face. We miss having Brooke and her mom backstage, so we loved getting to share our day with her. She was so encouraging and had such sweet things to say to them, both before and after the show.
We somehow never manage to catch a photo of all the mamas together, so this was a rare treat. We are missing a few faces, but this might be the most we’ve ever managed to get into a single photo. These girls have been such wonderful friends to us and if we have to live at the dance studio for hours at a time, there aren’t any other girls I would want by my side. It has been such a treat getting to know each of them over the last several years and I’ll seriously be a wreck when our girls grow up and we aren’t together all the time.
Right before the final show of the day, another mom and I realized there were tons of empty seats in the teachers’ reserved seating section. They were kind enough to let us hang out with them (even though it meant we were dashing out in between numbers), which meant I got great shots of the girls in their final dances of the year. Ella had no idea we would be that close, so I got this big, beautiful grin when the lights came on and she spotted me right down front.
Saturday was the first time we got to see the opening number and finale all put together. All of the older competition teams dance together for these dances and it is so fun to see them all dancing on stage at once. The production and choreography were beautiful!
Ballet is probably Ella’s least favorite class, but I think it’s where she really shines. This is the first time the girls have worn a long costume and they looked so pretty on stage.
At the end of their ballet number, all of the girls are on their knees and Ella gets to turn until the curtain closes. She has been so excited about her “solo” and she looked so pretty and graceful turning and turning. I’m guessing Gran teared up during this number since ballet is her favorite and Ella had a special part.
Hip hop is always really fun to watch and one of the dances where I think she enjoys her time on stage most. She is always so animated and her facial expressions are always so funny!
I confess, though, as much as I love all of her dances this year – nothing compares to their jazz performance. This is the number that did best at her competitions and the one I think they enjoy the most. They are nothing short of amazing from the moment the music starts and the choreography is so energetic. The moms all joked that we could do this dance ourselves, given the number of times we’ve seen it performed this season. This was their last regular performance of the night and you could tell they were just relaxing and having a good time on stage. This is my favorite part of the day – recital is almost behind us and they realize they aren’t being judged anymore, there isn’t any time to make changes or corrections, they’re just on stage doing what they love most in the world and it shows.
Saturday was exhausting, but so much fun. I say it every year, but recital day is one of my favorite days ever. It could be exhausting and overwhelming and there are a hundred things that could go wrong, but at the end of the day, watching your daughter do something she loves ranks pretty high up there on the scale of amazing things. She might dance until she graduates high school, but she might very well decide to do something different at some point in the future. I make sure to enjoy every moment like it’s our last, just in case.
I’ve had a few videos from an earlier competition this year, but we aren’t allowed to share choreography until after our season ends. While it doesn’t include many of the dances they performed during the recital, I thought you might enjoy a little glimpse into all of her hard work this year. The video quality isn’t fabulous (it’s been downloaded from the competition website and then uploaded here to WordPress), but you can see how adorable they are and how much fun they have on stage.
Hip Hop: Straight Outta the Nest Ella starts out on the far right, first row and then moves across the stage left. She eventually ends up on the right again near the end. The prop setup got captured in this video, but normally occurs behind a closed curtain. You might not be able to tell, but our prop dads have on plastic bird beaks, which the girls thought was hilarious. In case it isn’t obvious, our girls are in green and are “baby birds.” The girls in blue are the “mama birds” and are attempting to rein our girls in.
Tap: Mamma Was Right Again Ella is in yellow and is sitting at the bar, on the left. Once they are all dancing in formation, she is on the far left.
Jazz: A Little Party Ella is on the front left for most of the dance.
If you’re having trouble watching or the audio and video don’t quite match up, you can hop over to YouTube and watch them there instead (hip hop, tap, jazz).
