Magic

The 10 weeks of my latest dance class are over. My third annual performance was tonight. And I am still on a high. It was incredible. And I don't mean what I did. Sure, I did something. I facilitated - I created a space for my dancers to dance. I encouraged and observed and sometimes suggested and appreciated and noticed. But they danced. I am in awe once again (for the third time) of what great dancing young children are capable of - the grace, the rhythm, the boogie, the sweetness if they are simply given the chance. I have been down at the Inner World school for the last 3 days - cleaning, painting and decorating. Our dance this year was set in the future on the Gloomy Planet and 11 dancers arrived by rainbow rocket to cheer the place up....

Here is the room before anyone arrived. See my rainbow rocket? Rhiannon and I painted that yesterday. During the dance, each dancer emerged from the rocket to do his or her dance. And do you like my little house? The trees were originally painted by me for my very first performance.






And here is my very favourite dancer - her third year of performing. My inspiration for the whole dance class. In fact, without her, there would be no Dancing Buas. It was because I couldn't find a satisfactory creative movement class for her that I created this dance class. This year she was a Panther doing a jungle dance and she was amazing. She did an incredible interpretation of the music (African drumming). I am only sad there were no grandparents and no dad there to watch (dad playing in Canmore and the grandparents MIA). But I was so proud of her. I just wish everyone could have seen her great performance - she really put a lot of effort into it.







And here are the panther and the sunshine fairy posing before everyone else got there in front of the house.










And here is another of my dancers. She is incredibly graceful and naturally does beautiful ballet moves. I love to watch her. You should have seen her little leaps tonight. She is the friendship fairy.








And here they all are dancing to the last song.

Wow, what a night. You know, I think we often just don't give kids enough credit - or the space, unfettered by our own expectations, to really show us what they can do. They really did something tonight. They were amazing and I am in awe of them.

I am very satisfied right now. I feel like I genuinely gave it my best effort and I think it went really well. I wouldn't change a thing and I think each kid is pleased with themselves and feels like they did something real.

(and see those black slippers? They were Andrew's when he was 4...)