Micah and Jewelia's 1st Christmas Recital Together

In December of 2009, Micah and Jewelia got to be in a Christmas dance recital together! It was sort of like a play, but with dancing.

Jewelia danced as a gingerbread cookie.

Micah danced as a penguin.

Micah has learned a while ago that since he is the only boy in the studio that he has to sit out in the hallway instead of in the dressing rooms with all the girls. It's OK, he just brings a lot of books.

Micah Makes the Ballet West Nutcracker!

All of this dancing started many years ago when Micah, as a 1st grader, went on a field trip to a professional ballet performance of the Nutcracker downtown. From there he was fascinated with dancing and hoped that someday he could be in their Christmas performance of The Nutcracker as well.

We told Micah if he worked really hard in dance that someday we would take him to audition to be in the professional Nutcracker.

He was 9 years old, and that was about the age where they would let kids audition to be a part of the ballet.

We took Micah downtown to audition. He got a number and waited his turn to be evaluated.

It was a long time to wait. There were hundreds and hundreds of girls auditioning, but not so many boys. We did count about 30 or so boys.

It was awful to see how they did it. They would send groups of girls in and then hours later someone would come out and announce that they were going to let some girls out to see their parents, but these were the ones who did not make it in. So you would see all these girls come out crying and it was just so sad.

That would be the 1st cut, and then there would be another cut and another and you would see group after group of girls bawling and sad. Oh, awful!

So it was a little nerve racking to see this and be waiting for the boys' turn.

Their turn came and we waited anxiously for someone to come out and announce something. A lady came out and explained that they were going to release the boys first who did not make it. We watched on edge as boy after boy came out of the doors. 1,2,3,4,5,6 boys out, no Micah yet. 7......8......9......not Micah......and they didn't all come right out. It's like a few here, a few there, and you didn't know if they were done coming out or not.

Finally, I think they were done coming. There was no Micah. That was it. Did that mean he made it?

The lady came out again and said the rest of boys who would come out next had made it into the Nutcracker! He had done it!

Micah came out with a congratulatory letter and instructions of what to do next!

We were so excited for Micah to be able to live his dream!

Micah and Jewelia's Dance Recital 2009

Micah and Jewelia were very excited to perform in their first dance recital together.

Jewelia had just turned 4 years old, and this was her first performance dancing on stage.

We got some video from the rehearsal the night before.

Here is Jewelia dancing to "Mama, I'm a Big Girl Now!"



She seemed to know what she was doing the whole time. She was great!

Here is Micah in his ballet dance:



He did great!

And surprisingly enough, all the other kids in Micah's tap class moved or dropped out except for one other girl, so Micah's tap dance turned into a tap duet! He was totally awesome!

2009 Dance Costumes!

Jewelia and Micah got their dance costumes for their recital.

Jewelia was so excited about her blue princess dress!

Micah didn't really care much about his costumes, but he had one for ballet,

And one for his tap dance.

I thought he looked quite handsome!

Jewelia Finishes Up Community Dance

Although Micah had an awful experience with the local community dance class, his sister Jewelia enjoyed it, so we decided to finish up the year.

She had fun being a dancing princess.

Starting the next dance season, we would keep both Micah and Jewelia in Micah's dance studio a little farther away from home. It seemed more professional, and I think they taught more things.

Micah's 2nd Year of Tap

Micah started his 2nd year of tap classes and he started to learn more steps. He had a very small class, as people kept on moving or some would just not come.

Here he is starting to learn their recital dance:



He also began learning how to tap and spin.

It made him a bit dizzy!

Micah's 2nd Year of Ballet

While we tried out the local community dance place and they treated Micah awful, we decided to keep him at his old dance studio where the classes were small and they were a lot nicer.

The first year he was in a combined tap, ballet, and jazz class, but now he was in a 2 separate classes; one for tap and one ballet. They called this "Level 1 Ballet" and Level 1 Tap".

He seemed to favor ballet more than tap, which surprised me a little.

He was still the only boy, in fact, he was the only boy in the entire studio, but he didn't care.

Here is a video of his work at the bar:

And here is another of him learning a new move. I think it is funny how he keeps leaping, smiling at the camera even after he reaches the other side and there is no where to go.

It was almost April now, and they began learning the dance they would perform for the end of the season recital. Here is a bit of what they were working on: