Dance Weekend

This past weekend was "dance weekend". Hannah's recital was on Saturday and her company showcase was on Sunday. She had dress rehearsals on Thursday and Friday. And for the second time, we had major scheduling conflict. James' school play was on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. I hate having to choose between my kids and their activities. I ended up going to James' dress rehearsals on Monday & Tuesday. Chris went to all of James' shows. Hannah got to go to one, but I didn't make it to any. I absolutely hate that. Hopefully we won't have too many weekends like that in the future.

Anyway....this post is about dance. This past year Hannah took a recreational Lyrical class in addition to being in the smaller company. She had 2 dances in the Saturday morning recital and 2 dances in the Saturday afternoon one. Then on Sunday she had 2 more dances. I was in the parent dance, so I got to perform once in each show as well.

Here are a few pictures from the day. We don't even try to take pics of the actual performances. Ours never turn out that well since you are not supposed to use flash and the girls are moving around so much.  There was a photographer taking pics so we will order from him.

Here is Hannah with most of the girls in her lyrical class and their teacher, Ms. Lauren. Hannah LOVED this class.

Hannah & her good dance friend.

This was Hannah's favorite costume this year.

Hannah and her Daddy.  

Hannah and her "Little Sister" for the year, Abby. Abby was actually in my preschool class several years ago when I was teaching 3 year olds. It was good to see her all grown up!They are wearing their recital shirts. 

Getting ready for the 80's dance.

Hannah with her flowers.

Hannah with Daddy again.

At the end of the company showcase, the girls were all introduced.

We still have a couple more weeks of dance, but for the most part, we are finished for the year. All that's left is pictures and parties!

Dance Competetion

Hannah's dance company recently participated in the Stage One dance competition.


Here's Hannah backstage in her America dance routine costume.

This is a group shot of her company, missing a couple of girls.

Their second dance was an 80's remix.

Here are some of the girls with their team trophy and plaque.

And here they are with their individual ribbons.

The competetion was held at the Gwinett Center, so it made for a long day. We celebrated afterwards by going out for Mexican food. Competetion is one of Hannah's favorite parts about being in company.

Christmas Parade

Hannah's dance company at Studio Dance in Dallas, Georgia, participated in the Dallas Christmas Parade this past weekend. This is Hannah's second year being in the parade. The weather was much nicer this year!

Because Hannah's age was in the middle range of the dancers, she was given the choice to walk in the parade or ride on the float. She chose to ride on the float.


Here's Hannah with one of her dance friends before the parade. The theme for the parade was "An Old Fashioned Christmas" so many of the girls wore sock monkey hats.

Most of the entries in the parade were local businesses and politicians and it was just people walking in groups, or driving in cars passing out candy.  This was a cute "Grinch and Whoville" float. We had no idea who put this together - there was no sign.

Here are the Studio Dance Inc. dancers!

Hannah rode on the trailer. She's on the other side though. After she passed by, I made my way to the other side to get pictures of her.

Here she is!

Here's the back of the trailer. SDI colors are black and purple.

Time to get the house ready for Christmas!

Dance Company Photo Shoot

Hannah had a photo shoot today for her dance company. I took a couple of pictures of her when she was done with her individual photos. The professional ones will be ready in a couple of weeks, but here are the ones I took.

Glee Camp

While James was at Boy Scout camp last week, Hannah attended a "Glee" camp at Studio Dance, where she takes dance classes. Hannah is a big Glee fan, though I don't let her watch the show. I do save the episodes and let her watch most of the songs. There are several songs that she prefers the Glee version to the original!



The camp was a week long, two hours a day. They played games, did some crafts, and danced to Glee songs. On the last day, they preformed a dance to one of my favorite Glee mash-up songs, "Singing in the Rain/Umbrella".





Here is a cute picture frame she made during the week.



Here are all the girls - the older girls were in the Glee camp and the younger ones had a Princess camp.

Dance Recital and Company Showcase

This was the weekend of the Studio Dance Inc. dance recital. What an exhausting weekend! On Thursday, Hannah had her company dress rehearsal. On Friday, she had a dress rehearsal with the 3 & 4 year old class that she was leading. Saturday was the actual recital day. She performed in both the morning and afternoon recitals. The company showcase was on Sunday afternoon.

I took a bunch of pictures during the dress rehearsals and a few during the performances, but the pics didn't turn out well. Our camera just doesn't do a very good job with action photos. It could also be user error. The picture lighting was better without the flash, but then it if there was any movement, it blurred. I'm hoping some of my friends had better luck with the pics on stage!



Here is a picture of Hannah leading the little girls. Hannah was thrilled to be chosen as a class leader. It wasn't that long ago that her classes had leaders! (Hannah's the tall one - in case you didn't figure that out)


This was Hannah's first year in a dance company. When asked what her favorite part about being in the company was, she answered, "the opening number". The opening number was a 17 minute mash up of songs from the Wii game Just Dance 2. Each individual company group had their own song to dance to. There was also a song for the parents. Hannah really wanted me to participate, so I made my dancing debut this weekend. Hannah's company danced to "It's Raining Men" and my group danced to "Wake Me Up Before I Go Go" by Wham.

Here I am with Hannah in our opening number outfits waiting back stage. Each group had to wear black, white and an assigned 3rd color. Hannah's company wore turquoise and the parents wore yellow. I'm not a yellow kind of person.


Here is the parent group on stage. I'm in the center, just to the left a bit. It was quite the workout. We had 4 outside practices for 1 1/2 hours each. I was sweating with the oldies each week!


Hannah insisted on putting on her own make-up.


I love those freckles!


Posing with some of her Vibe friends.


The performance on Sunday was just for the company. Each company performed all of their dances. At the end of the showcase, each group was called up on stage and introduced. Hannah's in the Vibe company and here she is with some of her fellow dancers.

We've had a great experience with the dance company this year. Hannah is auditioning next weekend for the 2011-12 companies.

Dance Competetion

Hannah has been taking dance since she was 3 years old at Studio Dance (SDI) in Dallas, GA. (For those who are good in math, she will be 10 next month.) This year she joined one of the dance companies at SDI. This is a new company that that SDI started this year for students who wanted more than just weekly dance classes, but didn't want the commitment of the standard company. This company has had fewer performances and competitions than the other companies. It's been a fun year - we've enjoyed all the benefits of being in a dance company without all of the heavy commitments.

Hannah's company participated Saturday in the Stage One National Dance Competition at the Gwinnett Center. They performed a Jazz dance and a Tap dance.

Their first dance was the Tap number to the song "I Wish" from Happy Feet which is a remake of an old Stevie Wonder song.



Here I am putting Hannah's make up on her.


Hannah poses with one of her dance friends.





Hannah and her group were practicing their dance back stage the best they could. Not only did they not have their own music playing, but the music of the other dances on stage could be heard. Eventually their dance teacher took them out somewhere where they could run through their dance a couple of times with their music.


Their second dance was a jazz dance to the song "You Can't Stop the Beat" from the movie Hairspray.


Jazz costume


Posing with another dance friend.



James kept himself occupied during the whole thing. Video game limitations were removed for the afternoon.


We were not permitted to take pictures or video during the performances. Fortunately, we'll be doing both of these routines in May at the recital and can record them then.



Hannah with her award ribbons. One of her dances won 6th place overall for their age division and the other dance won 5th place overall. I'm not really sure how the scoring and awards are done. Hannah's groups were awarded High Gold scores. There are platinum scores which are higher, but then there's also regular gold, High Silver, and regular Silver.