Our first dance competition

Sometimes I have so much to say that it seems hard to organize into a blog post. The result ends up being a choice between a very disjointed post or no post at all. I guess I should go for the disjointed post, but I usually choose to wait until my thoughts are more organized (which seems to be never lately.) Anyway, for today I will try to stick to one topic, but my ADD brain may have trouble.

Last weekend was Curly Q's first dance competition. I have really mixed feelings about it (as does Curly Q..) It was a workshop as well as competition so the schedule was intense. She had classes from 7:30 -2:30 pm Saturday, then they competed. Sunday classes were from 8-3. It was a lot for her and the others in her company. By Sunday morning they all looked like they would rather hide than dance. Adding to the trouble was that the age group they were in went up to 10 (plus some kids were actually older). Still, the teachers were fun,and every one of them talked about the importance of having fun while dancing.

The competition was quite a learning experience. Some of these companies are SERIOUS. One in particular jumps out. In order to join their company you have to homeschool your child. This is because they practice dance 6 days a week. They also brought a make-up artist, seamstress and caterer to the competition. The biggest surprise was the massage tables and masseuse. Yep, that's right, between routines and classes the dancers from their studio got professional massages.

The problem for me isn't that they did these things. Obviously they are very committed, and it showed in their dancing. They were very good, amazing even. The problem is that by competing with them we start to feel like we should be that good. In order to be that good our girls would have to be just as dedicated, but in truth I would rather raise a well rounded daughter than a competitive dancer. It is so easy to get caught up in it though.

So there you have my initial thoughts on dance competitions. I am kind of hoping that the next one is a different experience.