Tap and Twirl

Yesterday Avery started her 'Tap and Twirl' tap dancing class. It is another class given through the city of Saint Charles and it lasts for 6 weeks. Avery was super excited before class. When we were in Minnesota we went with Allison to one of her dance classes and Avery was mesmerized. She just kept asking me if she was going to dance like Allison does. Al has this week off and so he was able to go to class with us.

There are about 8 kids in the class, all girls except one boy, and that one boy is wild! He doesn't really do much but run around. Al and I must have both prepped Avery about listening to what her teacher says because on the way to class she told us she was going to listen to her teacher and then periodically during the class she would call out, "I'm listening to my teacher, mommy!" Avery actually did do very well with listening to her teacher. I think it is because she was on the older side for the class and also because she goes to nursery every week and is used to listening to a teacher. The youngest girl in the class is LDS too and she did really well listening to the teacher also. I think nursery has something to do with it...they are already used to a little structure at such a young age.

Avery had a grin on her face the entire time, pretty much like the grin in the picture where they are holding hands in the circle. She loved every minute of the class. Yesterday they practiced walking in their tap shoes, marching, toe tapping, hopping, toe pointing, etc. Most of the little girls were very attached to their moms and so the teacher had all of the moms come and help their girls out. As you can see in the one picture I am getting a big kick out of the whole thing. I kept looking at Al on the sidelines and were were just laughing the whole time. It was just so cute!!

Avery really liked her teacher, Miss Marla, and tried to be by her for most of the class. When they were doing stretches Avery either sat right in front of her or right behind her. Miss Marla said Avery was her little buddy. At one point they were standing and doing circles with their arms. They did this for a while and then Miss Marla told them to go backwards, as in reverse the motion of your arms. Well, Avery took this to mean that she was supposed to stand backwards, so she turned around with her back facing the teacher and kept doing her arm circles. Al and I just laughed and laughed. That is the picture that I took of Avery's back.

When class was over Avery asked a few times if we could go do dance class again. We told her that we would be going back next week and she was pretty happy. Miss Marla wants the kids to practice throughout the week, which I don't think we will have to bother Avery too much about. She is loving this.