Sunday, November 19, 2017

Prance and dance

Sunday:

On Friday I should have been studying but instead slept most of the day except doing the grocery shopping, where apparently I forgot some stuff I needed to get. But three naps in one day seemed to help and I was feeling a lot better by the weekend. Still not 100%, but a big improvement. Lucky, because we had a super-busy weekend.

On Saturday morning Jasmine had her State Final Acrobatic Gymnastics competition. It's an enormous venue, you can only see about a third of it in the picture. Here the gymnasts are lined up ready to start, Jasmine is at the back of the line wearing black closest to the camera. See the group in red, twice as big as any other school, at the far side? Yeah, they basically won everything.


Jasmine and her partner didn't make it to the podium, but she did get a 'gold band' medal - I guess equal fourth? So that is still an awesome result. She also goes up a level next year. I didn't get a great shot of her receiving her medal. I do have good videos of her actual performances (they do two routines, a slow 'balance' routine and a faster 'dynamic' one), and there is probably a way to take stills from that but that's a bit too technical for me.

Then we had about an hour at home before my niece Emma was delivered. We were babysitting so her parents could go to a wedding. She was here all afternoon and stayed overnight. As it was her very first sleepover, and she is only four and doesn't hesitate to air her opinions and feelings, we weren't sure how it was going to go, but it was fine. Tim took all the kids out to an indoor trampoline place in the afternoon so I could study, then we watched 'Sing' in the evening, and she went to sleep quite easily in Jasmine's room on a mattress (Jasmine had to stay in the room for the going to sleep bit even though it wasn't her own bedtime yet). And woke after 6am so I call that a win!

After she was picked up by a slightly headachy and hungover daddy, we only had a short time before heading off to the local Entertainment Centre for a day of Dance Concerts. Emma had her concert first (lucky she got a good night's sleep) with all the pre-schoolers. They are not exactly stellar dancers, but very cute. And only three left the stage in tears over the course of the morning. A few did just stand there with fingers in their mouth. Emma got distracted a couple of times waving to us in the audience, but otherwise got through her routines with confidence. Each group had a couple of teachers or older kids with them to help them remember the steps, and get them on and off stage.

Then in the afternoon it was Jasmine's turn. Not allowed to take photos, unfortunately, we have to buy official ones if we want any. The dance routines were rather more professional than the morning, the serious 'troupe' kids were really excellent. Jasmine was with the 'fun' group, doing tap dancing, modern/contemporary and jazz funk. (Aiden thinks it's hilarious that Jas dances jazz). She did really well, very enjoyable to watch. She still enjoys dance, but I think her focus is more on gymnastics now.

It was a very long day/weekend, and I have an exam tomorrow morning, but I think I'm well prepared and I'm feeling a lot healthier than I was a couple of days ago so that is good.

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