Dancing Queen

Haley loves all of her birthday gifts, but I have to admit that I have a personal favorite. One of our friends got her the "Bella Cinderella Magical Princess Dance Studio", which is essentially an instructional dance video for little girls. It comes with a DVD, dance mat, and "magic wand". The video has a teenage girl teaching simple dance moves to younger girls, with the "plot" linking the segments together following the plot of Cinderella. The reason its my favorite one of her gifts is that she REALLY gets into it. Its so much fun to watch her.

Normally, when Haley is watching a kids video that asks her to sing or dance along with the characters, she just watches and doesn't join in. For some reason, when she watches this video she tries to do everything the instructor tells her. Some of the dance moves are a little too advanced for her, but watching her try her hardest to mimic them is a real treat.

In addition, since the video has a Cinderella theme, all of the girls are dressed in ball gowns for many of the segments. Haley takes this as her cue that she needs to be in full costume as well. Before playing the video, she puts on her Cinderella costume from Halloween, complete with long white gloves and glass slippers. The overall effect is one of the cutest things I've ever seen.

Building on her interest in dancing, Nicole has started her in ballet class. Its essentially the same controlled chaos as her earlier attempts at soccer classes, but this time shes wearing a tuu-tuu. All kidding aside, Nicole says that Haley is starting to respond to the teacher and follow her instructions. She really enjoys the class and tells me all about it when I get home from work. Hopefully, Nicole will get the opportunity to file a more detailed blog after this weeks lesson.