I can't believe my little baby girl is 3!!! She is growing up so fast and so
is her spunk, sass and smarts!
Elizabeth's friends all have birthdays at the end of the year, so we just
finished a lot of birthday parties, and Elizabeth started planning her's months
ago. We had a big friend party at the Newson's house on Saturday Feb.
6. It was a dress up party, with pizza, balloons and cupcakes- she is
easy to please. We filled a room with balloons and just let the kids go
at it, had pizza for dinner (parents stayed) and had the kids decorate their
own cupcakes for dessert.Elizabeth was
so excited and had fun!
Elizabeth's Cupcake- instead of decorating the cupcake she just decorated the plate around the cupcake.
On her actual birthday (Feb 9) we had ballet in the morning and took donuts
and had some fun play time afterwards. Nana and Grandma Baker came to visit in
the afternoon and brought presents (spoiled girl).That night we had pizza for dinner, of course.Ben was gone in the evening so we got ready
for bed before doing cake and presents (in new Elsa pajamas).She had a special Cinderella cake; she was a
little worried because she didn't want us to eat Cinderella's face.It was definitely a new challenge for me to
make but turned out good. (I did things wrong from the beginning so it was one 'fix
it' attempt after another but she loved it and it didn't break apart, like I
was fearing.) She told us she wanted pink, purple and princesses stuff for her
birthday and we delivered.She is so fun
to shop for because everything she opens is exciting and her face is so fun and
excited!
We sure do love our little Lizard and are so happy she has been blessing our
lives for 3 whole years!!
After Meredith came to visit and had so much fun, Sarah and
the younger boys (Jack, Luke and Thomas) decided to come out also.It was so much fun to see them and to hang
out with them.A couple days before they
got here there was a huge snow storm; Ben stayed home from work a couple days
and the snow made it up to Elizabeth's chest! She did not think it was that
much fun playing in it while it was that high.
By the time the Markos got here it was melted to a manageable
amount and pack-able for snowballs and sledding.The boys loved sledding and even got reckless a couple times (head first
over a jump- yikes).
Grandma Newson with two youngest Grandsons- Thomas (13 mo) and James (6 mo)
Luke after a good run and crash
Elizabeth loved hanging out with her cousins and they were
so patient with her.Thomas would just
sit and watch James, who is sitting up now; they will be good friends
someday.While they were here we also
had a birthday party for Elizabeth and had a super bowl party; the Broncos won-
yay!
I have been feeling a little lost for a couple months; other than a mother, who am I? Other than watching my kids and doing laundry, what are my hobbies? (I don't know if laundry even counts as a hobby.) And I have been doing a lot of soul searching, remembering how I used to be identified and thinking about who I want to be. Then I had a series of events that threw me back into an old hobby and identity and I am excited to see where it takes me. And that hobby is- DANCE!
I love to dance but I haven't done it in over 5 years, which is sad. I
not only love to dance but, even more, I love to teach dance. I was approached by a woman in my ward who home schools her children and is part of a Commonwealth School (independent parent run school- home school but not at home... and with other people) and wanted me to teach a class as part of their curriculum. So on January 13, I started teaching a Dance and Etiquette class at the Liberty Commonwealth School. I teach a class of 17 kids (ages 12-16) every Wednesday for two hours. The Mom's who are there
watch Elizabeth and James for me; Elizabeth has been invited to join their explorers class (ages 2-8) where they do new experiences and fun projects together (last week they made a string maze for the kids to crawl through).
I have loved it so far. It is a lot of work because I am writing my own curriculum and having to re-learn my etiquette. The dancing is fun and,with only 4 boys, the girls are getting to learn both parts, so it is going slow but giving me a chance to re-learn and perfect my knowledge of the guys steps. I am so excited for the rest of the class (16 weeks) and for the Cotillion at the end.
Another teaching opportunity I had was to teach Latin dancing at Mom's Relief Society Activity in January. They wanted to learn some moves that they could do, without partners, that could be good exercise. We did some fun line dances, the salsa, bachata, merenguie, and chacha. It was fun to teach (I was nervous to teach an older group) and I think they all had fun.
The last dance opportunity we has this month was a performance at a woman in our ward's birthday party; She was turning 50 and threw herself a big party with dancing and a 'dancing showcase.' After finding out what the other couples were doing (salsa, swing, line dances, ect) we decided to do a formal waltz and then, to add some excitement, Ben was going to step on my gown half way through and tear it off, revealing a latin dress at which time we finish with the chacha. Mom did an amazing job at, quickly and with no time, making me a formal dress that transformed into a shorter latin dress. It was fun busting out my dance shoes (wow the sore feet and blisters) and doing my hair and make up for a performance.
During the performance my dress didn't actually rip off and, with a mess
up from the DJ, made people think that we just stopped and some
uncomfortable applause started but when we finally got the dress off
(and the new music started) we were able to finish the dance!
After our performance, at the party!
It was really fun to perform again but it definitely has encouraged me to get back into shape so I can be more confident, in the future, when dancing. I hope to continue to get both teaching and performance opportunities and to get to rekindle this wonderful love and hobby of mine!
