Ballet

My 5 year old has been taking ballet since she was 3.5 years old and this past weekend was her first spring recital. She has been in two small shows in the past, but this was her first BIG show--and she was so excited! They had performances on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday as well as months of rehearsals leading up to the show weekend. Her dance school performed a variation on Cinderella. I have to say, I was surprised by how cute and *funny* it was! I definitely was entertained!

My little girl was a pumpkin--she's the second little pumpkin from the left.
She did SUCH a great job. The other little girls in class all are in kindergarten or first grade and my little one (who is the tallest in her class!) is in preschool.
The pumpkin dance was expanded a few weeks ago to include the dance that the mice performed. The teacher realized that the mice were having trouble with their dance, so she had the pumpkins do it with them in the hope that it would help the mice remember what to do.
The show was very well done and was a neat spin on the traditional Cinderella. The role of the fairy godmother was my favorite!
The sets (except for the kitchen set) were flown in from NYC and were beautiful! Here is a shot of the Prince dancing with Cinderella.
Uh oh, the clock struck midnight!
Oh and there even was a bit of disco thrown into the mix!
Prince Charming kindly posed for a picture...too bad my little girl was more interested in her flowers than in the prince!
Her ballet teacher danced as the Prince's mother in the show. She used to be Snow White at Disneyworld--doesn't she look the part?!
She was thrilled to get flowers after the show and didn't want to let them go!Me with my ballerina! She did such a wonderful job and worked so hard--I'm very proud of her!
Hopefully by the next show I'll have a better lens and a tripod for my camera. I'm pretty happy with my shots, but know they can be better--and I'd love to be able to zoom! Still, considering it was a dark auditorium with a brightly lit stage and we weren't allowed to use a flash...these are pretty good! I ended up using my 50mm prime lens (which isn't really suited for these types of shots) so that I could make use of the image stabilization it offered. I also used my gorillapod (kind of a mini tripod) and a remote to reduce camera shake. I definitely have a LOT to learn about my camera though!