Cinderella Ballet
On March 12th, Paul and I took Bella to her very first ballet. I call it her first of many, while Paul calls it her 1 of 1:). Yes, he did go with us and we all had a fabulous time. I saw it advertised and thought it would be a special thing to do even though it was no special occasion but we did wind up celebrating our 14th wedding anniversary all together since it was an expensive venture. Once I had the tickets purchased, I began 2 days before the event to prep Bella for the evening. In trying to help her grasp time (and patience), we began talking about going to see Cinderella dance like the Angelina Ballerina we see on TV. I called ahead to a restaurant that was across the street from the theatre and told them our plans. While it was an upscale restaurant, it was small and quiet and everyone was more than happy to help make this evening special for Bella.
I picked up Bella from school early that day and we went home to freshen up and get into our doll dresses. I wore a long burgundy evening gown and Bella wore her lovely black velvet with red satin dress. I pulled our hair back just alike and I even made her a mini pashmina out of a long skinny black scarf I had so it matched mine. Dad came home and dressed in his sharp blue suit - Boy we were a sight.
We parked downtown and made our way to the restaurant. It was a lovely evening so the walk was pleasant and enjoyable. As we walked around the front windows of the restaurant, Ratcliffe on the Greens, the maitre’de opened the door for us and announced ‘You must be Bella Lee-your table awaits’. Her face lit up light I’d never seen it before. From that moment on, she was a perfect little lady and extremely social and interactive with all the staff. She danced in the restaurant between courses and enjoyed all the food-she really enjoyed that they gave her the small cylindrical glass of water and an identical one like it with milk with small straws to go with it. She enjoyed the fresh bread, spreading the butter by herself with her own knife. She delighted in the lamb I shared with her and the grilled veggies I halfed with her. She was alright with Paul’s fish but preferred my lamb and the veggies. She won over everyone in the restaurant with her dancing and would recite her evening agenda to anyone that would listen (I’m going to dance with Cinderella’ she would say and finish her story with a hop, skip and twirl to the next table).
We finished dinner with delightful desserts and made our way to the theatre. Still a warm evening, we spend some time out front with the mirrored koala artwork in the front of the museum. It was about 15 feet high so Bella was not the only child enthralled with the image. We made our way to our seats right about curtain time.
Bella watched intently for a few minutes but then wanted to go up front on stage and ‘dance with Cinderella’. She asked about 10 times after that but enjoyed the show by asking about every detail and danced in the aisle a few times to make up for our constant ‘no’. She danced all thru the place during intermission and everyone simply adored her. She got really tired towards 9PM so when the curtains closed on the 2nd act, we left our seats for good. We bought her a small ballerina souvenir that could hold a bracelet or two and made our way to the exit. When Bella figured out we were leaving, that’s when the meltdown happened. I handed her to Paul, prepared the stuff and umbrella (since a downpour had begun) and we made our way out the doors. Within a few minutes, Bella had calmed down and begun to enjoy the downtown scenery again. We made it back to the car and almost home before Bella finally quit talking about the dancing and all the stuff she saw in the lighted streets of downtown before she fell to sleep. The night began with our own little Cinderella and we ended it with our very own little Sleeping Beauty. Even Paul said he had a good time!
FYI-When we pulled into the driveway today, she asked if could go see Cinderella dance again. Her little face was so eager to go again. I wonder which parts she still remembers. That night, her favorite part was seeing Cinderella dance solo in her white dress-my favorite part too (other than seeing my baby dance around all night on cloud nine with her Mama and Daddy).
This entry was posted on Saturday, March 13th, 2010 at 9:50 pm and is filed under Bella. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.