Performing Arts Night: May 14th

At the end of each school year St. Francis School puts on a show for the parents called "Performing Arts Night." It is fast becoming my favorite day of the school year. The students at the school sing or dance as a class and the parents/friends/relatives eat and drink on the lawn while the children perform. Its one of those functions that, as a parent, makes me well up with pride. This year's theme was "dance" and each class had to perform a dance routine for the audience. Initially, both Seamus and Finn displayed alarm at the theme. One day in April, Finn came home in tears because he couldnt dance the routine without messing up. It really concerned him. He dug in his heels and insisted to me that he would NOT dance for Performing Arts Night. Finn's class chose to do a country western line dance and in the beginning it was hard for most of them to catch on. Finn in particular is not very coordinated so Im sure those first few weeks of learning the routine were hard. Im proud to say that he finally caught on and I never heard another complaint once May arrived. In fact, Finn looked like he was enjoying the heck out of himself the entire time he was up on the stage. He was beaming from ear to ear.

Seamus sixth grade class performed Irish step dancing. If I had a nickle for the amount of complaints I heard from Seamus' classmates about their chosen dance genre, Id easily have $40 in my pocket. It didnt help that the 5th graders got to dance hip hop. Irish step dancing was not only hard, it was (in their mind) definitely not cool. Ironically, Seamus didnt seem phased about the type of dance he had to perform. He was however concerned about his class's ability to do it correctly. I think here lies the difference between my 3rd and 6th graders: Finn was afraid of doing something new while Seamus was afraid of being embarrassed. During Seamus' performance, he looked pretty stressed out the entire time. He didnt smile much. However, Seamus' performance had Matt feeling very prideful of his Irish ancestry. After the dance, a teary eyed Matt told me how proud his grandfather Walter would have been to see his grandson dancing Irish step dancing on that stage. It seemed to touch Matt immensely.

Jennifer, Barry and the kids accompanied us to the performance this year. Abbey and Eli were dancing in the aisle with each new act. It felt great to have them there with us, and even GREATER to think that next year Eli will be performing with the kindergarden class.

That picture of Abbey kills me. I imagine she looks just like Ramona the Brave from those old Beverly Cleary books. I also wanted to share one shot of the four of us. Matt and I are wearing brand new St. Francis Friars hats.


Happy Saturday.