Gracie's Birthday!

Well, not really. Lizzie decided that it was Grace's birthday today. So we made a cake. And then we ate it.

Lizzy's Dance Recital

Lizzy's dance recital was the other day. They performed 'Peter and the Wolf'.' Lizzy's class had a 2 minute stint where they danced around like butterflies. So stinkin adorable. Some of the pics are pretty bad, due to the lighting and the fact that we couldn't get any closer to the stage. She's the taller one in the blurry pics.

I was a little afraid she would get nervous on stage and with all the people, but she seemed not to mind. Although she, and most of her class, stared out at the audience looking for a familiar face while they were supposed to be dancing. We were able to snag a few decent pics of her in her butterfly wings at the end. She's not quite ready for Juilliard, but she sure looks precious. We love our little butterfly!!

Lizzy the Ballerina

Lizzy recently started taking ballet lessons. She loves to dance so we figured it would be a good outlet for her. The first week she didn't have a clue what she was doing, and mostly just did her own type of dances, which included throwing herself rather dramatically across the floor, and then yelling to me from across the room, "did you see, mom, that was pretty good huh!" After that I wasn't too sure if ballet was going to be a good match for Lizzy after all, it requires quite a bit of discipline and concentration, and she's 4, but so are all the other kids, so it seems to work. This teacher is incredible at getting kids to fall inline...she seems to have the perfect blend of warmth and high expectations for the girls, and they respond very well to her. After the first week Lizzy learned quickly not to talk during class, and to save her more "interpretative" dance styles for after class. To my surprise she didn't seem to have a problem with that, and has enthusiastically returned to class each week. She tries hard to please the teacher, who gives high praise for it. It's only a 30 minute class, but Lizzy is quite tired by the end, and comes home and likes to crash on the couch for a while.

In a few weeks her class is doing a little dance recital in conjunction with the older girls' classes. I can't guarantee that she'll get all the steps right, but she'll look pretty darn cute trying!

Halloween in Rotorua

Princess Lizzy, and Gracie Face (rawr!), the Bear.

So we did the Halloween thing this weekend in Rotorua, or something somewhat resembling the Halloween thing back in the States. People don't really do Halloween here, at least traditionally. In the past few years it has somewhat caught on with the younger crowd, much to the annoyance of older generations. So we didn't know what to expect going out to trick or treat. We were told people would know what we were doing. And we weren't the only trick-or-treaters out. But we did receive a few blank stares when the door opened. One lady oohed and aahed at the adorable princess, and after a few seconds realized that Lizzie was waiting for something. She looked at us and whispered "Is it money?" So I would say Halloween hasn't quite caught on here. But whatever, it doesn't take much candy to make these kids happy. Overall people were friendly, inspite of being somewhat bewildered by what we were doing. But we did get one old crone who upon opening the door to find two darling children smiling up at her, told us she did not believe in such a holiday. What is there to believe in? It's two adorable children just wanting a friendly smile and a piece of freaking candy...whatever lady. Can you tell I was just a little annoyed by that interchange? But you get those kinds of folks in the states too, I just wish they wouldn't open their doors to spread their misplaced piety.

Anyways, the kids had a good time. They were so very cute.

BTW, people are definitely not concerned about unwrapped candy here like they are in the states. Most everything we got was unwrapped. Lots of gummy worms (individual worms, mind you, taken in handfuls from a bowl). Umm... I might get some flak over that, sorry Mom, I already let them eat it, and they're okay, I promise! =) They would have been really upset if I had tried to take it away!