This little girl has her ballet recital tomorrow:
And little man got his first haircut!
Both were somewhat stressful events for mamma! We'll start with the ballerina... Ella had rehearsal tonight. For 3 1/2 hours. By herself. Ending at 7:30 pm. Now, I know she tells me she's a big girl and all, but rehearsal for this many hours through dinner time when she's all alone -- I was definitely suspect. But I packed up her little backpack with snacks and juice and gave her a pep talk about how Mom and Dad were not going with her. Yes, she goes to preschool by herself. But they are so over-protective-touchy-feely there the girl probably can't sneeze without someone helping her out. And she knows all of them. Anyway, when I first said we weren't going to be with her, she asked, "Where are you going to sit?" I said, no, Ella, we won't be in the building at all. And so she just looked at me for a minute and said "Okay, but please don't sell Cooper."
A little joke we have is that on a daily basis, I say, "Okay, Ella, today's the day! We're going to sell Cooper! I think I found a good place for him!" And she says, "No Mom, don't sell him, I love Cooper!" Well, I thought this selling business was a joke, but apparently she thinks I'm quite serious. Note to self: Three-year-olds might not share my sense of humor.
Anyway, this is her all ready to go:
But then she gave me this face:
And then this:
And I figured she was probably big enough to handle herself.
Until I got to the GREAT BIG SCHOOL. The rehearsal is at a HUGE high school, and I couldn't believe I was dropping off my baby all by herself. Not to mention I thought that there would be a few ballerinas, but I'm pretty sure there were hundreds. When we arrived -- early -- the line to drop her off was snaked around the school and it took over 30 minutes for me to get her checked in. Then I walked back to a big bustling dressing room, gave her a huge hug and a high five, and said a little prayer that she could put her shoes on when it was time and find her snacks and juice if she got hungry.
I wasn't the only parent that felt this way. Let's just say that when it was time to pick our tiny dancers up, it looked like people who hadn't seen each other in years running toward each other in the airport. She was all in one piece and had a big smile on her face. One of the moms who was volunteering and got to see the rehearsal said all the girls in her class basically looked awestruck on stage and just stared at the huge spotlight and kind of shimmied around. Tomorrow should be interesting :)
But on to this little man...
I really didn't even flinch when Ella got her haircut. She was so desperately in need of one, and how badly can you mess up a little girl's hair? Just trim it straight around the bottom. But a boy -- that's another story. I am a big fan of the shaggy little boy look, and I was terrified someone was going to give him a short-military-buzzed-on-the-side look. AHHHHH! So I did some research and went with a recommendation on the local mom's listserv from someone who described her boys' hair cut as "long and shaggy - similar to the little kids in the j.crew crewcuts catalog." That sounded promising enough. And only scissors please, if someone had come close to Coop with electric clippers I might have attacked. Plus, Cooper has THIS darling little curl that I can't bear to part with...
But the experience went even better than I expected. The stylist's first response was, "Why would you cut his hair! It's gorgeous, and there's no way I am cutting that curl off." I could have kissed him -- someone who did not want to butcher his hair or buzz it all off! So Coop got a nice little trim -- and got to keep the curls :)
He was so good! He didn't make a peep!
And this smile was prompted by his sister playing peek-a-boo with him :) She kept telling me, "Mom, it's okay, Cooper needs a haircut."
It doesn't even look all that different, which is why I love it. Hooray!
