Chloe's Nutcracker experience: The Dress Rehearsal

Finally...it was here.  We couldn't believe how fast time went by and finally the dress rehearsals and performances were here.  There were 2 dress rehearsals before the "real" performance.  The rehearsals were such long nights with all of the changes and suggestions that Clytie had for all of the dancers, in fact Chloe didn't get to bed before 1 a.m. on those 2 nights.  Luckily Chloe's first class teacher let her get away with coming in a bit late each day for school-it was necessary.  The pic above shows Chloe in her dress from some of the last scenes of the ballet.  

A quick pic by the large Christmas tree in the front lobby of the 

Browning Center.

 some better shots of one of the dresses that Chloe wore

 one proud Dad

 Here's one of the many cards that Kate made for Chloe...

 Chloe, Greta (Arabian dancer) & Emily (red soldier) after the dress rehearsal

Chloe, Sara (mouse) & Kate

Chloe's Nutcracker experience: The Practices

Well, I've given you the story leading up to Chloe getting the part of Clara in the Nutcracker.  Next are the LONG practices to learn everything which was no small task.  The great thing about Chloe is that she didn't mind the long practices at all, in fact, she looked forward to the all day Saturday practices each week.  

...learning the dance which takes place right at the beginning of the play when everyone comes over for the family Christmas party at Clara's house.  The blonde guy is Drosselmeyer whom Chloe just loved and looked up to so much.  He is a principal dancer with Ballet West.

Here's a great shot of Chloe and her "Clara" teacher-Leslie Christensen (one of Clytie's daughters)

Here's a pic of the "Nephew" helping Chloe twirl around

I absolutely love this picture of Chloe and her teacher.  I love how Leslie is looking at Chloe, almost as if she's saying "Good job Chloe, I'm really proud of you."

This was Chloe's favorite part of the play-where she leaps into Drosselmeyer's arms and he lifts and carries Chloe around for a minute.

Here's a note that Chloe's teacher gave her after getting the part of Clara:

Chloe,

Please know that you were chosen as Clara in our Nutcracker because you have something in the quality of who you are that includes your dancing abilities but is much more than that.  Hard to pinpoint but just a certain something that is magical and wonderful and comes across not only in the audition but in all other venues of your life.  Part of that certain something is to be teachable, to be able to fully involve yourself in what you give yourself to, to appreciate and be grateful for beauty and goodness, to be so attentive and soak in the whole experience.  These are things I see in you that will benefit  you and the people around you always.  You have given yourself to this and it is yours to cherish.  The memory will be forever.  The time and effort makes it yours to think of and smile about for all of your life.

thank you for who you are

Leslie Adams Christensen

Fall break with the Cheneys

Another year for Fall Break at school and we're off...off to the Cheney's cabin in Hanna.  Where's Hanna?  It's somewhere past Kamas, Oakley, some other weird town in the Uintah mountains somewhere.  Wherever it is, it's a fun place to be.  The weather was pretty decent-as you can see from the pic above, it was sweatshirt weather but sunny.  Clayton joined us too so that was fun.  This pic was when we decided to go fishing one day-it was a little windy but still fun.  We basically watched Emma catch a fish, we all ate lunch and took off. 

Eli, Casey and good ol' Harley

Chloe and Emma

Liam and Sam

Eli's usually a happy guy-Kate just wanted to force him to be happy at this moment.

Kate and Harley

Ok, Harley had quite the experience at the cabin. He was upstairs and whining to come down. Understand that these stairs are very steep and there is no railing to hang on to. Liam went up to get him and slipped coming down, Harley leaped out of his arms and took a tumble down the stairs and hit the wall at the bottom. He yelped and yelped for what seemed like forever as we were trying to calm him down. He couldn't even walk and he tensed up everywhere you touched him. We were scared and Liam and Eli were very emotional. We called a vet in the nearest big city and they said they could see him. Miraculous as it sounds, Harley started acting so much better, so much in fact that we decided not to take him in. We could tell though when we got home that he wasn't doing very good. We took him in to the vet and we were told that his back was tweaked pretty good and he had inflamation of the bowels (he had stopped eating all together). Doc gave us the right medicine for him (2 different pills and a special dog food) and within a day, Harley was acting great and has been good ever since. We keep praying for that little guy-he is almost 10 years old you know.

Clayt brought up his uke and I brought the guitar-we had a fun little jam session

The craft project for the trip was making t shirt with freezer paper, paint and irons. Here's Kate and Heather working on her ladybug shirt.

 

Clayton and Eli designing their shirts

 

Here's Chloe's finished product-cool huh?

Halloween...aka the greatest holiday

My favorite time of year has come and gone...way too fast in my opinion.  We were the first house in our neighborhood that had, at least, the outside of our house decorated for Halloween.  I couldn't help it with my new gravestones that I made in the summer and I tweaked our front room ghost that you see above, it was a fun Halloween season.  

I was pretty proud of this witch that we made this year.  We found this mask at Halloween City and then everything else just fell into place for her.  So many people thought that someone was really sitting there.

Look at that crazy bunch!

Brenda gave us a bubble fogger this year and it seriously was the biggest hit on Halloween night.  Kids were quite scared to come up to the house but the bubble fogger lured them in so we could scare them.

Chloe gets chosen to be Clara in "The Nutcracker"

So pretty much Chloe's (and all of ours) dreams came true recently when she auditioned for "The Nutcracker" and she was chosen to play the part of Clara!   I will try and summarize since it's quite the story getting to that point.  

First of all, Chloe LOVES ballet!  We have taken her to see "The Nutcracker" since she was 5 years old.  After turning 8 she was able to start auditioning to be in the play and she's been in it each year since then.  It has been Chloe's dream to play the part of Clara which is a very big part.  Heather and I knew that this might be the last year that she could be chosen to get the part since she's growing out of that little girl look WAY too fast.  She had general auditions and received a call an hour or so later to come back yet again, along with 15 other girls, for Clara call backs!  We were so excited for her...and very nervous.  She danced her heart out and was told that the parts would be posted a few days later on the company's website.   Well, that time came and went and still there was no word about parts yet.   The parts were finally posted...but not until the middle of the night!  I admit, I could hardly sleep anyway waiting for them to be posted.  I would run upstairs and check every few hours after going to bed.  At 3 a.m. I popped the lights on in our bedroom and stuck the printed copy of the posted parts in Heather's face saying "look at this!"..."she made CLARA!!!"  Believe me, I was tempted to wake Chloe up to celebrate too but Heather had to hold me back since she probably wouldn't be able to sleep the rest of the night either.   We're so excited for the big performance coming up soon.  Here's some recent pix from picture day at the ballet studio:

Here's Clara and all of the "party girls" (that was Chloe's first part 4 years ago)

Here's Clara with Drosselmeyer's nephew and the little guy there is Clara's little brother- Fritz 

(Chloe loves that little kid)

 Here's the nightgown that she wears when she meets the Mouse King and the Nutcracker

I love this picture of Chloe

Here's one very proud mom...

Looking forward to November 17-19th Chloe!!!!