Did I Mention My Baby Is In Pre-K This Year?



Dressed and ready to go!

 Yes, that's right...off she goes...growing up...making me feel proud and sad and old...

She cried (sobbed!) the entire first week, but rest assured she is doing great today, five months later. 


Door #18 at Autumn Lane





  

The Nutcracker 2010

RPO & Rochester City Ballet's Nutcracker 2011

We began taking Harper to see the RPO and Rochester City Ballet's performance of The Nutcracker when she was just two years old.  It is performed every year, Thanksgiving weekend, at the historic Eastman Theatre in downtown Rochester.  If you have not seen a performance yet, you really must go!  It is one of the few ballet's performed to a live orchestra. 

Harper loves going to the ballet.  She gets to wear a fancy dress and take a little purse with snacks.  We go to the last performance on the Sunday evening after Thanksgiving, and purchase seats that allow Harper to have an aisle to stand up in (if necessary) and also have an incredible view of the perfomance itself.  Each year she has gotten more and more mezmorized by the costumes and dancing.  And with each year, we enjoy watching her appreciate a cultural experience few adults have the opportunity to witness.

For me, her mom, I like that she gets excited by classical music and starts dancing whenever and WHERE ever she hears Tchaikovsky!

P.S.
This year was extra special because Harper got to meet (and receive an autograph from) Jessica Tretter, part of the company and Dew Drop in the 2010 performance of The Nutcracker.  Cool!!


Harper meets Jessica Tretter (Dew Drop 2010)



Beauty Is Often Painful





Before...excited and happy



 Unlike many parents of little girls, I made the concious dicision to allow Harper to choose when she would like her ears pierced.  She had expressed little interest until this year.  Several of the little girls in her pre-k class have their ears pierced, and low and behold...she decides it would be really nice to get hers done as well.  So, the Friday before Halloween we took her "trick or treating" at the local mall to kill some time and let her enjoy being dressed up.  We pass the Piercing Pagoda and it is decided that that particular evening was going to be the big day.  Sorry for the poor quality photos (they were taken by Chris' Crackberry) but you get the idea.

After.