St Patricks Day Fun

On the weekend I wrote about our plans for today, St Patricks Day. Having not done anything quite like this before, I was a little anxious about how it might go - several factors were against us. But it turned out to be a perfect day!

Alas, the hard shoes did not arrive on time, but last night we got the hair curled, product applied and all (yes, at last I know how to do curlers properly - better late than never), then this morning we caught the train and travelled to the Recital Hall without too many dramas. In fact, we were there first, long before anyone else. We chatted with the stage manager and one of the pianists briefly before being taken to our dressing room. Which was a "real" dressing room, so lots of fun (Laura even acted for a silly video before anyone else turned up).


Later the others arrived, we got the dresses on, lipstick applied etc and went to the stage door for a rehearsal. And, wouldn't you know it, the stage managers decided that we couldn't use hard shoes much after all, to save the soft stage floor! So Emily didn't need hard shoes, as it turned out! The girls had to dance their hard shoe dances in soft shoes, thumping their feet down as loudly as they could!

I stayed backstage with the teachers and got to see a lot of dancing (without the expense of a ticket!) Here is a peep of my girls onstage:

There were 1050 people in the audience, and all the girls danced brilliantly. My girls have only been dancing for two years, and were the most inexperienced of the group today, but they did well. (I heard afterwards that in the second concert Laura sneezed during her dance - but kept dancing!)

After the first concert we took off the hot heavy costumes and the girls changed and we went and had lunch in Martin Place. It was a perfect autumn day - sunshine and cool breezes.

An obliging man with blue hair presented the girls and their friend with balloons to play with

... and then one of the readers of this blog walked by! A lovely surprise - Hi Linda! She knew exactly what we were doing there! It's strange to have virtual and real life combine!


We went for a quick walk to a few shops and then returned for the second concert - another success!

Then we took photos of the group in the foyer (other faces blurred for privacy) and headed home. On the doorstep at home were a few parcels - the hard shoes had arrived (!), and the new Stampin' Up! catalogue (yey!)

I was exhausted but the girls bounced on ... some more Irish dancing in the hallway and then they offered to cook dessert! Woohoo! I sat with my feet up and a heatpack (poring over the new catalogue) and they baked a delicious apple crumble. Yes, a great day was had by all.