You Have To Watch The Dance!

Happy Friday! It is the first Dance Competition day of the year! Happy Competition Day! Can the Girl break the year of the 2nds and get a 1st? I think she can. Her solo is beautiful, a contemporary to a cover of Awol Nation's Sail by Lizzy Land. So today we are prepping and primping and getting stage ready! I had to iron/pressed out a costume with lots of pick ups and roushing. OMG what a pain in the ASS! But it looks so pretty now. I hated it  before I pressed it. Before the attention I gave it pressing with iron on low setting then holding it up and checking to make sure it was perfect, almost perfect anyway. It is brown and it looked like a wrinkled up paper bag but after some time and patience at the ironing board pressing and turning and spinning and smoothing out it looks so good! From drab to fab in just a swipes of the iron and time.

It is very metaphorical. To take a costume that is a silky rayon type fabric with overlays of tool and pick ups that looks all crunchy and wrinkly, like a paper lunch bag at the end of a day and make it look flowy and smooth so it will move beautifully with the dance the way it was intended. A little attention to detail armed with an iron and the costume is in it's original form of beauty, the way it was intended. We as people are the same way.

We tend to neglect each other and ourselves. We get crunchy, grumpy and bitter. Like we were packaged up in a bag to fit as small as possible so shipping charges would be minimal. We fold in as much as we can in the little time we have between work and school and taking kids to practices and rehearsals and getting groceries and cooking dinner and slamming it down our throats and off to a volunteer meeting. Most of us take little time to enjoy the good stuff, what time is there? How often do you step back to enjoy your kids in their element or you husband or wife in theirs? We balance our check books while we "watch" practice or better we fill the time by scrolling through social media. Then we wonder why the kids and husband are a bit crunchy at the end of the day...maybe it's you not them?

Can you realize that with a little attention they smooth out and look pretty. You take time on your hair so it doesn't frizz (if you are one who doesn't slow down and do so!) so why don't we take time on our relationships to smooth them out too? All it takes is attention, time and patience, there is no secret sauce or special class to take. The Hubs would say "slow down to go faster" you can't iron a roushed skirt with pick ups fast. If you do what is the point? You must slow down smooth it out and then iron it. Then move the skirt to just the right spot and iron just so. Do this with your life! Make everything in your life beautiful all it takes is attention and time and you, being present. You don't have to know how, you just have to slow down, use your instincts with the goal of making it beautiful!

You could say stop and smell the roses. I say watch the dance. We have spent the good part of the last 8 months getting ready for this day. The first competition day. Most of the work has been by the girl practicing learning choreographing the dance. But we have paid the bills, bought the costumes, pressed the costumes downloaded the music for her to practice, taken her to her rehearsals everyday and some weekends juggling it with the boy's schedule, it has been a labor for the Earl's as a whole family, not just the Girl. We have taken time to iron out all the details and made it beautiful. What we paid for, was not only dance lessons and choreography but for the opportunity to see our commitment show up on stage, and to be judged, we paid for our girl to learn dance and gain poise and personality and confidence, the most expensive show ticket ever but my mommy heart says it is worth it. Tears well up in my eyes at the thought of how beautiful she will be! We will all be proud! But it is almost meaningless if we don't stop to admire our work! We have to WATCH THE DANCE! I took a picture when I was done ironing that costume today. Sometimes you have to admire your hard work and look where you came from (I wish I took a before picture). Sometimes you have to post those pictures too! For everyone to share in your excitement and joy and pride and let your friends and support group give you the atta boys, that you most definitely deserve, and let them experience the beauty that is YOUR dance!

So today I am going to WATCH THE DANCE! I can't wait to see her on stage and hear what the judges say! I hope they love it as much as I will and I hope she knows that she is always a Titanium in my book (Titanium is the highest mark you can get, it's usually Platinum and that would be awesome to but this competition gives one higher for those scoring 98-100). I am proud for her just getting up there putting in the effort and putting up with all the ironing all the shifting stepping back and finding more wrinkles that need to be ironed out, be it practicing dance getting the right facial or her part in convincing the Hubs and I that it is worth the time effort and money from the family for her to do this, this is a family effort and it will be a family celebration.

Where does your life need attention? Are your paying attention to those details, pick out the wrinkles and iron them out. The end result is so worth the effort! Now get to ironing folks!

#Everyday2015