Dancing girl

I thought this might not happen.

One of the things I worried about when moving to Peru was what would Emily do about dancing. 

I could not imagine her not dancing.

 Emily started dance classes when she was three years old.  It was a big part of her life.  She was at dance three or four or five days every week.  She had been in The Nutcracker every December since she was six years old.  In the summer she was in Sleeping Beauty.  She had friends at dance.  She wore a leotard more than pajamas and could put her hair in a bun while dancing.

The year we lived in Washington she still went to dance.  Again she was in The Nutcracker.  Her dance friends were her church friends and her school friends.

I had found dance studios in Lima before we even packed our moving boxes.

The end of July we arrived in Lima.

And Emily would not go to dance.  She said that she did not speak Spanish and would not understand the instructions.

She would not try.

From July to December the ward insisted that Emily dance.

The Relief Society asked her to choreograph, perform and teach an American dance to the ward.

The Stake asked her to choreograph, teach, and perform at a shopping mall, a flash mob dance with the young men and women at youth conference.

She was asked to choreograph, teach and perform with the young women at the ward Christmas Party. It was like no one remembered she was 15 years old.

 She still danced in the car and in the house.  She talked to school friends about dancing. 

She missed dance.

We insisted she find a way to dance by the end of summer. (That was February, we're in South America)

Emily and her friends found a dance studio where they spoke English. They took a taxi after school and it was a long, long drive to pick her up.  Her friends were beginners so it did not make sense for Emily to be in their class.  They all auditioned in April at another studio.  Emily was placed in Level 3 so she could learn "character dances" and routines for the examinations.  There were girls her age in the class but also 10 year olds.  She understood Spanish enough to dance but not to socialize.  At this point I am proud of her for dancing just because she loves dancing.

So since then, she has had exams but not the results.  Her teachers have moved her to dancing with Levels 6-8 and Saturday she had her first performance.  There was one point in the dance where Emily was in the front center stage dancing with no one around and a big smile on her face.

It was awesome.