Celtic Legend

The kids had their recital for their Irish Dance on April 23, 2010. They had been practicing hard and were very excited and a little nervous. The beginning of the recital was just a simple jig which you can see in the video I posted at the bottom and the girls are in their traditional costume. Cam hadn't been taking lessons long enough to participate in that part of the program.

The second dance they were all in. The recital was based around stories of Irish myth, legend, and folklore. Bailey, Addie, and Cam's class performed the story of Tir na Nog and goes as follows.

Oisin is lured to the world of faerie kind by Niamh, the queen of the Tir na Nog. After what he believes is a very short time, he misses his family and asks to return to see them. The Queen warned him that if his feet touched the ground, he would never be able to return. He accidentally fell from his horse and was never able to return to Tir na Nog.

Bailey was one of the peasants, she wore a purple scarf and a red flowered skirt with an apron over her traditional costume. Addie was one of the fairies and wore a peach shirt with fairy wings. Cam was the horse with another boy in the class. To be completely accurate Cam was the horse's "ass". They were supposed to do a specific step that they had been working on for a very long time, but when they put the costume on they couldn't see where they were supposed to be going. They were so worried about running into things they just ended up walking for the most part. In the video clip you can see the dancers guiding them around the stage and pushing them in the right direction. At the very end I have posted video of Cam dancing since we really didn't get to see him in action during the recital.

After the recital they held a traditional Ceili (pronounced Keely I think) which was a party where the "experienced" dancers showed everyone else how to dance. It reminded me of a square dance since they have someone calling out the steps of what to do. They had a bunch of treats and danced. My mom and dad left before the Ceili started, but I stayed with the kids and video taped them dancing. Chase stayed home with Joelle. Bailey had her heart set on having Emery be her dance partner, but she was so short and after they switched partners Emery didn't know what to do, lost interest, and sat back down. Now when this happened all they were supposed to do was turn to the person next to you and be their partner for a brief period, so Addie should have been Emery's new partner. Well, Addie turned around and was confused and didn't realize Emery was supposed to be her partner and got upset and sad and hurried and sat down as well and started to cry. I have it on video, call me a bad parent, but I think it's funny. That's also at the end of the post. Emery was having a ton of fun and danced all over the place. I was worried she would be a problem, but she sat through the whole performance and absolutely loved it. I also caught Cam dancing on the stage during the Ceili and then he was joined shortly after by all the girls while everyone else was on the floor dancing. It was a really fun night for everybody, well except for maybe Chase who was stuck at home with a fussy baby. So, now for your viewing pleasure enjoy all the videos I posted.

One last note... As part of the girls' costume they are required to curl their hair in tight ringlets or wear a wig. Since we don't have a ton of spare cash lying around to purchase wigs we painstakenly(sp?) set curlers in their hair the night before the performance. I had the girls sleep on the curlers this time in hopes that the curls would stay, our last performance was a disaster and their hair went completely flat. When the girls went to school the next morning they opted to keep the curlers in and attended with a head full of curlers. I didn't make them do it, I gave them the option of doing it and said that their hair might hold better if they did. Well it worked out perfect and the girls had the cutest curls bobbing along all night while they danced. Cam was lucky in the hair department and didn't have to do anything of course.
The Girls' Curly Hair

Addie in the peach shirt and Cam next to the girl in yellow on stage for their bows.

Cam after the recital.

Addie and her banged up knee (from an acciddent at school) after the recital.

Bailey in her peasant costume after the recital. She had already taken off her ghillies and poodle socks.

The kids enjoying their refreshments during the Ceili.

Emery and the Irish dancing kids.