Under the Sea

The past month has been a whirlwind for Abbie. Her rehearsals for The Little Mermaid began on January 26th and became increasingly more time consuming as the weeks went on. I think that she really liked going to practice and being a part of all the excitement. All the hard work culminated in 7 (yes, 7!) performances over a 4-day period last weekend. Despite 10pm bedtimes on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights, Abbie did great with all of it. We were very proud.

(with King Triton at rehearsal on Valentine's Day)

The guppies were basically just involved in the big musical numbers in the show - Under the Sea, Kiss the Girl, etc. - and didn't have any lines to memorize. The production was really enjoyable to watch, and as the smallest of the guppies, Abbie was adorable.

(Abbie with Ariel after the Saturday matinee)

One of the more surprising conversations that arose from this whole experience was when Abbie told me that she saw her friend Eli in the audience. Eli is in Abbie's class and sits next to her. Turns out that she has a bit of a crush on him. She informed me that during the performance of "Kiss the Girl" she batted her eyelashes at Eli. Playing dumb, I asked her why. A bit sheepishly she replied, "I just like him." Again, playing dumb, I said, "He's a good friend, isn't he." 

 

Of course, this was not the first time that Abbie batted her eyelashes at Eli. There was also an incident on Valentine's Day. By completely random chance, I happened to put his name on a box of candy hearts that had a picture of the "Kiss Me" heart on it. Abbie declared excitedly, "and I was only a couple feet from him when he saw it!" To which I replied, "Yes, but we wouldn't want to kiss our friends because that is a good way to share germs." Abbie quietly informed me that getting a kiss from Eli would be worth the risk. She also informed me that she took the candy exchange incident as an opportunity to bat her eyelashes at Eli. Lovely.

As these things go, of course, once all the excitement of life under the sea subsided, Abbie found herself under the weather. She has been fighting a fever off and on since Monday. A trip to the doctor today revealed an ear infection. This came as quite a surprise to me, as I had assumed that she was too old for ear infections. Now that she has started a course of antibiotics, we are hopeful that she will be able to go back to school tomorrow. If nothing else, I'm sure she is looking forward to seeing Eli! :)