The Odegaard family: in progress: Showtime!

Picture this: You've been given a hand-drawn, slightly misspelled ticket. You've been led to a seat and given very specific instructions on where, exactly, your feet can go and where, more importantly, they cannot go. You're instructed not to look at Elise, because she's "backstage." Music may or may not begin. And then...with as much fanfare as a 7-year-old can muster with nothing more than enthusiasm and a smile...the show has begun!

The announcer talks about the amazing Elise and what she can do. You sneak a peak at Elise (if you're spotted, the show might start over) and see that she's covered in fairy wings, crowns, necklaces, bracelets, tutus, princess dresses, extra skirts underneath to make the princess dresses fancier, clothespins and paperclips. The announcer goes on about the magnificent dances and stunts Elise will do. Elise performs the magnificent dances and stunts, all while humming a made-up song if there's no music. Naomi tries to copy them.

Then, as the announcer prompts the audience, it's time to applaud! Another spectacular show is at a close!

Inspired by ballet, performing arts class, music lessons, a friends' garage/driveway circus and Elise's desire to be famous, the girls have been putting on shows all the time. They're equal parts impressive, adorable and hilarious.

The shows always require a lot of setup. They can spend hours rehearsing, dressing, re-dressing, and re-rehearsing, and then even longer setting up chairs for the audience so that the audience won't be in the way of the performers, the audience will have a good view and everyone will get the color of chair they most want. Occasionally the girls ask for audience participation, or insist on it, which can require grown adults to don fairy wings and possibly sing or dance.

And there are a lot of rules:
1. No feet on the rug (we might mar the fen shui, apparently, of the performance, or trip the performers)
2. When Elise is performing, especially a solo, your eyes must not leave her. When she's performing as part of a group, your eyes must be on her a fair portion of the time. She will check.
3. No singing along unless you're invited.
4. Naomi must sit quietly, preferably restrained (and by the way, those two things don't mix), until she just can't anymore, and then it's her turn to perform. Sometimes she is allowed to preemptively perform.
5. You must sit in your assigned seat, or have a very good reason not to ("I can't fit where you put my chair.").
6. If you're also a performer, you must wait your turn and not perform in any numbers that aren't yours to perform in.
7. No looking backstage, even if it's in plain sight.
8. No laughing at the wrong time.
9. Please hold your applause to the end, and try to figure out when the end actually is so that there's not a long pause while you decide whether to applaud or not.
10. Re-dos are allowed if a trick doesn't go as planned.
11. Attendance is required for everyone in the house.
12. Audience participation is at times mandatory.

In this way, shows can be almost as stressful for the audience as they are for the performers, but shows are also a big deal so that's okay.

Overall, though, we've greatly enjoyed the piano, singing, tap-dancing, ballet, "rock and roll" dancing, plays, soliloquies about rocks, puppet shows, tricks and much more that the kids dream up.

But wouldn't you rather I show, not tell? I braved video editing to bring you a couple clips from Thanksgiving weekend (thanks to Uncle Tom for recording them!):

Random pictures from the fall, because there is no time to organize them but they're cute:

Elise takes care of her little sister.

Kalina and Cupcake the mouse.

We love to ramble around the Bird Sanctuary near our house. Once Elise found a marble. A second time, Elise found a marble! Now she hopes to find marbles every time.

Coming to a Christmas card near you...

Naomi makes breakfast. She even cracks the eggs (actually, she usually cracks them to make either cookies or egg soup).

Elise performs in "When You Wish Upon a Star." She was super excited about the "golden" wand, but never quite forgave the teacher for not letting her keep it. I have a feeling the teacher may have been a victim of Elise's lawyering, based on the extent to which Elise seems to have thought the problem through ("Couldn't she just make more wands?").