A dancing Mother's Day

We had a busy and wonderful Mother's Day weekend. My parents and four-year-old niece came up Saturday morning. My mom took the girls shopping and my dad and I hung out for a few hours. I got some much-needed dad time. It was also my dad's birthday and he didn't realize the girls planned a surprise for him while we were out. They made signs, cards, bought cupcakes, played instruments. And then waited for us as apparently we were two hours late coming home (according to their schedule) so they were pooped out by the time we got there. We celebrated his birthday at a Japanese steakhouse and my niece was enthralled by the chopsticks. Kayla got sick after we got home but recovered by the next day-she didn't want to miss her recital.

Sunday, we had mother's day lunch at Macaroni Grill. Kayla gave me a card she made herself. It was very touching and something I didn't expect from her! I also got a book and some chocolates and apparently some earrings that she lost between home and the store. It was a new and weird feeling to get a bunch of "Happy Mother's Day" messages from people. But it was a really neat feeling to get the spend the day with both my mom and my new daughter.

Kayla's dance recital was Sunday afternoon so the rest of the day was spent getting ready for that. She looked beautiful and danced awesome. My little niece is so enamored of her and was enthralled watching her dance. She was in four dances in her recital-ballet, modern, tap and jazz. She was great in all of them and is clearly a gifted dancer. She went on all night about how she messed up in jazz, though. I told her no one noticed-I sure didn't-but she is way too hard on herself. She said next year she will do her best. We got home late last night after eating dinner out after the recital and I still have laundry and grocery shopping to do for the week. It was not fun getting up this morning.