{"id":536,"date":"2008-05-06T15:56:00","date_gmt":"2008-05-06T15:56:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog2\/2008\/05\/baby-bellies-outside\/"},"modified":"2008-05-06T15:56:00","modified_gmt":"2008-05-06T15:56:00","slug":"baby-bellies-outside","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/2008\/05\/baby-bellies-outside\/","title":{"rendered":"Baby Bellies Outside!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-style: italic;\">Question:  How many Baby Bellies does it take to put in a lightbulb?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-style: italic;\">Answer:  It all depends on if you have enough snacks.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Today we had more than enough snacks.  I brought graham crackers and goldfish, and one little girl brought in Starbursts.  They went crazy over the snacks.  I could barely get them back to class after the snack.  We only had time for a tiny bit of practicing the grapevine.  But they tried, God love &#8217;em.<\/p>\n<p>Before snack, we practiced the Misirlou a lot.  I reminded them that I was not going to allow them to switch hip scarves and I also said I did not want to have to retie them a lot.  So only two of them had problems this time.  Interesting how that works.  (Were my Baby Bellies spoiled before??)<\/p>\n<p>We had class outside on the &#8220;plaza,&#8221; the paved courtyard near the basketball court, because it was sunny and because with Election Day going on, the Multi-Purpose room was taken over. <\/p>\n<p>They did not like being outside, but I did.  They groaned at the hot sun, and needed a lot of water breaks, but thankfully there is a water fountain just inside the doors.  They also complained at the way the Extended Day classes were &#8220;staring&#8221; at them.  Kids cannot bear to be stared at.  It is just as bad as being bullied or teased, in Ben&#8217;s book (and, I suppose, the Baby Bellies&#8217; book).<\/p>\n<p> &#8220;But you are performers,&#8221; I said.  &#8220;It&#8217;s great to have an audience!&#8221;  It sure made me feel more enthusiastic.  I even got out my zills and started zilling while they practiced their Basic Egyptian hip walks.  These were my new zills from Turquoise International.  Just beautiful, like a bell.<\/p>\n<p>I didn&#8217;t bring enough veils, though, so some had to use hip scarves or just pretend.  I snapped at one or two of them who were rude, like when one of them corrected how I pronounced another girl&#8217;s name.  &#8220;Don&#8217;t correct me,&#8221; I said.  And when another asked &#8220;When is snack,&#8221; for the tenth time, I said, &#8220;Don&#8217;t ask me that again.&#8221;  It was pretty great, having them listen to me and actually practice the piece instead of chasing each other around.  I wasn&#8217;t mean, I was just annoyed now and then, and then sunny right away, like I always am.  C&#8217;est moi.<\/p>\n<p>They are really getting the Basic Egyptian, for the most part.  That and the way they hold themselves seems to be improving.  What a delight to see them pay attention to posture, arms, and now where they place their feet!  How I love those Baby Bellies, even when I&#8217;m mad at them.  Now I understand that the nature of a Baby Belly is to complain and pout and try to get attention.  It is the Little Diva in them.  It&#8217;s what, in the end, will make them beautiful dancers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Question: How many Baby Bellies does it take to put in a lightbulb? Answer: It all depends on if you have enough snacks. Today we had more than enough snacks. I brought graham crackers and goldfish, and one little girl brought in Starbursts. They went crazy over the snacks. I could barely get them back [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-536","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pSTth-8E","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=536"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=536"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=536"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=536"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}