Last night I was a Dance Mom!

And for those of you in Australia, that was not a mis-spelling of Mum 😉
Let’s set the scene…..
The Tween is a massive Dance Moms fan as some of you may have read before. She is constantly watching it on Foxtel and she has the first two seasons on DVD. She follows all the mothers on Twitter and Instagram. She comes to me all excited when one of the mothers favourites a tweet or answers her.
So when she found out that Christi and Chloe were coming to Australia……

Well you get the picture. So the only tickets we could get were to a dance class. (Yes, I paid for the dance class too) and last night was the night. I drove home from work and jumped straight from one car to another and off we went. It was easy to find the place because of the massive numbers of young girls pouring into a dance studio on the Gold Coast. We joined the queue to get in and I felt as if I was waiting in line for a Justin Beiber concert or something. To give my girl credit, she neither swooned nor screamed when she saw Chloe for the first time (although many others did). She did however get all excited when she spotted Brandon and Brittany selling merchandise. And when Dianne (Brandon’s mother) walked out she was undeniably excited. The main person she wanted to see (apart from Chloe and Christi) was Clara (Chloe’s little sister). She wasn’t disappointed as at one point, Clara came to the door of the dance studio and yelled out “MOM, I need you” lol She then came out later to meet everyone before retreating back to her Dad.
I was a little disappointed that I had paid VIP price and one of the organisers sent me upstairs to the observers gallery where I could see absolutely nothing. When Dianne became concerned at the number of young girls leaning over the balcony and came up to organise them to sit around the edge of the dance floor, I spoke with her about this and she took me downstairs, got me a chair and I got to sit up in the corner with a couple of other mothers and the stars lol
The official photo of myself, the Tween and Chloe and Christi is on the Tween’s iPad. She is still sleeping as it was after 11pm when we got home last night.
I wish I had taken the time to grab my Canon DSLR and not relied on my little point and shoot last night. I missed so many wonderful photo ops.
So here are a few photos to share.
This is Chloe talking to my Tween and telling her it’s okay that she doesn’t know how to dance and to just have fun. The Tween figures she scored brownie points by telling her that because later she won a special wrist band and a hug from Chloe for doing an improv dance. 😀 She also won a signed photo in the Trivia competition and then a signed magazine in the raffle. She was on a roll.
Brittany and Brandon. The choreography was all Brittany’s work and I loved watching Brandon dance. I’m sorry Chloe – but he outshone you in that routine. Chloe is just behind Brittany’s head.

Chloe performed an improv solo. This is the best of a bad lot of photos. Like I said, wish I’d bought the DSLR.

Chloe and Christi doing trivia. If you think Chloe looks red, she is. The whole group had been out on the beach that day and forgot their sunscreen.
I found Christi to be softly spoken (most of the time) and very funny. She did not put any of the other Dance Moms down (although she did say “Oh, ewww” when asked to describe Abbey in two words and when asked what Kathy is good at she replied “Annoying people”. I learned a lot about the shooting of the show and received an honest answer to my question about how the show had affected their family.
I was mightily impressed as Chloe and Christi posed with over 200 people individually and did not just pack up and say ‘times up, we’re going’. They stayed to the very end. We know because it was well after 9.30pm when it was our turn for photos.
So there you have it.
Last night I was a Dance Mom. I shared the floor with a lot of other Dance Mums (including Christi) as I watched my daughter dance with her idols.
And whilst I may be mother of the year for accompanying the Tween, the Garden Gnome is father of the year for sitting outside in the car and waiting for over three hours. 🙂