Thursday, July 31 -- International Folk Dance Festival

So today was probably one of our favorite days of the festival. Today was Youth Culture Day. I had to pick up tickets in advance. The tickets are totally free and are for ages 6 and up. I think they do this as a measure of crowd control. You can choose what countries you want your child to learn to dance from. Each class is one hour long. I decided to choose three countries for Sam. I chose China, Russia, and Mexico. I looked at the tickets wrong and so we realized at 9:15 that Sam's first class started at 10:00. We were running around like crazy trying to get breakfast on the table and Sam and I out the door at 10:00. Iscidro and Filipe didn't have to be there until 11:00. They stayed home with Bryon and the other kids while I took Sam to the Junior High.

Sam's first class was China. We had a great time learning about China's culture. The China dancers then danced a few numbers. They then taught some moves to the kids. They had also given each child that attended a "Passport." These were for the kids to get autographs right at the end of class. Sam had a blast getting autographs of all the Chinese dancers. I also noticed there were some younger kids there. I called Bryon. I told him if Conner wanted to come, he could drop him off when he dropped off Iscidro and Filipe.


Conner wanted to come and made it in time for the second class. The second class we attended was the Russia Cosack team. The immediately put the kids in a huge circle and started teaching them some basic dance steps. Sam held Conner's hand and helped him in the circle. All of a sudden, the dance started jumping around in the circle and Conner came out screaming that he was scared and I couldn't get him to dance the rest of the day! Again, Sam had a blast getting more autographs and meeting the dancers. Conner, on the other hand, was a little more hesitant as you can probably tell from the pictures. Probably Sam's favorite of the whole day was the class we attended from Mexico. In this class, the dance director talked about all the costumes and from what part of Mexico they came from. He then had each group dance just a small part of their dance to give us a sample of what the music and dance from that area in Mexico was like. Then they had some kids go up and partner with the Mexican dancers. The dancers showed them some dance steps. Sam was in the process of telling me that he was not going to dance. I was in the process of saying "Oh, yes you are", When a beautiful Mexican dancer came and dragged Sam up to the front of the room. Sam picked up the dance steps beautifully. Once again, Sam had a blast getting autographs of all the dancers. One of the girl Mexican Dancers kissed Conner's Passport. Conner screamed and cried at how she had ruined his book. I felt so bad. She was just trying to be friendly with a cute little boy. Well once Sam found out she kissed Conner's passport and not his, Sam wanted to get her to kiss his. So we went back over and asked some of the Mexican Dancers if they would kiss Sam's book. They said, "No. Boy sad." I tried to tell them that Conner was sad but Sam would be happy. So Sam's partner kissed his passport. Sam said he was going to cherish the book and never let it out of his sight. Sam and Conner even got Filipe and Iscidro to sign their passports.
Here's a close up of Sam and his partner. Aren't they adorable?!?Then the boys and I came home for the rest of the afternoon. We didn't have to go get Filipe and Iscidro until 4:30 p.m. I then took them, my friend Linda and her two girls and a guest of Linda's to Sam's soccer game while Bryon took Conner to his soccer game. Filipe and Iscidro were so excited to watch the boys play soccer all week long. I kept telling them it was nothing like in Mexico. I still think they enjoyed watching Sam's game.

We then came home and I made homemade spaghetti and meatballs for dinner.

That night the dancers had a party at the park with the other dance teams and so our job was to just drop them off and pick them up about 10:00 p.m.