Baby Cronk: Spring Update - Dance Comp Season, Fencing Tournaments, and More...

Sarah started her competition dance season this year with competing her ballet solo at Masquerade in Duluth. Her ballet solo this year was the Gamzatti Variation from La Bayadere. She did a beautiful job!

Sarah being a helper backstage for the younger dancers. She was a teaching assistant for the petite elite team for their ballet classes this year and was also a helper at the competitions for the teenies, minis, and petites. She's so great with the little dancers and they LOVE her!

Some fun pool time with some of her teammates.

Their first team competition was the following weekend at Applause.

Contemporary ("Lightning")

Jazz ("San Frandisco")

Tap ("Swingset")

Sarah with one of the littles sitting on her lap in the audience. Sarah stayed all weekend to help the little teams instead of only staying for her team's dances.

Production ("Wonderland")

My sleepy ballerina. She had to get up pretty early to get ready for her solo competition and be there when the doors opened.

With her solo teacher and ballet director of the studio, Casey.

Next up was another solo competition, Beyond the Stars.

In other news...

Austin was recognized with his Quiz Bowl/Knowledge Bowl team at the student recognition awards at school. Here he is with Alexis, who also brought home some recognition awards!

Drs. Judy and Bob Snook retired from Metro Peds.

They are greatly missed!

Austin participated in the Model UN conference.

While he was there, Sarah competed in another solo competition, Symposium and Trevor had a local fencing tournament 5 minutes away from the dance comp.

The weather was terrible, as we got a large snow storm overnight before we had to be there early Saturday morning. We had to drive to the competition in Lakeville before the plows made it out. We drove through at least a foot of unplowed snow and it was VERY difficult. I don't think I have ever had a drive that difficult! We made it safely and by the time Steve drove over later, they had plowed and the roads were fine.

Sarah and Briella, 2 of the ballet soloists

The littles getting very excited!

(Just don't get lipstick on the tutu!)

Sarah with more of her petites.

Sleepy Harlie on piggyback.

Sarah placed in the top 15 soloists!

Then over to fencing...

Trevor's friend Cameron got to come see him fence.

A busy and successful day was had by all.

Sarah won the Grand Prize at her studio for the month of April for exemplifying the Premiere Pillars!

We celebrated Easter.

Next was KAR competition.

Sarah and her classmates advanced to the State Competition for their History Day project!

Their project was about Nellie Bly and they did a fantastic job!

Sarah continues to be an excellent cook and baker!

Austin learned how to shave!

We all went to see Hamilton!

With the family crew!

And Schafroths were able to join us too!

Trevor gashed his head open AGAIN!

(This is #4 set of staples in the head for this boy! I have a staple gun in the cupboard above my desk at clinic just for him.)

Next was Trevor's regional fencing tournament in St. Louis, Missouri.

With his fencing buddy Callen

We went to see the St. Louis Arch after his first day of fencing, but didn't realize that you had to buy tickets in advance to go up to the top. We'll have to remember to get tickets next time!

We enjoyed some time in the museum under the arch.

Back to fencing the next day for the Y12 division.

As soon as Trevor was eliminated from the final bracket, we headed home. We narrowly missed driving through the peak of this big storm!

Sarah had her spring band concerts.

Austin was recognized at his spring band concert.

And at the Student Recognition Award Ceremony (with Alexis too)

Trevor had hat day at school.

Trevor also had a fencing camp with a high level NCAA coach (Peter Habala) and was invited to have a private lesson with him.

Austin played with the U19 soccer team for this spring/summer season in the Shakopee Soccer Association. For a few years now, they haven't had enough kids at his age level, so they put him up with the older kids. He had some college kids on his team!

Trevor played in his last season of soccer for SSA. Now that he has found the sport he loves (fencing), he is happy to give up soccer. It has not been a particularly good experience for him the last couple years, with teammates that bully each other and an overall negative environment.

Austin injured his knee in practice one day and we were sure it was an ACL tear, but happily, the MRI was normal and he recovered well after limping around with crutches for a while.

Trevor had the Night of the Notables again this year and chose Napoleon for his project.

We had a momma bird set up her next on our transom window above our front door despite our every effort to discourage her. She laid her eggs and had baby birds in there for us to watch briefly before they flew the nest and we got rid of it. Unfortunately, while the nest was there, it attracted bird mites which made their way into the house in Sarah's bedroom above the front door. She was quite upset by the bugs in her room!

Then on to another dance comp, the Spotlight Dance Cup!

Sarah earned a Diamond score (top score category!) AND placed 2nd overall for soloists! This is remarkable because ballet is particularly hard to score highly in and usually doesn't place well when up against solos in other dance styles. She did an incredible job!

Sarah with another ballet soloist Taya.

And with her friend and teammate Ethan.

Steve made his dance competition debut in the Dads and Dolls number, "New York Lights", a Broadway themed number in which their group was from "Grease"