Playing Catch Up: Oklahoma City Ballet

Shortly after returning from her cruise in June, Hallie spent three weeks at Oklahoma City Ballet's senior summer intensive. 

This wasn't her first intensive, but it was her first time staying in a dorm, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little nervous about how she'd handle being away from home - and without me, Tom, Will, and/or her besties - for such an extended period of time. 

I shouldn't have worried. 

She forced her (introverted) self to jump headfirst into the experience, and she proved that she is more than capable of finding her way, overcoming challenges, making friends, and taking care of herself. She's still a couple of years away from heading off to college, but this experience gave her a lot of confidence going into the big life changes that lie ahead.

Saying goodbye to Will. 😓

The main studio space at OKC is INCREDIBLE.

All of the dancers in her level.

With her friend and roommate, Savannah.

They went to Target A LOT.

They cleaned!

And did laundry!

With their suitemates-turned-wonderful friends.

It was hard to say goodbye.

They had a lot of fun around Edmond on their days off.

There's a place near the dorms (it's a gorgeous campus)
where lots of dancers do photoshoots, so Hallie and a
couple of friends spent a little while there one evening, just
snapping pics with their phones. It's a gorgeous campus.

I asked Hallie if she wanted to go back to OKC next summer, and to my surprise, she said no. When I asked why, she explained that the experience could never be replicated...and if she went back, she'd just be disappointed that summer two couldn't live up to summer one. So she'll go somewhere else in 2026, and the summer of 2025 at OKC will remain its own nearly perfect memory.

*Hangs Head in Shame*

I feel a lot of guilt when I don't keep up with something I mean to keep up with, so here I am, feeling a lot of guilt about not keeping up with the blog these last three months. 

I know it's perfectly acceptable for me to take breaks, first during the final two months of Will's senior year of high school, and then again throughout the past three months as we traveled (what felt like) a million miles back and forth across the country and crammed in Hallie's summer ballet intensive in Oklahoma, Will's senior trip across seven states, Tom's brother's wedding in Washington, Will's soccer tournament in Colorado, and then finally moving Will to the University of Iowa. But I still feel guilty...and now on top of that, I also feel overwhelmed as I face the mountain of catching up that awaits me.

I know that someday I'll stop writing here, and now - when I'm so far behind - would be a reasonable time to just call it quits. But I also know that I'm not ready to walk away just yet; I value this creative space and the history these posts will one day (already?) provide for Will and Hallie too much. 

So now I'm going to get back to it. Posts might be a bit more sporadic, and I'll likely intersperse real time posts with catch up posts, but I'm committed...at least for a couple more years. 

With no context, no explanations, and in no particular order, here are a few tiny teasers of what the catch up posts will include...

I'll be back soon, I promise!