One of the things I love about shooting in Texarkana is it gives me an excuse to see some of the most important people in the world...my parents, my brother and sister in law, and my adorable wonderful smart precocious funny nieces. This past weekend I was so lucky that it was the weekend of the girls "cheer camp" where they go for a few hours, learn a cheer and a dance and then they perform it for friends and family.
Well the two girls performances could not have been more opposite, and I just adored both of them. :)
Brooklyn is 7, she is very grown up now and she wasn't messing around. She knew the cheer and the dance and she worked it OUT. Here is a pic of her doing her thing, do you notice how she's the only one not looking over at the teacher doing the dance? And she's pretty much the only one doing the right move...girlfriends got some skills :) (Sorry, I'm that obnoxious proud aunt.)
And then there is Ella, aka monkey (I'm the only one that calls her monkey but I just can't help it, she's my cute little monkey!) So Ella comes marching out on the gym floor with the rest of the kids and I am front and center with my giant camera so of course, she spots me first. She then proceeds to yell "aunt avery aunt avery!" and then she starts making monkey sounds like she always does for me, then when the music starts and all the kiddos get in a line to do their dance they've worked so hard on...well at this point my monkey flat out steals the show. She jumped out about 5 or 6 feet in front of the other kids, yells "aunt avery watch!" and then she proceeds to break it down and do a solo dance complete with spins and twists and jumps not one of which matched up with the moves the rest of the kiddo's behind her were doing. In the pic you can see she's worked her way out of the line and is pretty much not doing anything the other kids are doing. :)
Gosh I love my girls :)