Here in Guatemala, celebrating a girl's 15th birthday is a big deal. The parents host a party called a "quinceañera" and invite a lot of people. This past year we attended two such parties, both of which took place at our church. For the first party, Elena and I (Heather / Erica) went the afternoon before and helped blow up hundreds of balloons.
For the second party, the mom asked me to teach two dances to the children and youth that would be participating. So I choreographed two dances to Christian songs and practiced them with the kids for several weeks ahead of time. There were 14 children and 4 youth boys. A local seamstress sewed the girls dresses.
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The girl in the blue dress is the
birthday girl, named Sucely. |
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| The children opened the event with their dance. |
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Then, unexpectedly, I was in charge of keeping
all those precious, wiggly, giggly kids quiet
(or mostly so) for over an hour! |
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During the course of the evening, the children
took turns taking objects to Sucely that
represented stages in her life. For example,
Veronica took her a Barbie doll that symbolized her
childhood; then another girl came and received it from
her, symbolizing that Sucely is moving into womanhood
and will be giving up her childhood toys. |
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| The boys did a good job with their hip-hop dance. |
