Tap Mom

My Tap Mom got married today.

No, not Vicki. (This is how rumors get started!)

AnnieK joined Tap Pups the same year I did, the year Vicki opened the studio¹. We met through Tap Pups, but one thing I love about the group is how you get to know so many awesome people from so many different backgrounds and experiences. It really is a community. We support each other in learning the dances and in life, through family issues, medical issues, and our various activities outside of tap. We shoe shop together² and go for meals together after class³.

¹ Previous to that, Vicki figured she had all the tappers and wannabe tappers in Central PA, all 50 of them. Then Everyone-needs-a-Brian got involved in the marketing and the Tap Pups took off. The year the studio opened, we had nearly 100 Beginner 1s⁴ and nearly 200 total tappers in four levels in the Spring Show. Now there are probably 500 Tap Pups. For more of the story, I highly recommend Vicki's memoir, Encore Performance, available in hardback and Kindle versions. There are also videos coded in that you can use your smartphone to get to Youtube clips.
² Becca and Lisa, I'm looking at you!
³ Betsy, Sabina, where should we go next? And when are you going to help me with the end of One, Marcia and Betsy?
⁴ Should that be Beginner 1's or Beginner 1s? Grammar Nazis, English Majors, help me out!

Anyways, AnnieK and I were in Beginner 1 together, dancing Stagger Lee⁵ and New York, New York with my Tap sisters⁶ and about 100 other B1s (B1's?⁴). We also plugged into Vicki's road trips, including a memorable (if wet) visit to Philly to dance on the Rocky steps at the Philadelphia Museum of Art for an international group of legislators. (How did we get hooked up with that? The organizer is a Tap Pup, of course.)

⁵ Now the B1s dance to Greased Lightning. I'm still working on how to get Vicki's choreography incorporated in my terping for Grease at CVHS. It's a work in progress.
⁶ Miss you, Elena and Jenni! Come back! D





Personally, I aspire to be an All-Star. But I've got a long ways to go for that.


Over the years, we've 1) inadvertently clubbed people with baseball bats 2) messed up Annie's hardwood floors with our taps 3) paraded around Harrisburg in day-glo green 3a) and even been followed by the mullet people

And today I was honored to join with Annie's and Terry's family-you-build for a celebration of two great countries coming together.


Congrats, you crazy kids. May you have many years of fun together.