Doing a little Cha-cha-cha

Today Anna and I headed across town to a Salsa Tots class. It had everything the name implies: latin music, maracas, and of course a conga line. The class was targeted at toddlers from 1 to 5 years of age though most of them were around the 18 month mark. One thing I'm finding and have heard other mommies comment as well is that these toddler classes are a lot of work for the parent. If you have a curious child, you'll be chasing your child around the room as he/she tries to rummage through everyone else's bags; if you have a fussy child, you'll be trying to appease them with cell phones and the like; if you have a child who is a little apprehensive in new environments (like mine!) you'll be holding them the entire time. So I salsa-ed, cha cha-ed and moved my hips to the beat (ok, maybe not to the beat) with Anna holding a maraca in one hand and a fist full of my shirt with the other hand. There was a brief period of time during the limbo where Anna settled for holding my hand while she limbo-ed underneath a scarf and then it was right back into my arms. I'm guessing if you do enough of these classes the child gets more comfortable and starts to participate but I think for us we need to wait until Anna is older (and I'm not pregnant) before doing structured classes - - the 2 1/2 year old in the class looked like she was having the most fun!