#DisneyOnIce and Me

This is not a review. I want to be upfront about that. This has become our February family tradition – every year – we race off to see this amazing Disney On Ice show at the John Labatt Centre. This is a post about love and traditions and the ways in which we celebrate being parents and childhood. And the bittersweet way that kids grow so strong so fast and leave us shaking our heads, holding our hearts in our hands.

From the time my oldest daughter was two, we would every December, walk over repeatedly to the London Public Library local branch or children’s branch and read together. We love reading and my daughter Payton, now ten, has always loved the library. Such a great reader early on. I love that – a passion we share. And every December we start the contest as soon as we read about it. The contest where you read books and have the potential to win passes to see Disney on Ice. My girls always read a lot and we always win. And I love that. First we were just the two of us. Payton and me. Dad opted not to see princesses skating the first year. And then Ainsley joined our family. And from then on we were a family of four – Disney fans. I wrote a post about this last year.

Every year I am amazed, so amazed that I am often moved to tears by the show, and the beauty of watching my children react to the skating and the spectacle, and the stories being told on ice. This last couple of years, I have found myself a bit apprehensive, always thinking it will be a little less special, a little less magical and that my kids will be less in love with the skating princesses. And, the first half of the show last night was a fair bit of confirmation that my kids had possibly outgrown this tradition and I was, indeed, less moved than before. I was actually sad thinking this would be the year, the last time I cried at Disney on Ice.

But the second half of the show, when Rapunzel and Flynn Rider showed up and they tricked us into looking somewhere else while the special effects people produced a bunch of magical lanterns, well, that sealed it for me. And for my kids too. Up until last night my oldest girl was clearly telling me should wished that she might have brought her best friend and not her sister, but I told her repeatedly it is a family tradition. Last night, way too tired at well past nine when she fell asleep, she confided that she was once again glad we had gone to see Disney on Ice. I was too. It is our family tradition. And some things are worth holding onto as long as you can.