Blue vs. pink
HighStepper director reveals her baby’s gender to the team
Photo by Reese Langdon
March 7, 2023
During fifth period on Monday March 6, HighStepper Director Amber Reynolds finally answers the big question to the anxiously awaiting but overjoyed HighSteppers: is it a boy or girl? Months prior, Reynolds told the team that she was expecting.
“[Reynolds] had a slideshow made, and it was a picture of her dog,” junior Ella Graham said. “At the moment, I was talking to my friends. I wasn’t really catching on. All of a sudden, someone gasped, and I looked up at the board. It said, ‘big sister’ [on the dog’s bandanna].”
After the realization had spread across the whole team, there were many hugs shared and tears shed.
“In that moment, my heart just dropped. Whenever I got on the team my freshman year, she [lost her baby]. It was really sad because I just really wanted that for her,” Graham said. “Whenever I found out, I just ran up to her immediately, and I was so happy for her.”
Due to Reynold’s troubles in previous pregnancies, this baby holds a special place in everyone’s heart. The team could not be more excited for Reynolds.
“It made me really happy because I knew that she had been trying for so long,” senior captain Emma Giddings said. “At first, I was in shock because I didn’t think that that was the news that we were going to be getting on that day.”
After the shock and excitement died down, each team member had much to say to the mother-to-be.
“I told her that I was really excited to see what the future would hold for her, Jeff and their baby,” Giddings said. “I also said that I couldn’t wait to come and visit the baby.”
Ever since this special moment, the team’s dynamic shifted to focusing on Reynolds and the beloved addition to her family.
“[The HighSteppers] ask me all the time how I’m feeling; they ask me how big the baby is and they’ve just been super supportive this whole time for me,” Reynolds said.
The team is ecstatic, but for the seniors, the news is a little bittersweet. The nine of them know that they will not be as involved in the baby’s life as they would have wanted to be.
“We’ve been here for so long, and not being able to be there when one of the biggest things happens to her, makes me very sad,” Giddings said. “But, I am just glad she gets to have a baby in general.”
Although the whole team is overjoyed to meet ‘Baby Reyn,’ there have been some friendly arguments and competitiveness over what gender the baby will be. On the day of the gender reveal, each HighStepper dressed in either pink or blue. Reynolds wore white and black to not give any hints.
“I’m on team boy because I think Mrs. Reynolds has enough of us girls, so I think God’s going to give her a guy,” junior Cassidy Grant said.
Grant was one of the few dancers to wear blue. The HighStepper studio was a sea of pink on this day.
“I see lots of team girls when I look around the room right now,” freshman Meredith McPhaul said. “We think that Mrs. Reynolds needs to have a dancing girl.”
Though each side was very passionate about their belief, there could only be one correct team. Reynolds decided to announce this in a fun, creative way.
“I made cupcakes for the whole team,” Reynolds said. “Inside the cupcakes is either pink or blue icing for the team to eat later at the end of practice.”
It was finally 3:40 p.m. Every HighStepper hurriedly grabbed a cupcake and impatiently waited for Reynolds to give them the go. Before the “Go!” could even get all the way out of her mouth, the dancers bit into their cupcakes.
“I knew it would be a girl,” senior Ellie Manneth said. “We love her already.”
