Katie & Justin

Father-Daughter-Dance-Practice from Katie Drews on Vimeo.

Remember when my dad and I rocked the house with some surprise choreography during the father/daughter dance?!!!

So many people were shocked to see my dad bustin’ those moves on the dance floor, and after our performance everyone kept asking me, “How did you convince him to do that?!”

Well, believe it or not, it was his idea!

And I still can’t believe we were able to pull it all off…

Here’s how it went down: My dad first mentioned it when we were in Missouri over Memorial Day weekend, saying it would be funny because no one would see it coming (truth!). I wasn’t quite sure if he was serious or not, but he planted the seed in my head and later on I found myself watching videos online to see how others have done similar dances.

The wedding planning craziness sort of got in the way and took over from there. I was so busy trying to finish up things that we never addressed the idea again — until 4th of July weekend, the weekend before the wedding!

Again we were in Missouri for the holiday, and my dad and I drove back home together. During the car ride I asked him if he thought we could still pull it off, and to my surprise, he thought we could. I was really nervous about it, but if he thought it was possible, how could I say no?! Luckily it was just the two of us in the car so we were able to start scheming without anyone overhearing…

Our first night of “rehearsal” was Tuesday night after work. My mom and sister were still in Missouri so we were able to use my parent’s house to practice. We spent a good chunk of time choosing what songs to use and how to figure out what dance moves to do, looking at my sister’s Just Dance video games for inspiration. My dad suggested “The Final Countdown” because that had been a family favorite while playing Just Dance, and we both knew the grand finale had to be Backstreet Boys’ “Everybody” because, well, what else?! Once we knew those two songs were “must haves”, I looked for others that had dance “instructions” built into the lyrics of the song….I’d take whatever help I could get!

Our next night’s practice was going to be tough because my mom was coming back home and we didn’t want her to find out. Our tentative plan was to go my place, and then somehow find a way to keep Justin downstairs … I wanted it to be a surprise for him, too! In the end, we ended up sneaking in to my dad’s office and then used the open space in the warehouse at his work to practice in. If anyone was monitoring security cameras, they were in for a treat!

The next two nights we’d meet after work and rehearse in the warehouse until probably midnight or so. I kept telling Justin I had to go to the suburbs to finish up the wedding decor, and my dad told my mom he had to come to my place to fix the wedding arch. All in all, it was only three nights total — again, the week before the wedding! I was pretty impressed we were able to learn so much so quickly. By the last few trial runs, we had everything pretty much nailed down.

The day of the wedding, I woke up by myself in the hotel room and decided to do a practice run one more time, even though I was alone, haha. I realized then that when I transferred the songs over to my iPhone (which is what I needed to give the band the music) from my computer (which I had been using during our practices), the fading in and out in between songs no longer worked. So without the fading, each song was about 5 to 6 seconds longer than it should be. That’s a TON of dead time in between each song that we had not planned for!! We would just have to stand there awkwardly and wait, and it could even throw us off for the timing of everything!! I couldn’t believe this was happening!

Thankfully I had brought my laptop with me, so I quickly began editing the songs, trying to trim them down so each one stopped at the same point as we had it during practice. As I was finishing the last song, I got a call from my hair and makeup people that they were on the way, and I literally finished it as they walked into my hotel room. Phew!!! Talk about last minute! Now I was just crossing my fingers that it would play correctly…

Later that day, after the ceremony was over but before the dances began, everyone kept telling me, “Now you can relax!!” And I would smile, thinking… if only you knew!!

UP NEXT: Video of the actual dance.