I've been catching some flack for not keeping the ol' blog updated recently. I don't have a particularly good excuse... just have been busy.
Abbey and Emery just finished a fun summer drama program called Camellot Academy. (Or as Emery likes to say, "Cademy A Camelot." In camp, they participated in voice, dance, art, acting, and chorus, and they had performances every Thursday evening throughout camp. I have video of these performances, and will post some of it once I have a chance to process it. Last weekend, they both appeared in the end-of-camp performance of "Peter Pan."
You should have seen Emery. She gave a whole new meaning to the term, "Lost Child." She had messy pigtails in her hair as part of her costume...at one point on Saturday night the little girl next to her reached over to straighten it out...Emery looked sharply at her and told her under no uncertain terms to cut it out. She looked like she was going to whack the girl. Then there were the bug bites. All the other little lost boys and girls were singing "ug-a-whug" while Emery was scratching for bug bites. Totally hilarious when she tried to look a the particularly itchy ones on the back side of her thigh. Each time she finished looking them over and scratching, she caught right up in line with where she was supposed to be on stage. Every time the lost children came out to do another number, I just couldn't wait to see what she'd do next!
Abbey was a lovely Mrs. Darling, but an even better pirate. They assigned her pirate character to act drunk. She never spoke a word, but managed to appear completely toasted throughout every dance sequence. I laughed until I cried at her eyes and gestures as she bounced off the other pirates or stumbled around or just looked bewildered. David said she reminded him of Lucille Ball, the way she would always try to blend in and yet somehow make every scene appear as though it were all about her. I thought she looked like Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Caribbean--when I said something about it to her after the show, she said, "That's who I was pretending to be!" Her drama teacher said she was really glad that Abbey had another role, so that the audience wouldn't just think she was like that all the time. She just absolutely never broke character, no matter what was going on around her.
I ordered a copy of the show on DVD. I'll see if I can maybe capture a couple little snippets for distribution when it comes. Lots of friends and family came to see the performance, including Grandma Susie & Grandpa David, Grandpa Bob & Grandma Ramona, cousin Damien, Uncle Ryan & Aunt Kim, Uncle Kenny & Aunt Brenda, Grandma Jennie & Grandpa Allen, and of course Helen was there because Emery's friend Julia was also in the show as an extra cute little pirate.
Tyler has had a busy summer too. He and David spent a week at Venture Crew camp, and then Tyler spent 9 days at Boy Scout Camp. That was some adventure! Tyler and his friend Chris won the "Messy Tent" traveling trophy award (which happened to be a stuffed gorilla) the morning of Visitor's Sunday. His tent is usually clean, but apparently the judging happened earlier than he anticipated. Anyway, after cleaning his tent, Tyler hung the trophy by a rope outside of his tent. Some campers in the next tent over were from another troop--their parents saw the gorilla hanging from a noose outside of Tyler's tent and were terribly offended. In fact, they must have been very very offended, because they complained to the Camp Commissioner. So later that night, the Commissioner came down to the camp site demanding to know who had done this terrible thing. Tyler claimed responsibility, and the virtual beating began. Now, I wasn't there for any of this, but I've heard accounts from multiple people who were there, including the Camp Commissioner, the Scout Master, Tyler, and several other Scouts and Scouters. What I'm told is that Tyler was pretty severely dressed down by the camp commissioner for being a terrible scout, failing to live up to being a good tribesman, and just generally being a racist.
Whoa! Really? A racist? We were totally shocked. None of us had any idea that a noose or a gorilla would be offensive in any way. Our kids have stuff hanging from ropes all the time. The gorilla has been the traveling "dirty tent" trophy for many a camp session over the years. What followed next was a series of apologies, varying degrees of acceptance of said apologies, a visit to camp from David & me to speak personally with the folks involved. All is well that ends well. Nobody believes Tyler is a racist anymore. The kids in the camp next door were forgiving. Our troop adults (mostly) forgave the camp commissioner for jumping to conclusions. And life marches onward. But it was exciting for a while. I figure this experience will give Tyler some great stuff to write about in an essay someday. Everyone's got to have their great "misunderstood" stories to write about, Right?
Tyler also got his first job this summer, working for Ken Wilcox in Grain Valley. Tyler basically does anything Ken asks him to do and then gets paid at the end of the week. I'm not sure what to call that job. Grandma Jennie tried to get more information out of him last weekend. She concluded that he is a janitor. I'm not so sure--do janitors load all your personal contacts into your new cell phone for you? Tyler does seem happy about getting paid though, and he really likes getting assigned specific tasks he can just go complete--and I'm super happy with Tyler getting someone else to give him money. That kid is freaking expensive! Actually, all of our kids are really freaking expensive. Sometimes I think I need to sit down and re-think my entire parenting strategy. Somewhere out there in the world, someone has come up with a way to raise kids who are not as expensive as my kids are--I'm just postive that must be the case.
I've stopped putting all my daily dietary habits in SparkPeople. I keep thinking I need to start doing that again--I really do very well at exercising and eating healthy when I keep up with it. I'm experiencing something less than commitment at the moment, however. Looking for inspiration, I suppose.
That's all for now. More to come soon...
