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While we've been recovering from The Sound of Music, more dramas have loomed on the horizon!

As I mentioned before, auditions for Charlotte's Web are this Friday, so Chicklet9 has been practicing.  She's singing "I'd Do Anything" from Oliver, and the truth is, as a veteran of just 3 shows, she can now memorize lyrics and choreograph movements all by herself.  I just need to remind her to do it every night, so she's got it down cold--the best way to shoot down the nerves.

After her audition, our family is going to see a friend star in a musical called Light in the Piazza. That, plus the drama of waiting hopefully for a callback and then for the cast list for Charlotte's Web, will be plenty of drama for one weekend.

Last week, besides playing general catch-up, I prepared for a new session of theater classes.  I am teaching an advanced drama class, two hours a week, which will conclude in the performance of a one-act comedy called "The Seussification of Romeo and Juliet."  It's the Shakespearean story told as Dr. Seuss would tell it:

Romeo:  
There's an optometrist whose name is Cupid,
He's opened my eyes, and made me less stupid.
I met a new girl, she's the best of the best.
She passed the Romeo "hot mama" test.

Lady Capitulate (to Juliet):
Yes!  It's I.  I'm your own dearest Mother.
I've been called the same by your sisters and brother.
I meant to say just what I said when I meant
That I am your Mother, One-hundred percent.

Last night, 17 teenagers, including B13, auditioned for roles in the play, performing highly entertaining monologues for myself and my aide for the class.  Then we had them read for various parts, and even the cold readings were hysterical.  So many of the kids could do almost any role; it made casting easy--and tough to decide.  The aide and I are pumped.  This is going to be such a fun project!

Further off, we have the drama of Holy Week coming up.  I am once again "casting" and "directing" most of the dramatized Scripture readings at the Easter Vigil, and also the Passion Reading for Palm Sunday.  Somehow this is more stressful than the drama class, because the casting never gets settled all in one night, and I don't get ten weeks to work with my readers for two hours a week!  I'm also arranging many of the readings.  Still much work to be done, on that front, and Palm Sunday only...2.5 weeks away.  Yikes!

Finally, the real-life drama:  My mother-in-law found out last Friday that she had a mass in her brain.  This was actually not as scary as one might expect, because she's had one brain surgery already, 23 years ago, when a congenitally malformed vessel ruptured, and this mass was in the same place. There is hope that this is residual tissue that may have been missed in the crisis at that time, and it would explain the seizures and other symptoms she's been experiencing in the last few years.

It's been hard to watch my strong, vibrant, outgoing mother-in-law declining to the point where she can barely walk down the aisle to receive communion in church.  They visit us frequently at Light of Christ, where both their sons and their families are on Sundays, even though it's a 1.5 hour drive for my father-in-law.  They came to spent the night on Saturday, so we could have dinner together, and then on Sunday afternoon, we all gathered to pray for Grandma, and Grandpa too. They are strong in the Lord, and in faith that He works all things together for good for them who love Him. It was sweet family time.

Her surgery was yesterday, and she came through it well.  Last report I heard, she was still sedated.  They believe they got all of the tissue, but we haven't heard the pathology report yet.  ...So the drama continues un

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One of the things about live theater--especially live theater with kids--is that there are always many humorous moments, on and offstage.

The directors like to memorialize these moments by giving funny awards for them.  For example, B16 received an award for Most Confused Parent, presented to him for Finally Figuring Out Which One is Louisa.  In one of the scenes, the Captain wonders aloud why Maria could have left so suddenly, without saying goodbye, and he is supposed to lead Louisa aside to ask her if she played any unpleasant tricks on Maria. Out of his five daughters--and two casts, so it wasn't even the same girl each show--it took him awhile to recognize the right girl to pull aside each time!

The directors said they intended to make a "God Saved Your Butt" award for him, as well, for one scene when the leads had to improvise because it was time for a song, and the music was not coming on. After a few lines of improv among the leads, B16 boldly stepped forward and asked, "Children, do you need a starting note?"  "Yes, Father," one of his children replied...and then all eyes turned to the Captain to see what he would do now??  Fortunately, the music started right at that moment, which made it seem almost like his improvised line was the cue, but still, we all knew he had no idea what he would have done next if it had not.

Chicklet8 received an award for Funniest Costume Challenge EVER, for Your determination to get your little sister dressed!  In the final scene, the Von Trapps appear on stage to sing at the Festival, "tea with jam, jam and bread." They are wearing traveling clothes, all in jackets and coats, and the Gretel, the youngest, rushing to get on stage with the rest, did not have her sweater on completely.  She tried unobtrusively to get her arm in the other sleeve, but was having difficulty, and then Chicklet noticed and began helping her.  "Leave it alone!" I was screaming mentally, but no, she kept helping, subtly, she thought, and then more overtly, and between them they still could not seem to get it on, and it was sooo distracting.  (I think it was upside down, with the collar at the little girl's waist.)  She helped and helped, and finally Maria tried, stepping in front of Chicklet, who then pushed around Maria to get back to her usual position at the front.  This was all as they were finishing their performance at the festival, and then during the Captain's little speech ("My fellow Austrians...") before he sings "Edelweiss" and then during the first part of his song.  The directors said they were in the back making the slit-throat gesture so that the girls would leave. the sweater. ALONE. and they imagined the poor Captain wondering why they wanted him to stop his song.  The director later came up to Chicklet and said, with a smile, "Sweetie, don't ever touch that sweater again!" Chicklet replied brightly, "Okay!  What sweater?"

Chicklet's class came to see the show, and it was amusing how they treated her afterward, like she was a celebrity.  They were in awe of the microphone still taped to her cheek.  "Do you get to keep it?" they all wanted to know.  "Will you sit with me on the bus going home?" one of them asked, forgetting that she had not come with them on the bus--and she had another show to do.  They made her a card when they got back to class, saying "Good job" and "Awesome singing" and "Up there on the stage it was you!"

I can't say much about the kissing scene, for fear of embarrassing B16, but they did have to practice a lot, because it was a fake kiss with his hand on the side of her face and his thumb over her lips so that he actually kissed his own thumb.  But they kept doing it too fast and it looked, on stage, more like a dive-bombing than a tender kiss. I shall refrain from further comment, except to state that all practicing was supervised by the directors!

Oh, and the moustaches.  As the Makeup Chairperso

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It's Production Week!

This week we have three dress rehearsals, eight performances, a strike party, a daughter home from college for Spring Break, Papa Rooster gone for a 4-day conference, and four grandparents here for the weekend.

I'm chairing the Makeup Committee again this time, so I'm frantically sorting eye pencils and brushes and latexing the backs of moustaches and beards prior to use.  I'm checking supplies and making my shopping list:  makeup sponges, makeup removal wipes, bobby pins. I'm wondering when I'm going to get my own kids' makeup and hair done, since we only have minutes after they get off the schoolbus before we have to leave.

I'm contacting friends about last-minute tickets to the show, and I'm reviewing Captain Von Trapp's lines with him daily.  (I know now when he deviates from the script, even without it in front of me!)  I'm helping with homework, late at night, and driving kids to school instead of them taking in the bus. I'm trying to make sure everyone eats and drinks and sleeps enough-- including me.

Onward and upward!

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And the good news is...the cast list was posted, and our kids all got leading parts!  Chicklet8 and Bantam12 are both double-cast as Von Trapp children--Marta and Friedrich.  This means they will play these parts in half the performances; in the other half, C8 is a Townsperson and B12 is a Party Guest.  So he will have to learn to waltz.  With a girl.  And wear an elegant suit.  He will be dashing, indeed.

And B16 is Captain Von Trapp!  He is so pleased, and eager for the challenge of a straight role.  He found his last role, as the comedic Little John in Robin Hood, to be almost too easy.  (Let's just say he and Little John have a lot in common.)  He has much in common with the Captain too; he's already used to ordering around his younger siblings off-stage, and now he will get to do it on-stage as well!  He is very good with kids, and he'll enjoy working with them in this show.

(The performances are March 1-4, local friends, but we don't know yet which performances will feature the Red Cast.  So don't rush to buy your tickets yet!  We'll let you know.)

The bad news is...I was in a car accident on Saturday, on my way to pick up Chicklet after her callback was finished.  I was heading north when the light turned yellow....and since I was going about 40 mph (under the 45 mph speed limit), and since there was still snow and ice on the roads in places, I kept going.  A southbound pickup truck waiting to turn left apparently had his eyes on the light but not on the traffic, and he began his left turn just as I entered the intersection.  I slammed on my brakes but had no time to stop.

My air bag cushioned me both from the sound and much of the impact of the crash.  I am sooo grateful for that air bag! Both of us drivers were okay, it seemed, and his passenger, a child in a car seat, was too.  What a mercy.

Almost 48 hours later now, I am sore all over. But my head and neck are better than my shoulders and ribcage, and I have pretty normal range of motion in my neck, able even to look over both shoulders, so I am better than I was after my other accident nearly three years ago.  It was a lower-speed accident and the air bag didn't deploy, so my body took the full shock that time.  (I really am grateful for that airbag!)

But I am heartsick about my beloved purple Prius.  I am so afraid that it's totaled.  Both airbags deployed, and it's turning 10 years old in 2012, with nearly 100,000 miles on it.  But it was still running after the accident, and surprisingly, it didn't appear too badly damaged.  I expected the whole front end to be completely crumpled, but it wasn't.  I think my brakes must have really slowed me down before impact.  So I still cling to some hope that the adjuster will find it worth repairing. It's a Toyota, and a hybrid, after all.  And it's my baby!

How life can change in an instant!  The remaining bit of "good news" that I am trying to soak up today is how every minute of life and health is a gift from God.  I am trying not to let my grief over my sweetheart car, that I may never drive again, overshadow the fact that my kids are not motherless and my husband is not a widower.  I am not crippled, hospitalized or in a wheelchair. I am trying not to let the financial concerns crowd out my gratitude for God's mercy on all three of us in the accident, and for the blessings of life and health.

I am reminded too, of the Advent truth that no one knows the day or the hour that Christ will return, and we should live as those prepared.  My heart echoes that Advent prayer from the first Sunday in Advent, that "when he shall appear, he may not find us sleeping in sin but active in his service and joyful in his praise."  And from the second Sunday in Advent, "when he comes again, we may be rea

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I am so excited.  A new 10-week session of theater begins this week!

I really missed it, while our kids were doing soccer this fall.  Even though I taught a drama class, it wasn't the same without my kids.  And I missed being involved with a production.  There's nothing like the thrill and the camaraderie of making that ten-week journey together.

So although we missed the Christmas Carol journey, we are excited to begin a new one:  auditions for The Sound of Music are this Friday night!  I am delighted that three of our kids are auditioning.  Chicklet8 and Bantam12 were givens, but B16 wasn't sure until recently.  For me, it simplifies my life when most of my kids are going in one direction, and I'm also happy when more of my own children benefit from the sacrifices of my time and energy that theater requires.  I love making these memories with my kids, though, so I'm glad that B16 will be making them with us.

B6 isn't old enough to audition for the production, but he's going to classes with us!  He'll be in Our Gang, an introductory theater class for 6- and 7-year-olds.  B12 is taking Improv, and Chicklet8 will be in Musical Theater.  B16 is going to be my aide in Drama 1.  It's a large class of 17 students, including one student with special needs; so he's a good fit, with his experience growing up with a brother with autism.  I'll be staying late to teach Drama 3:  Scenes and Monologues in the second time slot of classes.  I've been busy pulling together curriculum, scenes, and monologues, and I'm excited to teach this advanced class for the first time!

We have over 100 kids enrolled in classes for this winter session of our Christian theater group.  It has grown so much in 2+ years! There were so many new families last session.  I am eager to see how many more lives will be touched by this program as it grows. And I'm so happy to be part of it!

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Y'all know what has happened to me, right?

I'm lost in a Sherwood Forest of...

dress rehearsals...
makeup...
hair...
prom...
soccer games...
extra piano lessons...
laundry...
graduation announcements (done) and invitations (umm....)
graduation...
preparing for house-guests...
performances...
last-minute ticket sales...
...emotions...
...regrets that I can't find time to record it all for posterity and share it with all of you!

It's crazy, stressful, over-the-top busy, but it's also what I signed up for when I started having kids.  It's tough when it all converges like this, but it's all good and joyous and happy-making and I am grateful, soooo grateful, to be part of it all.

Now if I can just live through it...!

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It was a big weekend at the Henhouse.  Papa Rooster came home, after a week of absence--his second in a row.  All this traveling on his calendar, and my inability to join him, has got us thinking about ways of celebrating our 25th wedding anniversary, coming up this December.  We always say we'll get away some other part of the year, when it's not as busy as Christmas time, but then we rarely do.  Or it's connected to his company's big March conference, like when we went to San Antonio last year and Orlando the year before, and that's what he just returned from.  So we're thinking of celebrating early this year.  We're looking online at last-minute deals, and I'm getting excited!

He returned on Friday in time to make the kids' auditions for Robin Hood, our spring musical.  Wish I had time to figure out how to share video.  (PR thinks it's complicated and hates doing it, which doesn't encourage me, and our teens never use the good camera, just their phones, so they're no help.)  So let me describe them briefly, because they all did so well!

B12 performed the theme from The Muppet Show: "It's time to play the music/ It's time to light the lights/ It's time to meet the Muppets/ On the Muppet Show tonight!"  He started out marching, walking like an Egyptian, and playing the tenor sax before the singing actually began, and he did two character voices in the middle for the two old guys in the balcony who ask, "Why do we always come here? /I guess we'll never know/ It's like a kind of torture/ To have to watch this show!"  His facial expressions were hilarious throughout.

Chicklet8 performed "Do-Re-Mi" from The Sound of Music, from "Let's start at the very beginning...." After years of watching her parents help her older siblings think of movements and choreography for their audition choices, C8 hardly needed any help coming up with her own little moves and dance steps for "doe, a deer" and  "ray, a drop of golden sun," and so on.  She is especially good at facial expressions, and she tries hard to put expression in her voice too.  She was just so darn cute!  You'd never have guessed it was only her second audition.

B15 auditioned as well--his first time in over a year.  He ended up using the same romantic ballad he sang last time, "Till There Was You," by the Beatles.  But this time, instead of doing it straight, he decided to lighten it up unexpectedly.  So he sang the first lines beautifully, "There were bells/ On a hill/ But I never heard them ringing," reaching a hand to his ear as if listening; on the next line "No, I never heard them at all," he began twisting his finger in his ear as if digging out earwax, then pulled it, examined it, and then pointed with it as he sang the next line, "Till there was you."  Then he wiped it on his pants and continued on in that lighthearted, only-half-serious vein.  It was great.

Both boys were called back for lead roles on Saturday, and C8 was slightly disappointed not to get a callback too, since there were three speaking parts for little children.  Meanwhile, Blondechick was at a Solo and Ensemble contest as part of a trio from her school choir.  They sang "Nelly Bly," a very cute arrangement, with one girl singing the melody and the other two singing "bum, bum; bum, bum" as accompaniment.  The judge had almost nothing but good things to say, and they are going on to the State competition in May!

BC showed me a video of her trio that her friend h

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Both Papa Rooster and I are going to have lots of memories of this show! 

He got more involved than he really had time for, with what sounded like a simple picture-taking assignment.  When he learned that the pictures were to be Photoshopped onto a background and made into fridge magnets, parent badges and candy bar wrappers, to be sold as show souvenirs, he volunteered to help out with the Photoshop piece of it as well.

He did a beautiful job with the individual magnets and badges, then combined them to create photo montages of different groupings of kids.  You could buy a "Wonka Bar" with School Kids, Soda Pop Dancers, Oompa Loompas, Townspeople or Ticket Winners on the wrapper--and they were so popular, they sold out immediately.  They're making more for next weekend!  Imagine this image wrapped around a jumbo bar of chocolate:

With and without wig and makeup, as you can see.  And speaking of wigs and makeup, although I wasn't officially on the makeup committee this time, I've helped a good bit with turning these...





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At least I feel like one after the last week!

After three nights of dress rehearsals, two school day shows and three public performances of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, we are all a little Oompy-Loompy.

Ah, and here's our favorite little Oompa Loompa now!

That's her, directly underneath the Woody doll that Willy Wonka is holding.  Woody is the miniature version of Mike Teavee, of course.  That's a TV screen behind them.


And there's her reaction (click to enlarge) after Wonka suggests they put Mike into the taffy-pulling machine to stretch him back to normal size.  In just a moment, she will take Mrs. Teavee's purse, they will drop Mike into it and she'll be the one to carry purse and doll offstage.  It's the one moment that we can tell our friends to watch for and know it's her!


Because you know those Oompa Loompas...they all look alike.  (She's directly behind the two seated girls.)

On the other hand, our friends will have no trouble picking out B12.  He sings the opening lines of the first number:  "I can't stop eating sweets, all those wonderful Willy Wonka treats; you can keep the others, but me, I'm a Wonkerer!"


He's a School Kid named James, and he is a friend of Charlie Bucket, the main character, in the middle.  The girl on the left is Matilda, another school friend of Charlie's.


James, Matilda and Charlie help the Candy Man sing "The Candy Man." Can you guess why these friends are named James and Matilda?

Anyone?  Anyone?

My parent commitment this time was acting as a docent, visiting schools who were bringing classes to see the show.  I asked each group lots of questions about the characters, but this question, about these two characters, stumped every class.  They're not in the movie, for one thing.  But then I would ask if the kids had read any other books by Roald Dahl, the

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Tuesday night was the final Showcase performance that wound up our spring session of classes for our new theater group here in Kenosha!  I was so proud of my teachers and of the kids.  Each class performed so well; every number was entertaining and impressive.  I emceed the evening, and made the announcement to our families that I would not be coming back in the fall. Afterward, we had a

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So I forgot to pick up this thread until now, but in our upcoming production of Disney's Mulan, the Bantams both have fun roles!B10 is Chi Fu.If that visage rings no bells for you: He's the Emperor's consul, who alternates between being comic relief and the brunt of other soldier's jokes, and the bad guy who threatens the hero (Shang) with removal from his position as Captain of the regiment.

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We're Who's here, We are Whos here,Smaller than the eye can see...I'm the mayor of Who. Why, I've just been elected.And upright behavior is thus forth expected.We just had a talk with your teachers todayAnd they didn't have one single good thing to say!You invented new Thinks which defy all description!You gave Miss O'Dooley a nervous conniption!Your Thinks were so wild they disrupted your

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(Yeah!)There's a rustle in the bushes...There's a tremble in the trees...Hear it like a whisper,Smell it on the summer breeze (Mmm-hmm-mmm)Something big is coming nearerSomething big is coming through...Got some monkey business, that's what we intend to do!Well it's bigger than a breadbox,Hey, it's wider than a whale,Peanut butter breathAnd scared to death from head to tail.To Horton: "So you're

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Well, we are all on the other side of illness now, it seems--everyone is back to school, back to work, back to rehearsals and classes.It hit me last Monday that there was only one week until dress rehearsals for Seussical begin! Before I got sick, I had purchased (at Goodwill) an old suitcase on wheels to use as our theater group's new makeup kit, and I had purchased basic Walmart-type supplies

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Thank you, everyone, who's been doing just that, waiting on me to come back from my too-busy-to-blog break!I should do a birthday post today for Miss Chicklet7, whose birthday was on Sunday. But her pictures are on the home computer and I have too much other news anyway. (Next time!)I feel like the last six weeks has been one big educational switch-a-roo after another, and the last week

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Well, Blondechick15 is not the only one switching schools this year. Chicklet6.95, who was homeschooled for kindergarten last year, is going to the local elementary school for first grade! I just got her enrolled last week. It's been a mad frenzy of educational decisions around here lately, and I still have to plan what we're doing with the homeschooled kids this year. One at a time...But I

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Do you ever find yourself caught up in an inexorable current that you KNOW is the Lord moving and acting? We feel that way about Light of Christ. And it's happening again...as I am helping to start up a new chapter of our Christian youth theater group. (I have been calling it a children's theater group, but I just learned that in the theater world, children's theater is usually put on by

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