Stage Parents

Today is officially the first day of Spring Break--hooray!  It started off with a bang as our little family had a fantastic day, soaking up the time together as well as the most beautiful weather we've had in months.  Most notably though, we took Zoe to see her first play.  A local children's theatre (The Peanut Butter Players) has been performing a kid-version (shortened and performed entirely by kids) of Annie and a friend of ours was taking her little girl, who is a good friend of Zoe's.  We decided to buy tickets too, and check it out...and we were so glad we did.  Zoe was pretty psyched to go and brought along quite a few accessories, all with a very specific purpose.  She wore some shades (of course), wrapped a buddy in a blanket, packed a backpack and purse full of things she plans to bring to our vacation in The Cape this summer (don't worry, I don't get it either), and her valentine heart box with pieces of pine cone in case her backpack got hungry.  It was all so important that when her friend Nina asked if she could play with the stuff in her backpack, Zoe said "No, we can't cuz that's my stuff for The Cape."

Headed to the show!

After we got the tickets from the box office, we were seated by a little girl who introduced herself and informed us that she would be playing Miss Hannigan.  She waited a few seconds to witness our reaction at being seated by the ACTUAL ACTRESS playing Miss Hannigan and, clearly a little thrown by our mere friendliness, proceeded to show us to our seats at "Table 1".  Our table was one of maybe 10 buffet tables covered with plastic red and white checkered tablecloths (they serve a sack lunch after the show) and we immediately felt overdressed in our jeans and sweatshirts.  Not at all disappointed, though we settled into our seats and waited for the show to begin.

Nina and Zoe waiting patiently for the show to start

Right before the show started, the kids in the audience were invited to sit on the floor right up front, and they all clamored up happily as the lights dimmed.  The show was full of sweetly singing kids ranging in age from 7 to about 12 and while they all had nice voices and full personalities, the performances were charmingly stiff and self-conscious.  Our kids were completely sucked in the entire time, and Nathan and I ate it up.  We both admitted to getting choked up a few times and I even got chills during the closing number.  If you know us, that's probably not at all surprising since it's no secret that we are COMPLETE SAPS.  I couldn't help but notice that we reacted this way to a kids show that didn't have anyone we know in it.  Imagine what will happen if one or both of our kids decides to do this kind of thing when the time comes...I can only promise that I will NOT be one of those Mom's mouthing the words with tears streaming down my face, reminding my child to smile...other than that I guarantee nothing.

For the rest of the day, the songs have been predictably running through our heads and Zoe has been trying to work out the lyrics to "Tomorrow" ("The tunnel comes out, tomorrow...").  Couldn't have been a more perfect theatre experience if you ask me.

This afternoon, we soaked up the sun at our playground and brought out our kite since it was a little windy out.  We admittedly weren't very successful but we had a lot of fun trying!  Spring is in the air, for sure--yay!