Show and Spell--Lydia's best show yet!

Lydia logged her third theater production with the group at Blue Ridge Community College this past weekend.  She was AMAZING!!  She played Eloise, the maid of a wealthy woman named Ms. Worthington and Ms. Worthington's daughter, Desiree.  All of the characters in this play were hilarious and ridiculous so each of the young actors were encouraged to go big as there was nothing too big for any of them.  Lydia totally embraced these instructions and made Eloise absolutely hilarious!!  MANY of the parents and people in the audience, when they found out that "the maid" was my daughter, they commented on how good she was and that she "stole the show" in some cases.  We were so proud of her!!!  I wish I had been able to film her parts as they were so funny!!!

Flash photography is not allowed in the theater.  I was fortunate enough to be able to go in on their rehearsal night and take some pictures of everyone.  I shared them with all the parents.  Here are some of our great actress, Lydia!!

There are typically warm up exercises done before each rehearsal and each time they perform the play.

Her expressions were so fantastic!

One of my favs!

Not wanting to go to the mall with Desire

Curtain call

Her BRCC Theater Program friends.  Olivia and Bridget (holding dog)

Her peeps--Penny, Adella, Lydia, Emily Sponagule and Emily Washington

Show program

Lydia and Ryan Summer Campin 2

Ryan and Lydia did some summer camps this year!!  Ryan always does band camp and Lydia always does Drama camp, but this year they were able to do something different.  Drama camp happened to be held the same week as the family went to Myrtle Beach so Lydia had to forego that one.  She has been doing the Blue Ridge Community College theater programs so it was not a big deal to miss.  Ryan did band camp again this summer, but he wanted to go to Brethren Woods Camp with his friends Kemper and Kendall.

In lieu of Drama Camp, Lydia did culinary camp at one of our local high schools.  Not only did she get to bake a TON of goodies, but she got to bring samples home!!  They were wonderful!!  The high school did about 30 different camps that kids could sign up and participate.  After the week of baking pizza dough, homemade rolls, cake, cookies, banana bread and so many other goodies, they had a little end of the week ceremony.  Lydia's camp didn't do a skit like some of the camps, but we were able to look at some pictures that her instructor took and the camp posted on a display board.

 During their week, her camp took a field trip to a locally owned Italian restaurant.  There, they made their own pizza and then ate lunch there while eating their pizza.  Lydia really enjoyed this one!

I asked her instructor to send me copies of the pictures that Lydia is in, but she never did.  These are pictures of the pictures that I took of Lydia's week.

 Everyone had to take their turn washing dishes.

 A cake they made and she brought home the leftovers!

 Making the sugar cookies--homemade!!

After viewing the pictures, she was able to take me to the classroom where her camp me each day.

 This was her group's kitchen station.  Lydia in her kitchen!!

These are the sugar cookies that she made.  She was able to bring them home.  She made one for each member of the family and for her cousins as well.  They were visiting part of the week she was at camp.  The week was great and she loved it!  The notebook is something she got to bring home as well.  It has a print out of all the recipes they made through the week.  She has made several of them since.

Emily was not offered a camp this year because I was really hoping she was going to do a golf camp.  As it turns out, she has no interest in golf what so ever.  By the time I accepted this, it was too late to sign her up in a camp.  So, Emily was able to spend some time with friends, with her mother and brush up on her swimming that week.  Grammy's Bible School was going on that same week and my nieces, Adella and Penny were at Grammy's house that week to be able to go to Bible School.  Two of those days, Emily and I helped out Grammy by keeping Adella and Penny for the day (and overnight once) so Grammy could go help our family friends.

We took advantage of the days and took the girls on Emily's "mini camp."  Geocaching, walking through the park on a VERY hot day, playing on the playground, going to the dog park and hitting the weekly, summer, dollar movie.  It was a fun time!!

We have promised Emily a real camp next year.  :)

Break a Leg Lydia!!

Lydia has always done the Turner Ashby Drama Camp that is held each summer.  This year we signed her up for the Blue Ridge Community College production of Looking Glass Land.  She was in a cast of kids that ranged from 9 years old to 17 years old.  Some of these kids had been doing the BRCC productions for years and some were just starting like Lydia.  She made some great friends and learned so much about acting and stage presence!  She is ready to do the fall musical that starts in September.  The cast practiced each Saturday from January until May.  The week of the production she had rehearsal every night.  It was great seeing her come home every night made up like the red pawn.  :)  Even coming to Emily's softball game, made all up, one night was particularly funny.  She was so wonderful and Mike and I were so proud of her!!!  They did their production three different nights and one afternoon.  We were blown away by the talent that radiated from that stage each time!!

Ms. Cline, Lydia's teacher came to see her on opening night.  She was so surprised and happy to see her!!  Such a special lady!!  Lydia had a classmate, Owen, who was also in this production.  Ms. Cline gave them each such a sweet card and gift card on their opening night.  We will miss her next year in Middle School!!

These two girls were Lydia's dear friends!!  Lydia is next to Olivia and the one in the jean shorts (who had already changed out of her costume before I could catch her for a picture) was Moriah.  Moriah was the first friend Lydia made and Olivia was one that came later.  They were three peas in a pod.  It was great!!  Moriah is home schooled and going into the 7th grade and Oliva goes to another middle school in our district and is also entering 7th grade.  I don't believe there was anyone else that was Lydia's age (entering 6th grade), but they were great to her.  They had also both done BRCC productions in the past.

Grammy and Paw Paw came to see Lydia for the Friday production.  It was great that they were able to come see her!  Grammy came back on Sunday with Lydia's cousin Penny (Adella was not able to come), but Penny didn't want to take a picture with Lydia that day.  Guessing the make up threw her.  :(

This is another Olivia.  She played Alice.  Lydia really liked her and wanted to have her picture with Alice.  I love it!!  She had A LOT of lines to memorize.  It was crazy!!

This picture was taken during a warm up exercise one of the practice nights.  This is Moriah, Lydia and Oliva waiting for their turn in the warm up.

This is the play director.  Justine.  She was AMAZING!!!  She is very laid back and was so great for Lydia and her first year doing this BRCC production.  She is not the director of the musical, but I am sure we will be seeing her next year for the winter/spring production!!!

On Sunday, two of Lydia's good friends and classmates came to see her in Looking Glass Land.  Owen is the guy in the crown next to her.  He was the "Red King" and actually played Lydia's dad in the play.  She thought that was pretty funny. Owen was great as well!!  They are both future talents for sure!!!  Next to Emily is Abby.  She has gone to school with Lydia and Emily for three years now.  Her dad is in the military and this is the longest she has ever stayed in one place.  The day after the last day of school, Abby and her family moved to Hawaii.  Next to Abby and Lydia is Jesela.  She is also a good friend of Lydia's.  She has appeared in blog posts before.

Such a great experience!!

Club 56--Making their mark

I don't believe I have ever been as proud of my girls as I was today.  Lydia and Emily are part of a youth group--at our church--called Club 56.  It is a group of 5th and 6th graders, and another mother and I are the youth leaders.  Ryan was part of this group last year and the year before and now it is the girls turn.  Each year, our youth group preforms a church service for our local Presbyterian retirement community.  Many of the service attendees live in the assisted living portion of the community, but some come from the apartments within the community.  In addition, the residents who are not able to make it to the service because they are feeling sick, etc., the church services are piped into their rooms.  Well, today was the day for our service.

The last two years, Ryan has participated in being one of the ushers.  He has never been comfortable with speaking in front of people so he left the speaking parts to his group members.  Emily felt the same way this year.  She was not interested in speaking in front of anyone.  She felt comfortable with handing out bulletins and collecting the offering.

Because our group is a little smaller this year than it was the last two years, we needed to make sure we had enough kids who were comfortable speaking.  Lydia volunteered to do the Children's Sermon.  Emily agreed to hand out the crackers that were to go with the story Lydia told.  We do a children's sermon and the younger siblings of our group members are the children that come forward.  Lydia read the entire story (found at the bottom of this blog) and Emily handed out the crackers.  Lydia was amazing!  She even wanted to add to her prayer . . . "and all God's Children say . . . " and everyone in the congregation says Amen.  Our Pastor will often say that and she asked if she could add that to the prayer that we picked.  I was so proud of her.  In addition to the Children's Sermon, she also did the greeting.  In the greeting she welcomed everyone and explained who we were and what Club 56 was about.  She also introduced the ushers.  And then, towards the end of the service, she did the Prayer of Thanksgiving and lead the congregation in saying the Lord's Prayer.  She was wonderful!  All the Club 56 kids were wonderful!!  I was just so proud of the way she took this and ran with it.  We had talked about making eye contact, but didn't talk about it much.  I don't know if she forgot to do it or was nervous.  Most likely forgot.  Either way, thought it was good.  She never looked back and never hesitated or seemed nervous.  For 5th and 6th graders--they were all amazing!!

 Emily passing out bulletins with her club mates . . . Ashley, Connor and Megan (Megan used to be on the Crush softball team with Emily)

 Emily giving a bulletin to one of our dads.

 Lydia, delivering the service greeting.

 Lydia reading the Children's Sermon story to the kids.

I was not able to get a very good picture, but this is a picture of Emily passing out the crackers to the kids.  It was part of the story.

Emily passing the offering plates.

The four ushers dropping the offering plates at the front of the church and Lydia giving the prayer of thanksgiving and the lords prayer.

 The hymns and prayers are projected in the front of the church for the congregation  This was during her leading the Lord's Prayer.  I really was saying the prayer while taking this picture.  Can you see her at the pulpit at the bottom?

After the service, we took the kids to Golden Corral for Breakfast/Brunch.  This is tradition.  They had such a great time and enjoyed celebrating what they accomplished.

Here is the bulletin that everyone received in the service and the story that Lydia told during the Children's Sermon.

Here is the link to the service.  If you would like to watch it you can.  It is about 30 minutes, but of course you can skip over parts with kids you don't know.  So very proud of Lydia!!
https://youtu.be/s8Nlb-hFhx4