Conversations with Smiths- Part 24 or "My Son is the Interpretive Dance Penis in the High School Musical"

Hello, do you think that you could give me Bens phone number so I can get Pippin info?

Oh wait, does he have a phone?

He has no phone number. He is in the wind. Much like the anatomy he will be playing on stage.

Conversations with Smiths- Part 22

I've mentioned before that an alternate title to "Conversations with Smiths" could easily be "Poor Todd". Bless the man and all that he puts up with from the rest of us.

Also, for the record, and for context. Benjamin is totally better at doing make-up than I am. Not that it's a high bar or anything. In fact, a toddler could step over it. He's been doing dance and theater since Kindergarten, though, so he's a pro. Other than the occasional swipe of mascara and lip balm, I just don't wear it often enough to be good at application. My sisters who are makeup experts look at my blank face with lamentation whenever we go to visit them.

However, make-up is necessary on stage, darn it.  So a few times a year, I have to suck it up and paint my face.

Me: Benjamin, I'm going to a stage make up workshop in a couple of weeks.

B: Oh! Will they be doing age makeup??

Me: No. They're doing "looking fabulous when you dance on stage" makeup.

B: Hm. [Knowing he doesn't actually need that.]

Me: Could be useful for you.

B: Well, I guess if you won't let me be a stripper, drag could be the way to go.

Me: Drag is much classier than stripping. You have to entertain, not just titillate.

B: Good point. And to do good drag, Brendan said you need to know how to do your contour makeup correctly.

Me: True. Although, you're welcome, for those already fabulous cheekbones you have. Anyway, it's good to keep your career options open, right?

Todd: SHHHH!! Will you two behave? We're at church!

(Church hadn't started yet, btw, but we were probably not adding to the overall reverence of the pre-service ambiance.)

Conversations with Smiths- Part 6

I'm a fan of good vocabulary words. As is my sweet husband.

He used to have a word of the week he would hang up on the inside of our front door for the kids to learn and use, so dedicated to the task of making sure our kids had a good vocabulary was he.

The other night, I was able to teach everyone at the dinner table a new and very useful word. (It would have been exceedingly useful in Part 5 of this series of conversations)

*All names of friends have been changed to protect the identity of those who are both hot and not.

Me: Wait, so what was the name of the friend you were hanging out at the pool with last night? I thought that was John, the human bologna.

Benjamin: No! That was Joe.

Me: Really? Who's the human bologna, then? 

Benjamin: Jay.

Me: Hm. Oh, wait. Joe is the one who is bff's with Mellie who is a total diva and Brady doesn't get along with at all, right?

Benjamin: Exactly. Joe is Michael's brother.

Me: Michael who?

Benjamin: You know, the one who played the older brother in the first show we did this year?

Me: Really?? Wow. Poor Joe.

Todd: Why poor Joe?

Benjamin: Because Michael is hot.

Me: And Joe just...isn't. He's squidgier.

Benjamin: Yeah. Michael is fine.

Me: And callipygian.

Caleb: What does that mean?

Me: Callipygian: having well-formed buttocks.

Benjamin: He really does.

Me to Todd: He really does.

Todd: [shaking his head at the both of us]

Nathaniel: Is this discussion really happening? And why do you know this word?

Me: I read. It's a good word to know. Now that you know it, I expect you to use it in conversation this week.

Nathaniel: I don't think I have those kinds of conversations.

[We then went on to use the word at least a dozen more times in context before dinner was over. Vocabulary for the win! Incidentally, Caleb has been the best at incorporating it into his vocabulary.]

Seven Things Sunday

Phew! This week has been exhausting. Here are 7 things we did this week:

1. Lilyanna went to her friend's birthday party. After 2 days of school being cancelled due to frigid temps, some playtime with friends on Saturday was a blessing. Getting her face painted like her beloved white tiger was a dream come true for her!

2. After 2 days of those aforementioned frigid temps we then got a large snow storm on  Saturday. The roads were awful Saturday morning, but alas, the school district's science day did not get cancelled. Nathaniel was not happy about having to slip and slide through the storm.

3. Friday night was the opening of  the high school's production of "How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying". Now the last time I saw this show was on Broadway, so I went in with very low expectations. I was pleasantly surprised, though, and enjoyed the show very much. Their Bud Frump was better than the Broadway version, IMO. Benjamin was one of the Junior Executives and in the chorus and had a great time dancing and singing his little heart out. And then Saturday's show was cancelled due to the snow. (NOT THE SCIENCE DAY, just the play. Grrrr.)

4. Earlier in the week, Nathaniel deigned to get his haircut before his audition for his school's production of "The Sound of Music". I took lots of pictures of the process and kept trying to convince him to stop at each phase, because he had kind of a cool emo thing going on. Alas, he didn't think it would be authentic to the period of the play.

5. Nathaniel was cast as one of the children in the Von Trapp family. I believe he was typecast, as Kurt is the incorrigible one after all! ;)

6. All of my careful trip planning for this summer fell apart this week. We were supposed to spend part of our trip this summer visiting our relatives in Spain, but they discovered this week that they have a conflict the only days that we can be there, so in a flurry of fb messages, phone calls, texts, and emails, we managed to purchase tickets for a few weeks from now so we can visit the Spanish relatives in the Western United States while they are visiting other relatives. We're really excited to see everyone, but figuring things out almost cured me of my omnipresent wanderlust for the week. (Almost. I was back at it today to try to figure out where to go for the days we would have been in Spain. I know. We should all have such "problems".)

7. Warren got not 1, but 2 jobs in the last couple of weeks! Fingers crossed and prayers said that all will go well for him.

BONUS:

8. I had my first mammogram yesterday. After the first couple of pictures, I wondered what all women were whining about. (Unless they are relatively flat chested women. That would be awful.) THEN they did the sideways pictures with the arm up and all manner of contortions and just OUCH!! The technician gave me chocolate afterwards, which did help assuage my shock at the whole thing. But still, I think at the very least a good dinner beforehand should have been warranted. Oy. This was also on the same morning of the icky, slippery roads. The upside of all of this was that everyone else had cancelled, so I was in and out of my appointment before my appointment was even supposed to begin. Silver linings, you know. 

My Drama Llamas

Nathaniel and Caleb were recently in a production of "Fantastic Mr. Fox". Nathaniel was one of the farmers and had the most wonderful Scottish accent. I was truly impressed by it.  Caleb played a drunken rat and had way too much fun with that role.  

 The also both got to be chickens for part of the play.

I'm so grateful to live in an area where we have resources like a fabulous community center and a wonderful drama instructor as well as a good pool of talented kids who enjoy participating in such things.

Nathaniel's Been Holding Out on Us!

Nathaniel doesn't love performing. He enjoys everything else about theater, except the actual performing. And yet, this year especially, he keeps throwing himself at it as if he's determined to find the right formula to conquer this fear. When I saw him perform last week in the 5th grade production of Cinderella, I was SO proud of him. He didn't seem nearly as nervous for this production as I've seen him with others in years past.

Also, he SANG! Nathaniel has always had a deep voice, even as a baby. So, while other kids can happily sing along to chirpy "kids' music" that was never easy for him. He often just gives up and sings at sort of a low monotone leading the rest of the family to feel sort of bad for him being the one Smith kid who doesn't really sing.

But, here on video, I have proof that he CAN do it! He can match pitches, AND sing high, AND harmonize! (This was the evening production, and he was a little more nervous for this one, so he was running out of air at the beginning, but that didn't happen in the day time production.)

On top of all this, he's performing in a different production this week. No singing in this play, but he's really looking forward to only worrying about lines for one show now. (He's been working on both shows for the last couple of months.)

Super proud this kid!