Tuesday, April 22, 2008

What a Weekend


A super busy weekend. On Friday Kendra had her semester ending performance at the Youth Performing Arts high school. She was in 3 of the 8 dances and had a grand time. It was the first time she had ever performed on pointe shoes in public.


Then Saturday she was up early to teach her dance classes and then off to a dance competition for her dance studio. We were all up early to go out to Douglass' family day picnic at his military school. We had to take picnic supplies with us and tables and chairs and raincoats. We should have brought the winter coats because it was sooo cold. It was great to see Douglass, we brought one of his friends down with us so they got a chance to horse around. We played Frisbee and soccer, ate food, played volleyball and corn holed, sat around and talked, and in between the rain showers we played the congas in a drum circle. A lot of the other cadets were fascinated with the drums and that was a great interactive activity. We stayed until 3ish then went on home. Douglass was pretty bummed to see us go, but he has a pass on Mother's Day weekend to look forward to.



Although he does not like being in the program because it means he isn't at home, he is doing really well. He is about to test in the first group for his GED and he is doing really well in his college class. He seems very motivated to get this schooling hurdle over and done with. I know he does not like being in the highly structured program with limited access to fun stuff, but it really seems to be doing him a world of good. And he knows this, the letters he writes where he spews forth his frustration at being there and how much he hates it, always end with the assertion that he is going to continue with the challenge because he promised himself he would follow through. I am very proud of him, but far more importantly, he seems to be proud of himself.



Saturday after getting back from the picnic I had just put my head down for a short nap when Kendra called needing to be picked up from her dance competition. then she announced that we had to go run around and get some accessories that she would need for day two of the dance competition on Sunday. By the time we got home, rhinestoned her costume (nothing like waiting until the last minute is there!) and packed her bag for the next day I was ready to drop.



We had to be up extra early on Sunday as she had to dance with her group "The SuperStars" at 8 AM. Luckily it was tap first, then jazz. We had a short break and all piled into the van to get some brunch, were back for awards and then she had solos all afternoon. The competition did not finish until 11 PM with the solo awards. That was a long day. I got some reading done and even napped in the auditorium sitting in my chair with music blaring and the lights flashing. Exhaustion is a good sophoric.


Then we were up early for school in the AM. She actually made it to school with minimal fuss. It is getting hard to remain motivated as the school year grinds to an end. The dance part of her education is basically done, they had their end of year recital on Friday night so there isn't much of excitement in dance class every day to look forward to anymore. They have testing for the next two weeks courtesy of No Child Left Behind. Apparently the kids take it as a big joke and spend a lot of time making interesting patterns on their answer sheets. So how valuable will that data be? Oh well, the craziness of over bureaucratized schooling.

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