Shakespeare in May

The kids have been working hard over that past month and a half on the play "Pericles."  A homeschool mom put this together for the kids and I'm so glad we participated.  All of their hard work paid off during their Friday night performance.  I originally thought the only people who were coming to the performance that hadn't been to all the practices were the dads.  Most people here don't have Grandparents or extended family to come support but I think everyone knows that and really helps support each other.  Three families from our ward came to watch the kids and I know there were others who had friends come to watch as well.  I think one of my favorite parts was just as Tucker walked out someone from the audience shouted, "That's my friend!"  It was cute.

The kids were nervous, especially Tucker, but it went really well.  Tucker was two different characters and had several speaking parts so he was understandable nervous, but he seemed to thrive on the nervous excitement.  He was the oldest child there by a couple months, so it was a pretty young cast.  Penelope was scared during the first couple practices but once she knew what to do she was totally fine.  It also helped that she didn't have an speaking rolls.  Scarlett did great during the play, but it was hard to get her to cooperate during the practices.  It took several different practices to get her to even say her part.  She wouldn't even attempt it until everything was perfect.  She had to be confident in her part and have the exact right baby doll.  I one time brought the wrong doll and she refused to do her part.  We also had lots of disagreements about getting her to wear her costume.  Leon did well with his storm part, his biggest struggle was to hold still and be quiet during the rest of the play.  All the kids acted just exactly according to their personalities and I wasn't surprised one bit by how the behaved during the process.

We took videos!