There is no "new normal"

I am really emotional today.  Jeremy brought in the mail this morning, and there was a box addressed to me.  I opened it and found these Disney World scented candles that Dawn sent us to remind us of the wonderful memories of our vacation there together!  I bawled.  

All ready to try a Zoom piano lesson with Carly...

It did not go so well...No fault of hers, but there was trouble getting a good connection and it wasn't really video.  And the audio was awful...when she played a song with the pedal it sounded staccato.  Next week we will try a different platform.  It was really wonderful to see her, for sure!  It just proved that live video is not an option for all 16 of my students.  :(

Jeremy did the grocery run today.  He also got carry out from Moe's--our first food pickup since the stay-at-home order.  I forgot to order queso though, so that was a big bummer.

Snaps

Took a walk with Sylv and Caed this afternoon.  These buds on this tree are such an awesome color!!!

Sylvia wore her crafty jeans and we took some pics on the stairs of the church.

I wanted to get a picture to replicate this one...

Tried to get a pictuer of Sylvia, but someone else wanted in too...

Walking home

Sylvia spent some time skating.

I used the sidewalk chalk.

This afternoon, Sylvia put in the Barbie Island Princess dvd singalong version, and she and Caeden sang along.  Too funny.

Ridgeview's production of Guys and Dolls was supposed to open tonight.  Sylvia has dreamed of playing the part of Adelaide since she was a little girl and first saw the movie.  She choreographed the entire show and had taught all the dances to the cast. She had chosen costumes from the closet at school, from Amazon, and had gone to the theatre warehouse with Mr. M.  She had spent countless hours listening to and practicing the music.  So had the whole cast.  When Mr. M realized he had no other choice but to cancel the show, he called me and asked to tell Sylvia personally.  She and everyone knew it was coming, but it was really kind of him to let her know himself.  He said he will for sure do Guys and Dolls for the musical next year, but he will have to re-audition and re-cast it. Sylvia cried.  Caeden was disappointed, but knows he should have more opportunities through his high school career.

This evening, even though she hadn't practiced in 3 weeks, Sylvia put on a dress and lipstick and sang through Adelaide's Lament in her bedroom.  I was glad to be her audience, and I cried. I hope someday she will get the chance to play Adelaide.

More performing

Gooooood morning, campers! The exhaustion is fierce today, but so is the determination to rock 2 performances and have a fun time at the Magic Kingdom!

Mr. R and Mr. K are ready for breakfast.

Each of us gets a $10 card for lunch and a $15 card for supper.

We took the ferry to the entrance of Magic Kingdom.

These fancy ladies and pink hippos greeted us at the entrance.

Annah and friends decided they would make a beeline for Space Mountain before the line got ridiculously long.  I hung back a little bit behind Shelby, who was enjoying her first time entering the Magic Kingdom and was taking pictures.

The line for Space Mountain was 50 minutes.  There are more people here today than I've ever experienced at Disney World.  Spring break craziness!!!

As we were passing the Mad Teacups, the wait was only 10 minutes, so we hopped on!

We made our way across the park...admiring Rapunzel's tower.

The Haunted Mansion!

Grim Grinning Ghosts

Tyler's buddies figured out how to do some FastPasses on their phones last night without him, so we enjoyed him hanging out with us all morning.

Dawn, Shannon, and Reece had FastPasses for all 3 of the mountains this morning, but we saw them zip through the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad FP line while we waited in the long queue.  We took pictures of each other.

The BTMR queue has a lot of really cool stuff to do while you wind your way through it.

I met the rest of my girls to give them their lunch cards and everyone ate before the band had to meet to get ready for the parade.  They got to take an awesome group photo before they marched!

I found Dawn and she sat with me while I had lunch at Pecos Bill's.  Then we did a little shopping while we made our way down Main Street USA to find a spot up on the train station overlook to watch the band.  It was another gorgeous day...not even quite 80 degrees and sunny and clear.  Pluto and Marie (the cat from Aristocats) were greeting people near the flag pole.

It was VERY COOL to see our kiddos marching through the middle of the Magic Kingdom and down Main Street U.S.A.!

They marched right past Cinderella's castle!

In this video, the band is coming right down Main Street USA (after passing the castle) doing their "monster stomp."

This video shows them at the very end of their parade route.

After the parade, we had some miscommunication problems that led to a hard time meeting back up.  But the girls managed to get this great picture with Mickey and Walt and the castle!

I went by the castle too.

We finally met up and were not hungry for supper, even though it was our only chance to eat again today.  We did the Starbucks meal substitute option again, then we hurried to the ferry to meet the rest of the choir.

We got back on one bus to go to our backstage changing and warm-up area.
(Mr. R and I even got our own dressing rooms!) Even though they were soooooo tired, the kids sounded wonderful in warm-up.  A show choir that was stretching and dancing to warm up behind us, applauded upon hearing Go Lovely Rose.

After warming up, we got back on the bus and were taken to Disney Springs.  We walked a little ways to get to the beautiful Waterside Stage for our performance at 7:30.

It was another beautiful venue for the performance.

You can see the volcano of the Rainforest Cafe across the lake behind the stage.

And it "erupted" during the performance!  (The kids didn't even know until they saw photos afterward, but the audience enjoyed the effect!)

Since I was accompanying the choir for 2 of their 4 pieces, I was onstage with them and unable to take photos and video.  These are from other parents on the trip.  The choir performed 4 pieces, but I have only found video of these 2.

Go, Lovely Rose by Eric Whitacre

Seize the Day from Disney's Newsies!

Back on the bus to the dressing rooms...

The students were congratulated on their performance by a Disney Performing Arts professional who reminded them that they all can now say they have been Disney performers.  She presented them with a trophy for the school.

 And, each student will receive Disney Performing Arts Mickey ears.

We took the bus back to the ferry to the Magic Kingdom, but arrived just as the nighttime Wishes fireworks display ended.  It was disappointing the way it timed out, but we were all tired and ready to go back to the hotel anyway.

What a privilege to have performed at Disney World, and to have had fun learning at the same time!