Starry Art Night and Great American Road Trip

 Golda was going to do the Starry, Starry Art Night, but she had a (sudden) dress rehearsal, so I got to do it.  All throughout, I laughed at myself for thinking we were going to look at the stars toward the end.  It doesn't even get dark until 9:30, and the camp ended at 9!

 This craft actually turned out great.  We tried to make stars out of twigs, though, and that didn't turn out great.  The stars looked more like piles of twigs stuck to pieces of paper with massive pools of glue.  Ha ha!  The Pinterest version was much better!

 We talked about Van Gogh and made finger paintings of his Starry Night background, then did cutouts of some foreground items like houses and trees.  The kids were a crack-up.  I've never seen such hard work for such sloppy results.  Ha ha!  That's what you get for letting them finger paint!  Nonetheless, their artwork was wonderful.  I just love kid art, which is good because the very next morning, Ruby ran the "Great American Road Trip" camp.  The cityscapes she did with the kids, with the Brooklyn Bridge made out of string and paper, turned out so cute!

 Baseball craft.  As a general rule, kids will use as much glitter as you give them, even if they have to pile it in mounds all over their craft.  They are like little glitterholics.  They don't know when to stop.

 I wish I had pictures of all the cityscapes, because each one was so unique and perfect.

 Eric made a dragon instead of a cityscape.  He was so focused!  I love these kids.

See what I mean about the glitter?  These will NEVER dry!

Beauty and the Beast

 Beauty and the Beast is going to be a great production!  This Thursday, Friday and Saturday night, and a matinee on Saturday, Browning Center's Allred Theater at Weber State.  Buy tickets at the door.  Pleeeeeez come.  You'll love it!

The "siskins" and a fork. :)

Ari and Ellison, friends since (before) birth, as villagers.

Golda, the sorceress.

Golda the sorceress after her transformation.

That's Ruby there in the center of the wolf pack.  She must be the alpha wolf. ;)  Golda, Ruby and Lexie are also napkins, and dancers in the tavern scene.  It is so fun to watch them all, and to know so many of their friends who are in the production.  Jana Dearden does a great job putting on a production.  She is all business, cuts to the chase, and gets these things done with fewer rehearsals than is humanly possible.  That said, these plays take a TON of time.  Opening night tomorrow is when we all switch our train of thought from, "I will never do another play" to, "I can't wait to see what the play is going to be for next year."  It's a sickness.  It really is.  It's just so thrilling to be part of a "play family."  I'm sure some of the girls will shed a tear or two when it's all over.  There will be a void in their lives, and they'll miss their production friends, but I know a pool that is calling our names!

On Being Derailed

I taught a student who had to be dragged out of his car for his lesson.  Then found out he is switching to trumpet in a month.
Ptolemy was scheduled for general anesthesia at the dentist and woke up with a fever, clenching his tummy. The dentist was cancelled.
While I was practicing with Freestone, Tziporah used the toilet brush to decorate the whole bathroom with poop.
I took Ari and Golda shopping for things they needed, didn't find those items, spent money anyway, and made them feel guilty about it.  Fun mother-daughter bonding time, huh!?
Had to reschedule guitar because of a play practice that I swear was not on the schedule, and moved the guitar lesson so it was during Ruby's ballet class.  Ruby had to call and re-reschedule it.
Took Ruby to the doctor for allergies and sinus problems, leaving all the kids home watching Care Bears, wondering where Mom went.
Had a bawling breakdown at Scott's office, where I wailed in front of his secretary and some clients, "I am the WORST shopper!"  First world problems??
I picked up Tziporah and ended up with a puddle full of pee filtering down my new shirt, my white skirt, and into my right shoe.  "Did you just pee on me??"  Enthusiastically, "Uh-huh!!"
Tried to do a 30-minute errand in 10 minutes, and then felt my blood heat up to boil as the cash register at Neverland Emporium had to be rebooted, making me late for everything that happened the rest of the day.
Had a violin waiting on my table all day long for a repair and never got to it, just like I never got to a hundred other things on my list.
Once the three girls were gathered in from their ballet classes and lessons, fed pizza and delivered to play practice, I took the 4 littles to Cherry Hill.  Once there, I mercilessly lectured Freestone about "just freakin' MINDING ME so we can all have fun, dangit!!"  Then I left him to watch Tizzy while Ptolemy took ten years to go to the bathroom and decide which soap dispenser to use to wash his hands.

At this point, having failed each and every child individually throughout the day, I spotted my friend Michelle, waving me down.  Oh, thank heavens!  A friendly face!  As we talked, my frustration and free-floating anger started to melt away.  Just as I was about to pull Daredevil Tizzy out of the pool for the 5th time, this handsome man appeared in stylish sunglasses, a linen shirt and crisp, navy blue swim trunks.  He scooped Tizzy out of the pool and held her against his clean, unbespotted outfit, while she probably peed.  He took the boys "mini-golthing," as Ptolemy likes to call it.  He gathered kids and supplies from the four corners of Cherry Hill and stuffed them in my car with all the pizza crusts, ballet shoes, underwear and wet towels, while I drove alone in Scott's perfectly clean car, listening to Haydn.  (My man had classical music playing in his car!  Be still my heart!)

When I came out of the shop from my violin lesson (with a student who was earnest and fun), there was this handsome man, having foot races with our kids on the lawn.  Their faces showed remnants of Bowman's half-price donuts, the glazed sugar highlighting the glow of their happiness.  Later that night, Ari called from play practice and said that she was finished, while the other girls weren't.  I picked her up and took her to Dylan's for a Summer Half-Price shake.  (Dopps know the deals)  We sat there and talked, the mother-daughter bonding time Ari had so craved.

Sometimes you can't redeem yourself.  Sometimes it takes a listening friend, a wise, understanding, proactive husband, an enthusiastic student, a forgiving daughter, a Heavenly Father who answers jumbled prayers, to put you back on track.  By the time I had padded around the house at midnight, locking doors and checking kids, I felt not quite so derailed as I had all day, my train careening wildly around the life I was supposed to be in control of.

Control?  Ha!  There's a chance I'm just along for the ride, and I just don't know yet that I'm not the engineer.

California Dreamin' Day Camp

 "Dopp Cottage" day camp, day one, was a success!  This one was Ari's camp, which meant it was mostly me.  Ari would rather be an artist than a teacher, and easily slips from being in command to being immersed in the creations she has planned for the kids.  That's perfect for me, because then I get to take over!  I don't get to do that with Golda and Ruby, so this was kindof my turn.

 15 kids made salt dough and then molded it into sand dollars, etching patterns on them with bamboo skewers.

 We read a story about a boy who puts a letter in a bottle inviting the fish to his house.  We wrote letters from the fish to the humans.

 We had story time on the back porch.

 We talked about "The Starfish Story" and made a Starfish Stick out of paper we had designed.  The paper, we had sprayed with paint water from spray bottles.  Each kid made a different pattern and they turned out cool.  I don't worry about the end result too much.  I just want the kids to create.  So some of the results are less than professional!

 We read a story about the boardwalk, handed out tickets for suckers and popcorn, and popped the popcorn on the stove.

 Also made sharks with our paint water technique.

 Googly eyes are me new favorite thing.  These seashells are so funny with eyes!  Sorry it's upside-down!

And we made necklaces from some of the seashells with holes in them, and had lunch.  The next camp is Tuesday night, and Golda is doing it.  It's called "Starry Starry Art Night," and the kids will paint, star gaze, craft, and learn about artists through stories.  It only costs $5 a kid, so please send your kids!  I can't wait!

Summer Love

Now that I have quite a few summers under my belt, I know that each one has a different flavor.  Two summers ago, we had our big checklist of fun and exciting things to do.  Best summer ever, until the next year.  Last year was Preposterous Plan, the massive road trip.

This summer hasn't exactly taken on a character yet, but I can tell you that I don't want to make a list, and we're not going on a 24-day road trip, so it's going to evolve into another variation of summer, one that I love already.  In some ways, summer hasn't started in earnest.  Yes, we go to Cherry Hill and/or the pool every day, but it's wedged in between the usual 30 dance classes a week, all of our music lessons, teaching, the last week of play practice (every night for 4 hours) and now the girls' camps.  We're still finding our groove.  With the play next week and the ballet recital the week after that, and then European visitors coming to stay the rest of the summer, my biggest fear is that the whole thing will fly by too quickly.

I'm scared of that because I sense this magical moment we're in, with all the kids still at home, our parents healthy and close by, Nana still up the hill with her stately home and Oreo cookies, friends we love, and a house that can wait, clean and cool, once our chores and practicing are done, while we eat our meals al fresco between laps around the Lazy River.  It's nirvana here, it really is, and we live in such a state of peace and beauty that I feel like the Spirit is close by, anytime I pray.  There is no chaos, no political upheaval, no ugliness between here and heaven.

Tonight as I left Cherry Hill with Ptolemy and Xanthe, the light was that perfect pink-yellow on the mountains.  I spread out my arms and said, as I have said before, "Guys, someday you'll move away, and then you'll come back here and you'll say, 'My beautiful mountains!  I missed you!'"  I dabbed a tear.  Xanthe was quick to reply, "I'm going to just stay here.  Well, I'll go on trips and leave my husband home with the children because that would just be a pain to take them."  Way to kill the moment, Xanthe!  She also said the other day when 4 of the kids were gone, "We should just have three kids because everything would be so much cleaner, and it's so quiet."

So maybe one person's peace and tranquility is her daughter's noisy, tumultuous, crazy life, packed with too many bodies.  But this is my sweet spot, right here, with everyone around me.  Just looking back at those two posts from 2012 and 2013 brings on a sense of despair that already so much time is gone, and so much more is slipping away, every second.  The best we can do is notice moments, make connections, give love, and know in the end that we did all we could to love in the time we had.

That's all that's on my list this summer.

Dopp Cottage Day Camps and Week Workshops!

You are invited to

Dopp Cottage Day Camps and Week Workshops!

Friday, June 6:  California Dreamin’….9-12 am.

Tuesday, June 10 NIGHT Camp:  Starry Starry Art Night…6-9PM Wednesday, June 11:  The Great American Road Trip….9-12 am

Friday, June 13:  Haunted Cottage Adventures….9-12 am

Wednesday, June 18:  Rancher Round Up….9-12 am

Tuesday, June 24 NIGHT Camp:  Fairies of the Forest…6 to 9 PM

All day/night camps are a combination of crafts, music, art, reading and fun.  Bring a sack lunch and a drink.  $5 a day!  Ages 3ish-9ish

Week-long Workshops with Golda:  FROZEN with Anna!

June 23-26 (4 days)

9:30 to 10:15, Dance Camp

10:15 to 11:00, Art and Crafts Camp

Week-long Workshops with Ruby:  MUSIC!

June 30-July 3 (4 days)

9:30 to 10:15, New Orleans Rhythm Works

10:15 to 11:00, The Art of Music in Play

$10 for one camp, $15 for both.

Reserve at 801-726-8685 (Circe), 801-425-5195 (Golda) 801-425-5194 (Ruby) 385-439-7751 (Araceli)

Yessssssss!

The day has finally arrived!  Ruby is finished with 9th grade at Career Path High!  She went out with a bang and a solid 4.0, with hours to spare in the school year.

CPH is a new charter school that just opened last fall.  The premise is that students can go at their own pace.  The assumption is that that pace will be faster than traditional school, so that the students can add in vocational classes.  All the coursework is online, however, there is a campus where the students can study.  The experience was a mixed bag for Ruby.  She thought she would be able to participate in the nursing program, but it's only for juniors and seniors.  As a freshman, she had to focus on her core classes, so she didn't get to utilize the state of the art medical teaching facilities that the school has access to at the DATC.  Also, she didn't realize the school would be so totally online.

For some kids, the learning center was appealing.  Ruby didn't like it because she had a little run-in with some of the other students early in the year, and they taunted her whenever she went in there.  (She told a kid not to swear.  Wrong crowd for such a suggestion!)  So Ruby studied at home most of the time, where there are a LOT of other interesting and fun things to do besides studying.  She got behind first semester, and then more behind when we went on some trips in the spring.  The only deadline the school had for coursework was the last day of the year, and the teachers, while sometimes reminding the kids to stay on track, never held them accountable.  Part of the premise of the school is that the student is in charge of his or her own pace, so you have to be very mature to discipline yourself.  It a learning process.  (Incidentally, the school, by and large, did not draw the type of student who is extremely self-motivated.  They drew students who had maybe not been successful at their public schools, so it was a difficult dynamic.  Ruby fit their desired profile to a T, though.)  Also, there was a significant amount of restructuring during the year.  Teachers and administrators dropped like flies, and were constantly being replaced.  Some of the teachers were very difficult to get a response out of.  Ruby had to be extremely persistent in emailing the teachers and counselors, which she was, but she still had a lot of work to do at the end.

So, for the last two months of school, there was never a moment when Ruby wasn't either studying, teaching, practicing or going to ballet, guitar or play practice.  If there was such a moment, Scott or I would be nagging her to death.  It was brutal.  Absolutely brutal.  I was exhausted from questioning Ruby's study habits each time she took a break to eat or get a drink.

The way the online system works is cool.  The students can take a pre test for each section of a course.  If they get a good score on it, they skip the work on that section.  She was able to skip a lot of the English sections.  The other option students have is to go back and retake each section or test up to two times, to improve their scores.  Ruby did that a lot, so it was much more work than a traditional class, but she also learned more by re-doing those sections, re-studying them each time.  I love that option!  Especially since it eventually led to her perfect 4.0.  It's a good feeling to be taking that with her to high school at Davis.

The very last day of the school year, Ruby still had a B in her first semester of math.  She was so tired of homework, she debated whether to throw in the towel and call a 3.9 good.  Somehow, she mustered up the will to go to the learning center and get special permission to go back and retake several sections from that class, inching her grade up to an A.  I am so proud of her!  Coming out of that school with everything completed to the level she wanted must have been such a relief to her!  I know it was for me!

Yesterday, Ruby kept saying giddily, "I can do anything I want!  School is OVER!"  Both Ruby and Golda had such a heavy course load during the school year that there was never truly a feeling of being finished with homework, especially with Golda's AP class.  You're never finished studying.  Golda would always rush in the house and sit right down at the computer, whenever she was home.  If they had free time, it was with the specter of unfinished work hanging over their heads.

So, the absolute freedom of summer is soooooooo sweet!  Granted, they do have practicing and the play and dance and teaching, and there is the question of making money over the summer, which involves yard work at Dad's office and planning several kids' camps, but there are moments of tranquility.  I wouldn't be surprised if Ruby stayed up all night last night watching a whole season of Design Star.  Remember TV, Ruby?!   Ahh, sweet freedom.  This is why I love summer!

The Real Last Day of School

Preparations for our pancake breakfast started early on the last day of school.  It started while my hair was still having nightmares.  This picture is for all of you rabid fans of "keeping it real."  Oh look, it's something less than perfect.  That must be REAL!  Because it can't be real if it's good.

By the time the children arrived, I was marginally more presentable, if slightly less "real."  Interesting which picture I put on Instagram, though.

I even edited out the messy spoons next to the griddle.  I'm so not real.

Here's something that really happened, even if we are all still at a loss as to WHY.  Freestone and Sam could NOT wait to dress as nerds for the last day of school.  Nobody knows why, but I think they look awesome, and I love that they don't worry about conforming to everyone else's idea of normal.  Their goal for the summer is to procure ironic t-shirts, their favorite being a t-shirt that says, "I hate t-shirts."

Ari, Freestone and Xanthe invited everyone in their classes to our pancake breakfast, which is about 90 kids.  I always have a moment of panic when we do this, that everyone will come.  It never happens that way.  It's always about 30%.  Ari says it's because she's "not popular" that so many kids didn't come, but it's a pretty predictable statistic that you can plan on 30% for any event.  I even remember my wedding caterer saying that.  Anyway, we had the perfect number of kids, the morning was delightful, and we will definitely do it again next year, if we remember.

My friend Lucy, who is a flight attendant for Delta on the PARIS route, helped serve drinks.  All I had to do was gab with her and crank out pancakes.  It was so much fun, it might not have even been "real."

Lucy and I were having so much fun, I was almost late for Ari's 6th grade graduation, especially since I had to hobble over to the school on my stupid ankle.

These are real pictures.  You can tell because my skin is dry, my surgery scar is ugly, my toenails are chipped and the whole foot is purple, green and yellow, which aren't colors that necessarily look good together.

Graduation was great.  Ari got an Academic Excellence award, along with most of the other kids, and Mr. Volmar said good-bye to the school.  I am really sad he is being transferred.  I have been a fan since Ruby was in first grade and I got a call from the robo school line, saying she wasn't at school.  That's scary!  I ran over to the school (ah, the good old days when I could run) and asked Mr. Volmar about it.  Cool and unruffled as a penguin, he said, "Ruby?  She's in the lunch room right now."  He didn't even hesitate; he knows each kid and where they are at any given time.  As he handed out graduation certificates, some of the papers were out of order.  He knew in one glance if the kid matched the name on the paper, without fail, on every single kid. 

Ari is ready for junior high.  She has a wonderful graduating class, full of enthused, friendly, smart and inclusive kids.  They are going to be fun to watch as they move on to the next chapter.

For now, our next chapter was SUMMER!  As soon as school finally ended, all the kids got their practicing done lickety-split, and we were off to enjoy the waterslides and mini golf.  Don't look back!  Summer is here!  And I have Scott and seven of the best kids ever to spend it with.  We won't waste a minute!  And THAT'S FOR REAL!