Kids' Choir!

In these past couple of weeks we've started a kids' choir. We are looking for ways to get the kids more involved and also ways to get their parents to church. A couple of weeks ago we had our first practice. Choir was scheduled for ten in the morning and I'd told several of the kids that I'd come by and get them. When Saturday rolled around, I figured the kids had forgotten about choir practice and weren't going to be expecting me on a Saturday morning. I left much earlier than I needed to, which turned out to be a good thing. I got to the first kids' house and there were no kids in sight. Between me honking and their mom yelling, the kids started rolling out. Ana climbed into the car in her Monsters Inc pajamas - I asked her if she'd just woken up and she wordlessly shook her head as she rubbed her eyes and pushed her hair out of her face. Ha!

My number one tip for anyone going to choir is to brush them teeth beforehand. No one be wantin' to smell that while taking deep breaths and busting out high notes. Nevertheless, I can testify to the fact that this basic hygiene rule was not followed. Bless their hearts.

We still had a bit of time until choir so after picking up Ana and Paulina, we went to get breakfast. Marisol has been telling us for a while that the lady on the corner of her street sells the best tamales...

Are these kids not the cutest thing you've ever seen. And more so in their pj's!!!

Ana and I got a tamale Jarocho - it comes wrapped in a giant banana leaf and (these ones had) chicken and red sauce inside. Paulina got a traditional mole tamale (pronounced mole-eh) sandwiched inside of a torta (a type of bread).

We sat in the car and ate until it was time to go. We had a good little group show up at the church! 

Another very very very exciting thing about kids choir - 

I've been teaching Marisol piano for the past year or so. She's been doing really well and I am soooo proud!!!! I've been telling her for probably the past 6 months to prepare to play something in church. At first we thought she'd play for me and I'd sing a solo. 

However, when the idea of kids' choir came up, I knew this was her perfect opportunity! She was so nervous about playing in front of people, but I told her everyone in the congregation would be looking at the kids being cute up front and wouldn't even be paying attention to her on the piano. I am so happy she agreed to play! She did such a good job!!!!! (She played on Pentecost Sunday this past weekend.)
Side note: I have a blog post coming up introducing my piano students!

The kids were crazy about getting to talk in the mics. We'd be in the middle of a song and Choyo (red shirt) would, lightening fast, grab the mic and in a deep voice holler "HOLA" or "QUE?" ...ha!! 

I told them that sometimes it was okay to mess around a little bit in practice, but they had better behave during the real deal - augh!

Snickering over the sound of her voice coming through the speakers

First choir practice group shot!

We had one more practice after this, then they sang for the real deal - Pentecost Sunday!!!! I will be posting about that tomorrow! (Anyone notice yet that I blogged everyday last week?? We have so much going on, so many things to record into this online memory book of mine. I got on a roll last week and uploaded sixteen drafts worth of posts. That's a record, for sure. Looks like I'll be posting everyday for a little while more...gotta get caught up before all these good things overtake us! :)

~Bethany~