Letters to Jack & Audrey: Concerto in Pandemonium B

Jack,

Last night - god love it - was your first Christmas concert.

I know, I know.... finding out that your daycare was having a Christmas show where the children would be SINGING (ahem…) at a nearby school from 7-8 PM kind of blew my mind.

First off - a disclaimer. You can barely talk, let alone sing. PLUS - when I'm in the same room with you and your teachers, the idea that they thought you were going to stand on a stage AWAY FROM ME - allowing me the space to potentially take off running for the nearest door, they HAD to be SOOOOOOORELY mistaken (and possibly ON something?).

SOOOOOO - I therefore was faced with the opportunity to BLOW A WHOLE FREE EVENING watching you NOT sing in a concert and probably NOT EVEN APPEAR ON STAGE!

SIGN ME UP!

Actually, and here I must admit to being such a DIE-HARD fan of yours that I was actually EXCITED about the concert. In my mind, I have to admit - the worse I could imagine it being, the more I wanted to go and witness it for myself.

We got there in advance so we could get in place because the toddlers and babies were going on first.

Now, I'm about to say something that I may regret because this is such an unfair blanket statement to make but.... what is it about mayhem that gets little boys so excited?

As all of the audience trickled in and the crowd thickened and the noise volume got louder and louder, you and the other boys who were there for the concert started running in the open space that remained in the back of the auditorium.

Here you are trying to show your little friend, Calvin, the enormous blue stallion painted on the wall of the auditorium.

And more craziness in the pre-concert show for the gathering audience of families....

Here is a picture of you doing push ups on the coat rack where people were trying to hang up their coats....

god love you - you were SO excited about the blue horse on the wall!

You kept forgetting it was there and, when you turned around and saw it again, you would be amazed all over again. I LOVED IT! The downside is that you are now petitioning that Santa bring us one for your room.

Then it was time to corale all the toddlers and infants towards the stage to line up for the concert. I kept the camera clicking while we did this and I'm glad I did because this is EXACTLY how I remember that going....

And then the concert began! :)

You wouldn't go on the stage without me, so I went up there with you. Once I had you on the stage, though, I had - repeat HAD to get pictures of this!

You weren't pleased with this. Here your teacher tries to keep a hold on you while also preparing the other toddlers to sing. You were ready to take a stage dive right into the audience to get back in my arms in case I was thinking of sneaking out and leaving you with these people...

So - how did they keep you on stage for the concert you ask? Great question!

They stuck you in the sled which was a stage prop while everyone set about singing.

But did this stop you?!?

HELL NO! Not my boy!!! :)

At this point, I joined you on stage with the other children and the teachers/moms that were needed to keep some semblance of order (don't you see the order? NO? You have to look REALLY HARD!)

But then you decided to show me what it was like to be left on the stage and promptly crawled down from the stage leaving me in your place.

Serves me right.

Then the concert was over.

You immediately headed for the Emergency Exit door to the Auditorium.

I found this hilarious.

When it became clear that you weren't getting out that way, you took off for the other door on the other side of the auditorium.

I'm sure you can picture me chasing after you but you can't hear me laughing my ass off. I loved the chaos of this event.

At this point your teacher, Ms. Joyce caught you because your crazy lunatic mommy was laughing too hard and snapping too many pictures to be of any help at all....

Once caught, you decided to return to the now deserted stage. You crawled up on it to put on your own single solitary concert. I heard people laughing as you took the stage solo and I was tempted to sit back and watch you belt out the theme song to Bob the Builder or something equally impressive.

What REALLY happened, though, is that you scrambled right over to the stereo that the Christmas accompaniment music was coming from and I could clearly see that we were in for the volume to get cranked up to 10, so I scooped you up and we left the auditorium.

We ran through the hallways of the school mostly up and down the wheelchair access ramps while the older children solemnly lined up and nervously prepared for their turns on stage.

The older children's teachers would shush their groups as they waited patiently only to have you excitedly start screaming AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH! as you raced up and down the hallways like a child pumped up on sugar (which you weren't, I assure you! It was 100% performance addrenaline!)

We even checked out the boy's bathroom on our way out.

I must admit to being slightly curious myself having rarely (YES, I said RARELY...what of it?) had the chance to be in the Men's room.

Can I just ask - why is it necessary to have a sieve-like apparatus in the bottom of the urinal to catch things? What disturbing thing do guys expect to fall out of their pants when they go to pee that this would be necessary? Is it just that women are more trustworthy than men when it comes to the temptation of clogging up plumbing? I'm just saying that I don't understand is all...