Canyon Springs High School.... here he comes!

Yeah! Derek made it into Canyon Springs High School. It's a Law and Leadership magnet program. His goal is to be a lawyer in Seattle one day and what a great way to get his career kicked off, but by starting in High School. It's basically a normal High School with athletics, arts, etc, but 1/3 of the student population are in all advanced Honors classes and special classes that focus on Law and Leadership. The first two years are spent introducing the kids to Law and Leadership and then at the end of their sophmore year, they must choose an area of study... at this point, Derek plans on chosing Law. He's very excited about going to High school. He's already anticipating trying out for the Football team in the late summer! The only downfall to the school is it's location... about 45 minutes away with no traffic! He'll get bussed, which is great, but he'll have to get up that much earlier each morning! Way to go, Derek, we're proud of you! :)

State Thespian Competition

Friday and Saturday was the Nevada State Thespian Competition (grades 6-12). Sade & her "troup" competed in the Regionals back in February. Sade and her partner, Ryan (a girl) did a scene from "The 12 Dreams" and got an Excellent Rating which allowed her to compete this weekend. So, Friday morning after Derek & Dele were off to school, Sade, Kayode & I packed up snacks and a Nintendo DS complete with Ben 10 game (for Kayode, of course) and off we went to the State competition. We met her troup at one of the local High Schools. The competition started with an opening number featuring talent from around the state. What amazing talent this state has! Anyway... Kayode did fabulous, especially considering the DS wasn't fully charged and only lasted about 20 minutes or so. He enjoyed the show as much as Sade & I.

We spent 3 hours in the auditorium watching the opening number and then two short student directed plays. Finally, for Kayode, lunch time came. We ate with Sade and then I left her there with her troup to watch some of the competition while I took Kayode to Wal-Mart and then to the park where Dele picked him up so he wouldn't have to watch any more Drama!

Sade competed at 5pm. She and her partner, Ryan, performed the same scene from "The 12 Dreams." They did a great job. We spend the rest of the evening watching the competition. Once competition was over for the evening, they served dinner and then auctioned off dates for the dance that night... gosh... High schoolers are crazy? We're we really that crazy? Hmmm... yep, I think we were! :) Anyway... Sade didn't want to stay for the dance, so we headed home to get rest for the next day's events.

Saturday morning we arrived ready for their "troup" to perform a 10-minute scene from "Grease," but they weren't on the schedule anywhere. Saturday was filled with workshops. Sade took a workshop called "Acting the Song" with one of the cast members from "Momma Mia" here in town. He was great and she learned a ton from his class. Then after lunch she spent 3 hours in an Improv workshop with a guy from Second City in town. He was fabulous with the kids!!! Sade kept getting up to try improv and play the games he taught the kids to strengthen their improv skills! I'm so proud of her!!

Saturday ended with an Awards Show in which her "troup" (school group) opened the show with their 10 minute scene from "Grease." They were the only Middle School Group that attended the competition and the High Schoolers were wonderfully supportive... cheering, clapping, hooting!!! They loved it! To top the night off, Sade & Ryan ended up getting an Excellent Rating again! Way to go!!!

Trying it out...

Well... I'm going to try this "blogging" thing out! Not sure how it really works or how successful I'll be, but I'll do my best! Thought it might be a good way to share with family and friends what we're up to down here in Las Vegas! Thanks to my friend Jenny (Passey) Grothe from whom I took the idea. As you can see I've successfully added pictures of the kids! Mostly current ones, too! I guess I'll have to be better about taking more pictures of the kids doing their thing! :) Here goes... wish me luck! :)