Christmas program

Today our church presented the cutest children's Christmas program ever. (This may or may not be because this was the first year that Cambel was in the program). In a "preview" of the program during a dinner at church, Cambel was so overwhelmed (with what appeared to be a combination of mostly nerves and a little bit of his desire to eat his ice cream instead) that he refused to stand in front of everyone and sing. Instead he bawled and clung to me (and since I was standing in front of everyone, this was a less than pleasant scene). 

In the intervening time since this less than stellar preview performance and today, we have spent considerable time and energy practicing and talking about how great the program was going to be. Our efforts seem to have paid off, because Cambel donned his angel costume (instead of a spiderman costume, which he initially requested when he heard they were going to be wearing costumes for the program) and marched down the aisle (with an occasional jump-because this is his new favorite thing to do) and performed his little heart out. He sang, although intermittently and mostly when it would require making a large "O" shape with his mouth, and he said his line into the microphone. 

All the other kids were cute of course, and the program was filled with all the fun antics of children (forgotten lines, announcing "I forgot my line" into the microphone, some kid yelling out he was too hot, halos being pulled at and taken off, getting a few beats ahead of the music so that it just sounded like total chaos, etc).  But our eyes were mainly on Cambel, as we were taken over with that overwhelming emotion that must be inherent to every parent--a mixture of pride and love--and in this case, probably in that order. This is your child that you dreamed about, carried for 9 months, gave birth to, cared for, got/get up in the middle of the night with, feed, clothe, worry about, play with,  laugh with, plan for, dream for, pray for...and here he is all dressed up as angel waving at you and smiling, singing, and clapping, and picking straw off of the stage floor--yes, you are even in awe of that, because he is yours and you love him more than you can express. 

The last song of the program required the kids to clap. And as you might imagine, they all clapped at different times, none of which appeared to be to the actual beat.  Cambel was especially off, but I think that just made it even cuter. 

Kevin got some video of this (the shaking is because he is laughing, with pride and love of course). 

 *For some reason I can't get the video to load...I'll try again later