The Missoula Children’s Theatre Camp

Lila definitely has the "performance art bug." Whether she's singing, acting, or dancing, she is naturally drawn to the stage. When Lila's grandma was looking for birthday gift ideas for our little rising star, I came across a flyer for the Missoula Children's Theatre Camp. It was the perfect gift-- an experience that Lila would truly enjoy and remember. 

Soon Lila was signed up and ready to go. About a week before camp, we received the details. The kids, ranging from Kindergarten through 12th grade, would be cast on Monday and by Friday evening they would be prepared to showcase a full theatrical performance. Having been in a few plays in high school and now working for a college with a conservatory of theater arts, I know a little bit about what goes into a production. I couldn't wrap my mind around the idea that in just one week (actually 5 days) they would be performance ready.

But Missoula Children's Theatre (MCT) has this all down to a science. Although this was the first time that it was on my radar, this was actually the MCT's 25th season at our local theater. They travel around to communities throughout the country, with everything they need to put on a full-scale children's production. They teach and inspire kids nationwide by exposing them (even if it's just for a week) to the joys of musical theater. In such a short amount of time, the children form a bond, jelling into an ensemble, and together take on the challenge of learning lines, songs, and dance routines to be performed by the week's end. And they have a blast! After the first day, Lila was waking up early, eager to go and have fun with her new friends and teachers. She absolutely loved it.

Lila's group put on a production of The Little Mermaid (a different story line than Disney's The Little Mermaid). Lila was cast in the role of a "sea pony." All the behind the scenes preparation was kept under wraps, so family and friends filed into the theater Friday night not knowing what to expect. What we got was an entertaining, adorable performance. Sure, with just a week preparation, there were some fumbled lines and missteps, but nothing is better than witnessing the confidence, creativity, and pride in these young performers shining on stage.

The Sea Ponies in The Little Mermaid

Lila the Sea Pony- so proud of her great performance!

At the end, there were lots of hugs and smiles and promises to see each other the same week next summer. Lila's experience with the Missoula Children's Theatre not only created a lasting memory, but perhaps an annual tradition. -Tara

Our star, post-production, being showered with flowers and gifts. 

Supporting my Budding Artist

Clara comes home from school, proudly pulling out her artwork out of her school bag. There are pages full of her designs: smiley faces, dragons, girls with long hair, boys wearing dresses, stars, suns, flowers, and swirls tumbling off the page as they literally tumble out of her bag. There are also nearly microscopic, cut-out cirlces and shapes which sprinkle the floor like confetti. Her fine motor skills seem to be right on track, since on the back of each of these teeny, tiny shapes she has managed to write in the smallest of letters the following: TO MAMA LOVE CLARA or TO PAPA LOVE CLARA or sometimes even TO CLARA LOVE CLARA.

It has taken me several years to create a workflow that supports my little artist while managing, displaying, and preserving the prolific amount of work she produces. Here are some of my top suggestions if you have a child who loves art at home.

1. Set up an Art station

I borrowed this idea from my sister. She spends a lot of time cooking in the kitchen and she was looking for an activity to keep her daughter occupied while in the kitchen. She set up a small table with a watercolor station for her daughter who was then two years old. I loved the idea when I visited, and so when I got home I created a similar setup.

There are watercolors, markers, crayons, stickers, and paper always available at the table. Clara doesn't need to ask me to get anything for her. She is able to use the art station at any time- no need to ask for permission. She likes being able to create art independently. Clara uses the art station probably every day. I would show you a photo, but one side effect of the child-centered activity is that it is perpetually in a state of disarray- papers and all of the above items I mentioned scattered everywhere. Although it is a mess, it is also a place that is meant just for Clara, and it is one of her favorite places to be in the house.

2. Portable Art Case.

One of our very favorite tools that has helped to support Clara's artistic interest is a portable art carry case that she got from a friend for her birthday last year. It is a simple concept: a plastic carrying case with a clipboard front and inside there is room for many pieces of paper as well as pens, crayons, or markers. For most of last summer, she carried this everywhere. She still likes to bring it in the car so that she can draw on the way to school.

  

Something that made it even more special was that Clara's case was personalized with her own name. You can find the case at Mrs. Monogram for $21 with personalization. If you don't care about getting your child's name on it, you can find the Dexas Clipcase on Amazon for $10.99. This is the most well used item in Clara's life out of all of her toys and art supplies... if you have a budding artist in your family, I highly recommend it!

3. Managing the paperflow of a prolific artist

It is a joy to see the passion that Clara has for expressing herself visually. It is also one of the biggest housekeeping challenges I have to keep up with the volume of artwork she produces. At the very minimum, I would estimate, she produces at least five pages of artwork per day. That's 35 pages a week, and 1,820 pages a year... and I think she actually makes even more that!

I come from a family of savers. I think my mom probably still has nearly every piece of artwork that I ever made. I have a colleague who said that her kitchen is decorated with the childhood artwork of her now teen children, and that she would never ever throw out anything they produced. I think it sounds nice in theory to keep every piece of art that is produced, but I don't know how I could physically contain everything that Clara produces without renting out a storage unit.

So, we have come to some compromises at our house. When Clara opens her bag, we go through it together and pick the most special pieces to keep. We recycle the rest. When Clara was younger, I initially did this step by myself, but I always thought about the story of my niece who found some of her artwork in the recycling bin that my sister had secretly put there. My niece came to my sister with tears in her eyes, holding up her drawing, and asking, "How did my beautiful art end up in the recycling bin?" With that story in my mind, I tried to involve Clara from an early age about making decisions about what art to keep so that there she would find no surprises in the recycling bin.

4. Taking photos of the artist with her work

This is one of my favorite methods to preserve Clara's work because it helps me to remember just how old she was when she created each piece. I love seeing proud Clara holding up her various artistic creations. I created a folder in iPhoto for "Clara's Art." I peruse my iPhoto folders much more frequently than I look at any hard copy folders, and so it is an easy way for me to quickly scan her work. I wish I remembered to do this more of the time.

Two-year-old Clara and her Halloween creations.

Clara designed a picture of the doll she wanted to create and then sewed it in art class last summer.

5. Displaying the artwork

One of the best ways I found to display Clara's artwork is in a kid's L'il DaVinci frame. I bought a standard 81/2 x 11 frame from Amazon. I like the frames because they are easy to open and they have room for about 50 pieces of paper, so you can easily add and rotate through your child's favorite images.

There are a few additional ideas I would like to try for displaying and preserving Clara's art. I like this idea of a clothespin wall for easily rotating favorite artwork. I think a binder with plastic sleeves would be a good way to preserve and review art over time.

I hope these tips help you to support any young artists in your house. Do you have any other tips to share?

-Ellyn

Out of the Mouth of Babes

Have you ever experienced a proud mommy moment that instead turned into disappointment? And that disappointment was all the more deep because of the pride you had mistakently felt just a moment before? Well, let me walk you through just such a moment in our lives.

Last weekend, we attended an exhibit about animation at a local art museum. Clara got to make an animated robot and participate in a stop-motion video. (She is the first one in line in the video, and her robot is the last robot that flies off the top of the screen.)The big event of the day was that the museum had invited one of the lead animators from Blue Sky to present a workshop about drawing. 

Many of the people in the audience were adults or older children. As one of the youngest children in the audience, I was proud of Clara as she sat with her lap-size easel and sketched the characters along with the animator. She seemed so confident and comfortable, in fact, that I decided to walk around the rest of the exhibit while she continued to draw under the watchful gaze of her father.

 

Here are some of Clara's sketches of "Scrat" from the Ice Age movies.

When I returned to where Clara was sitting, I was surprised to see her eagerly raising her hand to ask a question. Other older children had been asking questions, but she was definitely the smallest person trying to ask a question, so small in fact, that the animator couldn't see her extended hand above the heads of the people in front of her.

"What question are you going to ask?," I inquired eagerly.  (Clara is often shy in front of people she doesn't know well, and I was overjoyed to see that she was stepping outside of her comfort zone to ask a question in front of so many strangers.)

"No, Mama... the question is not for you... it's for him," Clara replied pointedly.

"Uh- OK," I thought. I wanted to encourage her to speak out more in general, and so I urged her to stand up and raise her hand high so that the animator would see her.

The animator finally called upon her. 

Clara got nervous, and she paused for so long that I thought she wasn't going to ask her question after all.

"Go ahead, Clara- what's your question?" I inquired. (Sometimes when she does speak in a situation where she is nervous she is so quiet that she can't be heard.) I urged her to ask her question loud and clear.

Finally, she spoke- loudly and clearly...

"WHY IS THIS TAKING SO LONG?"

The audience laughed. The animator took her question in stride and said that Clara's question was just the type of line they look for in animation- something that will get the crowd laughing. I turned fifteen shades of red and sunk, embarassed, onto the floor, holding Clara next to me.

After the presentation, my husband laughed and laughed... at me. For him, the funniest part of this event was not Clara's question itself but the eagerness with which I encouraged her to ask the question followed by the look on my face once she did indeed ask the question. 

When we asked Clara later on why she asked that question, she explained that she had initially thought of another question, but when put on the spot, she got nervous, and asked the first thing that came to mind. Her question made sense given that Clara often wonders about why something is taking a long time, and so it's a default question that she can easily recall.

 I will continue to encourage Clara to stand up and speak out and ask questions... but next time, I will be sure to have her tell me what exact question she is thinking about before encouraging her so eagerly to speak out!

-Ellyn

A is for Artist

Clara confidently announced yesterday, “When I get grown up, I think I will be an artist,” as she slowly and deliberately added a smiley face to the little girl in her crayon drawing. Smiley faces, rainbows, and sunflower dresses provide the content for about 70% of Clara’s current drawings. 

Although the content of her drawings might sound frivolous, Clara takes her art seriously. I admit I have a tendency to call anything that is colorful on paper “a painting,” but Clara quickly corrects me if I mistakenly refer to one of her crayon drawings as a painting. “This is not a painting,” she explains in an exasperated tone, “I used crayons to make it."

 As she finished the final sunflower flourish on the little girl's dress, Clara pronounced that her desire to be an artist wasn't just a destination for the future but was a place that she had already arrived. She said that she didn't need to wait until she grew up to be an artist "because I already am an artist... I really am."

It would be nice if we all had such confidence in our ability. It’s hard to know for sure at four years of age what she will be when she grows up, but I am charmed by the earnest certainty with which Clara announced her career as an artist. She has artist relatives on both sides of her family, so perhaps this yearning is already somewhere in her genetic makeup. 

Most of all, I am inspired by Clara's pride in who she is right now as an artist. Whatever form her artistic ability takes in the future, I love my little artist of today. Her rainbows, smiley faces, and sunflower dresses brighten my day every day.

-Ellyn