Eve auditioned for Matilda today.  It was a roller coaster 24hours.  Shortly after deciding to do it, Eve had the lines memorized and was 100% confident in herself.  She had no need to practice, no need to sing in front of people, and no need for voice coaching.  She was good.  I was nervous (for her).  I encouraged her to talk to the 4th grade teacher who runs the school drama club.  She eventually agreed and by the time we were able to coordinate schedules it was this past Thursday, just two days before the audition.  Guess what?  The teacher told her she wasn’t ready at all.  Surprise.  One of the songs she was planning to sing is Hard Knock Life, from Annie, and it turns out the version she had been rehearsing with on Pandora was slightly different than the theater version we had the sheet music for.  That threw a HUGE crimp her her plan, and confidence.  Friday night she was a wreck.  Tears, anger (at the music), and frustration (at the world).  We had a long talk about it and she eventually went to bed and passed out.  BTW – Eve is always tired on Friday afternoons and it’s never really a good time to push her.  Saturday morning came and we had another chat.  She insisted she wanted to audition and even (kind of) owned her mistakes.  We talked a lot about confidence and “fake it ’till you make it” and her thoughts on acting, and lots of other stuff.  She said practicing was making her nervous and she just wanted to go in and do it.  She listened to the music (on the app with the sheet music) several times and declared herself ready.  I went to shower and when I came back I found her dressed and ready. She was wearing sweats and a print t-shirt, so I suggested, tentatively, that she might want to wear something a tiny bit nicer. Much to my surprise, she agreed and put on a dress!!

We went out to lunch at Panera Bread because this mother knows her daughter is always more positive when she is well fed and because I wanted to make it a fun day for her.  We had lunch and got to the audition with plenty of time. In fact, we had enough time to take a walk around the block and just be relaxed.

She looks relaxed, right? :)

When it was her turn she went in and gave it a go.  She knows the director from when she did the Shakespeare in School program.  The guy is very nice and very positive.  He was happy to see her and made her feel comfortable. She did make one mistake during her Annie song, but he stopped her and had her start again and she did it right.  He gave her lots of verbal praise at the end and even gave me a hug, much to my surprise.  Maybe that means she did well?

Truthfully, I don’t care if she goes on.  I’m just so proud that she stuck with it, through the hard times, and chose to get herself to that audition.  She was nervous, she had all the feels, and she CHOSE to get herself there and audition anyway, despite the nerves.  That is a big step for her.  <3

Afterwards we went grocery shopping.  Right back to life as usual. :)

On another Eve note, last weekend she made a scavenger hunt for me.  It was very silly. I asked if Lex could come too, because I didn’t feel like wandering around outside by myself trying to figure out her clues.  She said ok so Lex and I followed her marker-on-cardboard clues and had fun.  The final clue was a secret knock, which she answered, and we found the “treasure.”

When she first asked me to do the treasure hunt and was all secret about the treasure, I reminded her that I had just eaten breakfast and wasn’t ready for cake. I had a feeling her “treasure” was birthday cake. So we got back and discovered cake for Lex and pb&j on english muffin for me. LOL.

The clues.

Arlo was sad that there was no treasure for him.

She is an amazing girl, even with all the ups and downs.