Performance Face

Kiefer recently had his first performance in front of an audience. He sang holiday songs with his Kindergarten classmates and the First Graders at his school's "Holiday Shop".

He was nervous. Leading up to his big gig, he mention several times how worried he was about his first REAL performance with an AUDIENCE. He had also mentioned prior to the event that he needed a prop so he picked out a flashing red reindeer nose while we were out shopping one day. After lots of singing around the house and practicing at school, he was ready! But nervous.

The Holiday Shop was well attended, so Kiefer's first audience was a big one. When it came time to sing, we shuffled Kiefer to the stage area, said our "goodbyes", returned to the audience and I immediately noticed almost-crying eyes. Luckily, to the rescue... his best buddy Samantha - the only other child with a flashing red nose for a prop, as it turned out. They exchanged giggles and it was on!

Once the music started, he went for it. He was singing loudly enough, I could pick out his voice. Aannnddd then I cried.

Well, what mama wouldn't with this Performance Face staring back at ya? Add this to the list of reasons I feel like such a lucky mama.

You Better Not Cry!

Haha! I almost started this post with a comment about how long it's been since I posted here, but that was my opening line on the LAST entry - from Dec 2010. So, that comment is officially getting old. I'll just summarize with, "Kiefer quips are fast and easy to post to facebook for fun" -- yeah and then I can't go see them without making a lifetime commitment of "view more posts"-ing. So, let's get something on the blog for crying out loud.

Speaking of crying. Kiefer's school is preparing for the holidays and hosting a Holiday Shop complete with a visit from Santa and musical performances from the kiddos. We listen to a lot of Christmas music every year when the season rolls around, so these songs are nothing new but now Kiefer has to PERFORM. So he's taking this seriously and learning lyrics.

Last night Kiefer started in on "Santa Claus is Comin' to Town" and said, "wait, Mom... 'you better not cry?' I have cried before...like when I get hurt." So I tried to break this down.

You better watch out,

You better not cry,

You better not pout,

I'm telling you why...

Who wrote these lyrics? If you cry, Santa won't bring you presents? Confusing for me, let alone a five year old. I stumbled around then went with, "I think it means you shouldn't cry like whining crying." We decided that was legit and reasonable.

On the subject of Kiefer's holiday music stylings, I must give a nod to his creative mash-up of Deck the Halls (Fa-la-la-la-la La-la-la-la) and Lady Gaga's "Rah-rah-oh-la-la Roma-roma-ma" lyrics. It was awesome. It only happened once and I couldn't recreate it if I tried. I overlooked how bizarre (and I'm sure WRONG**) it was in lieu of the the fact that it was incredibly creative. Watch for Kief on Broadway someday.

**I know, I know...Gaga? Lame disclosure/excuse: He learned the Glee cover of Bad Romance from Glee: The Music, Volume 3 Showstoppers. I have a small addiction to everything show choir.

More Occupational Forecasting

Just realized two things: I haven't written a post on the blog for months and several of the posts I HAVE written are about Kiefer's occupational aspirations. What can I say, it's good stuff and I get a real kick out of "I'm gonna be's".

This morning Kiefer carried his breakfast dishes across the room to the sink very carefully and told me "Mom, I'm gonna be a restaurant waiter guy someday."

Oh? Well, you're being very careful so I think you'd do a great job.

"Well, I'm still going to also be a rockstar, too."

If you are shooting for "rockstar" it's like 99% chance you will need to master "restaurant waiter guy" as well along the way... Good plan.

And I can't forget this one:

A couple of weeks ago was "Community Helpers" week at Kiefer's school. All the kids wrote their name on a paper along with the title of their future occupation. Most of the boys went with firefighter, police officer, Batman or Superman. One girl must have said "mom" out loud because all of the girls listed "mom" as their future occupation. Searching the wall, I finally landed on Kiefer's sheet that read, "P r e s i d e n t".

Car Fixer Guy

After explaining to Kiefer that I had to take the car in for a quick fix on something simple, he responded with the offer that HE could just fix it for me.

"Mom, you know I'm a car fixer guy. That's my job. And I'm a scientist...and a sailor man...and a rockstar."

Wow, that is quite a resume. "You have all of those jobs, Kiefer?" To which he replied "yes" and followed Forrest Gump Bubba style:

"I have lots of jobs. I am a guy who makes movies, a teacher, a fix-the-house guy, a sell-a-house guy, an alarm fixer, a fire fighter, a policeman and a hat maker. I'm a pirate, a ship maker, a knight, a trash can maker, a guy who sits out restaurant tables and the President."

Wow, so like the President of the United States?

"YES. I'm really busy, Mom. I do one job each day and then it starts over. Oh, wait...one more: I am also a lifeguard. And I'm the guy who does groceries. Ok, the very last one is museum night guard."

I guess I'll have to wait for car fixer guy day to roll back around on the schedule so he can take a look.

Good Day

This morning, the garage door opened to beautiful sunshine and some wonderful June heat...ahhh! SOOO much better than sub-zero... have I mentioned how much we love Spring and Summer?

Kiefer walked out onto the driveway instead of around to his door to the car so I continued my "come on let's get in the car" campaign... I climbed into the car to drop his bag and my purse and just as I was ready to repeat the "let's go" speech, I looked up to notice he was standing in the driveway with his arms outreached, face to the sun. I asked if he was soaking up some nice warm sun and he spun around and said "yeah, mama, this feels so good... I am gonna have a good day!"

Then transitioning into a sort-of robot voice while spinning he said, "I am soaking up lots and lots of gas so I can be super fast at school today! Ok, I have lots of gas now, mom, let's go. Ryan won't be able to catch me today!"

Soak up a minute or two of sun today and have a GREAT DAY!

Taco "Belle"

Last night, in a moment of delusional fast-food weakness, I decided I wanted to drive through Taco Bell for two tacos (despite the fact that I have plenty of food at home AND that I'm pretty much against anything including and/or below Applebees on the eating-out-or-fast-food food chain.) Sometimes I just get a weird hankering for that delicious combination of fake meat, sour cream, lettuce, cheese, tomatoes and of course: authentic Taco Bell mild sauce.

As we pulled through the drive through, Kiefer asked "why is there a bell, mom?" spying the Taco Bell logo. Of course branding sort of being my thing, I started to launch into my take on why Taco Bell uses a bell in their logo and name... only to be corrected by the following explanation:

"No, I've got it Mama. Maybe someone who works at Taco Bell goes on vacation to Disney World and then when they're there, they dress up as Belle and then they are Belle at Disney World."

Well, that very well may be exactly right.

I'm A Really Good Artist

On a nice Saturday afternoon a few weeks ago, Kiefer and I were playing baseball in the backyard. I was impressed with how well he was hitting my not-so-great pitches and throwing the ball back to me.

"Kiefer, you are doing such a great job! You're really good at this!"

"Mom, I'm also a really good artist."

He followed with, "and you know what I'm going to be when I grow up?"

What?.....

"I'm gonna be a genius."

Well, that is an excellent aspiration. In the meantime, he's taking his "really good artist" title very seriously! Last week he drew a horse-drawn carriage on his easel, complete with the sun and clouds in the sky, a tree, some people and he asked me to draw some birds. Those two wing-dings in the sky were my contribution by request as he "didn't know how to make birds".


Last night, picking him up from school, he had just finished building a castle from legos. It was a very convincing four-sided castle-like structure. When Kiefer walked away from his design, two little girls, barbies in hand said "let's play with Kiefer's castle!"

So far, this artist thing looks like it's working for him. And...there's always the genius thing to fall back on if necessary.