Shakespeare and Reunions

This has become my favorite weekend. Last year was Mackenzie's first year as a competitor at the Shakespearean Festival in Cedar City.  It's almost unheard of to be chosen your Freshman year. I was fairly impressed :0)
She was chosen again this year and she was even better! Her monologue was Queen Katharine from Henry VIII. Her last judge commented on her "regal-ness"...she was beautiful.

This would be fantastic by itself, but there's more... Kim comes up from Flagstaff and this year the whole family came!! It was so great to see everyone, I have really missed them!

The judge in Kenzie's second round was Mr. "Vest".  He was a slender thing and he had a SillyBandz. Need I say more?

 Not sure which one it was, but Vanessa would have loved to trade with him :0) He had the kids all hold hands and talked to them about enjoying the realization of all their hard work. He said the audience could not touch their faces or leave. Kian and Maddy were like statues, but it turned out neither one of them felt good.
Kian ended up going to the hotel with Doug and falling asleep at 8:00 p.m.  Poor Maddy had to stay with us, but was pretty miserable.  So was Bruce if I'm being honest :0)
While waiting for Kenzie's last round which was incredibly late in starting, Kim and I decided to try to learn how to take better (or even good) photos of ourselves with our cell phones.

Yeah, we were really bored, but Kim has the BEST mugshot...I'm sure she will never share, but I have seen it!  This is what the "kids" were doing...

Mackenzie's final round finally began and she was terrific! Bruce and Maddy had to leave early to go to the car since they were both feeling awful. I think the judge, who had zero control of the room, really liked Mackenzie's performance. I know I did.

Then we finally got to go eat and out of respect for tradition, we chose Applebee's.  We will be starting a new tradition.  Kim and I ordered Strawberry lemonade and he brought one that was the end of the lemonade mixed with strawberry and one that was mixed with Sprite, which was really Sierra Mist. Kim refused that one and when I tasted mine it tasted like fruit punch.

Sierra Mist is NOTHING like lemonade, am I right? When I told "Talon" (yes, that was his name) mine tasted like fruit punch he said "Yeah, we used to have one that was really good, but then they changed it to a cheaper one and that's what it tastes like".

Mallory and Savannah...we were all REALLY hungry!

After Kian slept for 12 hours he felt much better and today we met the Spotts' at their rental cabin in Duck Creek Village for a picnic.

It was SO much fun...I somehow forget how much I miss my friend and it was wonderful to see her girls and their personalities.  They were so good to Kian and it certainly was a memorable way to spend his 7th birthday.  

He did get Birthday Brownies from Day's Market and a watch.  He asked first thing when he got up this morning, "Mom, do I look like I'm 7?"

On our way back to Provo we saw SNOW!!! It was actually a beautiful drive.

Then we went to the mall so he could get the "marble game" for his gift. He'll have his party next weekend and for at least 2 more years his birthday will unfortunately get pushed to the week after because the Bard will wait for no kid's birthday! Can't wait for another YaYa subset reunion!!