Ramblings of the day..lol

Last night my family and I attended a beautiful Christmas(yes, Christmas before Thanksgiving) concert called "Birthday of a King"at BYUH, put on by three groups; University Chorale, BYUH Brass Ensemble, and Ko'olauloa Children's Chorus. My fifteen year old daughter, Jen, is in the KCC so of course I was really excited to go see their first Christmas Performance.
Actually, the director of the University Chorale is also the director of the BYUH Brass Ensemble and this was her concert so she invited the Children's Chorus to come join them. I should add that the Ko'olauloa Children's Chorus will be going to New York this coming June to participate in the Carnegie Hall Festival so every practices, performances or concerts they did, do and will do up to the time they leave for the trip are considered preparation for the big event so it is mandatory that every member of the choir whose going on the trip to participate in all the performances they have here in Hawaii.
So, like I said I was really excited to see them perform (I always get excited when I am about to see people sing, and of course I get more excited to see one of my own offspring performs). The concert was set for 7:30 p.m. and because I didn't want to be late, I told my family we have to be at BYUH no later seven o'clock. I actually have dinner prepared and ready by 5:30, this is record for me since I usually didn't have dinner on the table til about seven. My boys were really cooperative, they even got their chores done without complaints. I was actually patting myself of the back here since everything was going soooo smoothly. Even my husband, who is usually late for everything except for work, was even ready on time. Usually getting four boys and a toddler ready to go somewhere takes a lot of nagging and yelling on my part, but last evening, there was not even a whine or yelling (from me, of course) was heard anywhere. By seven were already on the way to the concert. We even got there early enough that we were able to find parking closest to the BYUH Auditorium where the concert would be. We even got seatings of our choosing...isn't that wonderful? Of course being there on time, I was able to go around and chat up friends and people I knew to catch up on life. About ten minutes before the concert started, I realized that I had forgotten to bring my camera. I asked a friend of mine whose kids are also in the choir if she can take pictures, she also forgot her camera...hmmm. "It's ok, I'll just use camera on my phone", I thought. Nope, I did not have my phone with me either, I gave it to my 17 year old daughter who was going to a school dance last night. I'm sure you can imagine my disappointment not to mention the pending frustration now. Luckily, there was somebody there whose been asked to come video tape the whole thing so I felt better thinking I can buy the dvd later.
7:30 p.m came and the director came on stage and welcome everyone and did a little description on the concert and the lighting effects was beautiful. They started the first number with the Brass Ensemble doing a prelude music on O Come, O Come, Emmanuel, and while they were playing their beautiful brass instruments, the University Chorale walked up the stage from the aisles singing the first verse of the song and by the time they got up on the stage they were close to the end of the first verse and when they finished the verse and started on the chorus, the Children's Choir entered the auditorium and walked down the aisle singing the chorus along with the other choir as they made their way up to the stage...oh, it was soooo beautiful to see the kids and it sounded heavenly to have the two choir and the brass ensemble doing the beautiful number together. When that first song ended, both choirs and brass did another number, called Angel's Carol, another beautiful number {I wish I had recorded the whole thing so I can play it back on here, oh well...}.
When the second number was done, the Brass Ensemble and University Chorale exited the stage while the KCC stayed behind to sing the third number all by themselves. Now that was a very fun and exciting number...they started with one of the kids introducing the song {I'm Gonna Sing with the Spirit} and then he started the song off with a solo part...aww, that was a teary moment, something about a child singing solo always brings tears to my eyes. {To me, children are the closest to heaven here on earth and when they sing, they sound like angels.} The choir then joined in and this song was one of those bringing-down-the-house-joyful-song kind, with the kids swaying and doing their hand motion and a lot of Hallelujia to it. It was beautiful...of course, I'm partial to that since my daughter is singing in that choir. {Sorry folks, I wish I have some picures to show you.} After this number they had the kids sat down in the audience and my daughter left with some of the kids so I thought they've probably gone around to enter the stage again from the back for when they perform again. {The KCC director had emailed all parents to let us know that the kids will be performing three numbers, two at the beginning and one at the end.} So, when my daughter was gone I thought she would be entering the stage later, but she came back a few minutes later, out of her choir uniform. She told me that the last number they will be singing, they will be singing from the audience not on the stage and it's optional if they want to sing that number or not. Since she doesn't want to sing from the audience, she might as well change out of her uniform...made sense. So the concert went on as it was, mostly the Brass Ensemble and University Chorale alternating between themselves. Halfway through the concert, I just realized something.
As I scanned the auditorium, majority of the audience were friends and families of the Ko'olauloa Children's Chorus. That was when the realization hit me that the University Chorale/BYU Brass Ensemble Director used the children's choir to get people to come to her concert. She knew that if she had the KCC performed in her concert, the kids' family would make it a point to have anyone they know attend otherwise it would have been a really sad sight indeed to see a concert with an audience of maybe about ten or so people. {pfftttttttttt....how dare she!}
That just totally ruined the mood for me...don't get me wrong the rest of the numbers were beautiful indeed but I wasn't as enthusiastic about them as I was earlier...the thought just kept going through my mind that was a backhanded trick on her part. "I wonder how the KCC director feels about this", I thought to myself. As it turned out the last number that the children's choir was supposed to join in was second to the last number and it wasn't even a whole verse, the director had asked the audience to join in on that song too.
Well, I was only too happy when the concert was finally at an end...when I went out to tell my friend about my discovery, she laughed and told me she and another mom had just been talking about that very thing.
I was really bothered by that discovery...and when I'm bothered about something, I usually ramble about it to my hubby, so you can see this was what I was doing on our way to our car. My hubby, in his attempt to keep the peace, responded, "just look at it this way honey, we have been uplifted by wonderful spiritual music". {He has a point there....but did he have to be sooo darn positive.}
We got to the car and he suddenly remembered that his Elder's Quorum was having an activity in the BYUH Gameroom so he decided we should least make an appearance. By then it was around 8:30 and when we got to the gameroom, the activity was long since over.
Now, he turned to me and said, "I've been looking forward to this activity all week to attend and you made me completely forgot about it."
"What? You're blaming me now for something you never mentioned til now? I've never heard anything about an Elder's Quorum activity, why didn't you tell me this on Sunday, at least I would have written it down and reminded you."
"Because I had already made it a point to remember it and you made me forget by dragging me to a boring concert."
"WHAT?!!"
Then it another thought occured to me so I smiled my sweetest smile, with dimples and all and said sweetly, too sweetly, I think....
"Honey, look at it this way, at least you have been uplifted by wonderful spiritual music tonight", and walked away with a satisfied grin on my face.
Walking back to the car again, I heard him saying to our daughter Jen that he didn't mean to say the concert was boring, the number her choir sang was beautiful but everything else was not as good. Well, we decided to rent a movie, go home, make some hot chocolate and enjoy a nice family moment.

There you have it, my ramblings for the day...