Sunburst

Summertime means summer camps. The only attendee interested, my brave daughter KARSON. Last year she attended two individual camps--clay camp (art) at the Kentucky Museum and basketball camp at WKU--and then of course, our favorite, church family camp at the end of the summer. With many, many, MANY snow days last winter, our kids got out of school in June this year. Ugh. I feel like our summer together is already speeding right past us. I signed Karson up for SUNBURST theater camp which happened to be the first two weeks in June (two different sessions). I opted for the 2nd week simply because I felt odd putting her in camp the first week of summer break since it's from 10-3, and she has been in school all year. We needed at least one week to catch our breath and have NO WHERE TO BE (which really didn't happen as we spent most of our week traveling back and forth to Louisville, but that's another story). Karson has developed an interest in theater. This isn't a recent happening, but we only have time to pursue one passion at a time, knowhatImean. Theater hasn't been at the top of the list because I know the commitment level it involves. However, after performing in our church's annual Christmas show and then have a speaking part in the Plano Christmas program, Karson's love of memorizing lines and performing has blossomed. She's a natural at this kind of thing. Her memory is concrete--if you say it, you better mean it, because she will NOT forget it.

I hadn't done much research on the local arts in BG, but I have picked the brains of a couple of friends and found that the Public Theater of Kentucky (PTK) is probably the best fit for us. Karson has loved every minute of theater camp this week. She received her speaking part on Monday and devoured it. She knew all her lines probably before we even got home that night, and trust me, they weren't simple. I've loved hearing her talk "stage" talk and about what she's learning. For example: (1) there is a mean girl in her skit. I don't mean a girl who acts like a mean girl, but a girl that Karson doesn't care for simply because she isn't nice to ANYONE (2) she eats lunch with a boy named Logan everyday and recently Xavian and John (3) house left and stage left don't mean the same thing (4) they haven't painted any props and she was looking forward to that (5) she wished she had gotten Chris as her director and not Beth (because Chris is funny). (6) late Wednesday afternoon....oh yeah, Mom we're supposed to dress up like cowboys tomorrow (ummm, no I can't improvise that quickly and unfortunately our boys have never been into cowboys so we own NO cowboy dress up clothes, but if you want an oozing swamp thing with eyeballs dangling or a snow wolf ninja, I can hook you up). Can't you see how much she's learning??? She told me that she wasn't afraid to get up in front of an audience and perform because she had to do it in front of everyone at the camp. I, of course, know this because she performed at Plano in a super crowded gym with standing room only. I guess she thinks I need to know she's now a professional. The most important thing is that she cannot wait to go back next year, and guess who wants to go with her, Isaac Matthew. Woo hoo! They are certainly dramatic in my book.

The entire performance is composed of a bunch of different skits with snippets from Alice in Wonderland to To Kill a Mockingbird. Karson's skit is called Striking Out. The name of her character is Hustle.

Photo shoot the night of the BIG performance with mom and dad.

Her cheering section. A special thanks also to the Garcia's and Pappy and Mamaw Maglinger for coming out to support Karson.

We weren't supposed to take pictures during the performance so as not to distract the "acting". But I figured it was okay to snap one or two if I turned off my flash (I mean really who is going to follow that rule--kind of like the no clapping until every graduate has walked the line rule). AND, since my digital camera is also a video camera, I recorded most of Karson's performance.
Our proud performer.