our Drama Queens

I am blessed to be an Aunt and I try (emphasis on try) to be active in my nieces and nephews lives.  My brothers daughters are the ones who I know the best and who I live closest to.  Recently I got the opportunity to attend my nieces play "Star Power".  She had participated in a 2 week 'drama camp' and this 'play' was the end project.  I love theater..... but, this is the kind of theater that only a loving and adoring relative could truly appreciate....the most important wonderful part of the play is how much the children love, love, love what they're doing and all of the loving accolades poured upon them by relatives (such as I, who understood probably 1 out of every 7 words and having missed the first 10 minutes spent the following 3 acts trying to figure out the plot) who sat and cheered and absorbed the cuteness.  My niece is particularly cute (in my very biased but I believe accurate opinion), she broke character a couple of times to wave at her dad or scan the crowd or fix her antennae (see following picture)..... she was darling and most importantly, she had a wonderful experience and she wants to do it again next year... My other amazing niece was also in a similar camp but I missed her play (in which I must believe she was darling and completely amazing....because that's how she is).  Of course with loving family gatherings comes photo ops...and with photo ops and my family comes lots of goofy pictures (ugh...they drive me bonkers.... I mean, is it totally awful to ask for just 1 nice picture where the whole family is smiling???)

I do love these goofballs.  I am so lucky to be part of their lives!

So, similar topic, separate subject.....after the daahling play I took my eldest niece "A" to Borders bookstore.  A couplea weeks ago I gave her a gift card for her birthday and declared we'd go spend time together @ Borders and she'd get books and I'd spend Auntie/niece time....a few days later Borders declared they were closing all of their stores..........grrrrrrr............ so, since we couldn't go right away I had to hope that some decent books would be left in the store by the time we got there.  The pickins were pretty picked but some of the deals were awesome (some were just so-so and some were blechy)....but, we spent our auntie/niece time together.  I adored talking to her.  She has so much personality and is getting old enough so that we can talk person to person instead of older person to younger person...granted I am still a lot OLDER but I figure since we have the same shoe size right now that I'm granted some leighway..... (is that how you spell leighway or is it leeway???)