The Barri (more than one Barrus): Ward Christmas Party

This evening was our ward Christmas party. For the past several years (at least seven), our ward Christmas festivities have been the morning of the first Saturday of December. We've had a breakfast (with varying degrees of yumminess), a short program, singing, and once a visit from Santa. This year, however, the planning committee wanted to move it back to the evening. So instead of having breakfast, we had a very nice pot roast dinner, a fun program (with varying degrees of funniness), and a sweet message from the bishop.

Part of the program was a talent show. The Primary sang, and naturally, they were the best. Brandt and Blythe seemed surprised they were supposed to sing, but they got up and did a great job. My pictures are terrible, mostly because they were taken with my phone, in the dark, from below the stage and behind Kelli Austin who was conducting. Oh well.

The Relief Society had been asked to put together something for the talent show, and the High Priests had been as well. This meant that our whole family had an opportunity to be on stage. The High Priests were told that they would do a bell number, with no rehearsal, please just be willing to show up and get on stage and work your bell. So when the time came, Kent dutifully stood and got on stage. Thing was, there were lots of other men who dutifully got up, and Kent, very slyly, just kept handing out bells to others until they were all gone and he didn't have one. So he came back and sat down to watch with the rest of us.

They were terrible. In theory, they understood what they were suppose to do, but putting it into practice was another thing all together. People weren't dinging their bell when they should, or dinging, but just off tempo enough that the tune was recognizable, sort of, but only just barely. Those of us in the audience were highly amused through their first attempt, but when they were going to launch into a second number, Kent and I began clapping and they recognized a merciful reprieve when it was handed to them.

The Relief Society number was better. Just. Maureen (RS Prez) was asked to put something together and told me she had the thought, "I should just call Katherine and McKenzie (Drake) and ask them to do something." But instead, she put out an email asking for anyone who would be willing to participate in a talent display of some sort. Who responded? Me and McKenzie. To her credit, Mary Atkinson did too. We gathered Sunday at our house to put something together. I had suggested that we sing "It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas" with the counter melody "Pine cones and holly berries." That seemed fine until we looked at the music and realized that if we were going to sing it seriously, it would take lots of practice. We didn't want lots of practice, so we decided that we would lip sync to an Osmond version, while wearing something silly on our heads, and doing minimal choreography (turning twice in between the verses). During the week I got silly head stuff, and brought along some bells, sticks, and maracas we could play as accompaniment.

This evening, as others were doing their numbers, I tried to round up several more sisters to help us. Having only four of us didn't seem like nearly enough. In the end, in addition to Maureen, McKenzie, and me (Mary was nowhere to be found when we needed to go on stage), we had Laurie Heiner, Hilary Davis, Angela Richards, and Elizabeth Elder. Several of them didn't know the song, but that didn't even matter. We sort of bobbed up and down to the music, looked silly in our hats, turned all together in between the verses, and played our instruments. The Osmonds sang, we were on stage for two and a half minutes, and the Relief Society made a showing. I think we may take our gig on the road.

There was a Christmas sweater contest. I participated, though I wore my ugly Christmas t-shirt from camp. I got second place and won an elf-eared hat, which was the silly thing I wore on my head during the Relief Society number. We sang, we visited with all our good neighbors, and a couple of us ate way, way, way too much desert for the amount of dinner consumed. All in all, it was a wonderful Christmas party.

As a side note, I think I'm counting this party as our Friday field trip. I'm blogging about this activity more than a month late (in Janary), and I can't remember at all what we did today. Is that bad? It obviously wasn't much fun, but the ward party certainly was. FTF #16.

Here are the really terrible pictures of the kids singing.

No pictures of anything else, though I may ask around if anyone has any others.