Weekly recap + what we ate: Opening Nights and Mother’s Day in the City

I opened my show! The 12 year old opened her show! The 12 year old closed her show! Yay! It’s been a very packed week.

First of all – the 12 year old’s middle school production of Annie Jr. was delightful! She played Tessie, one of the orphans. Tessie is the one who says, “Oh my goodness! oh my goodness!” The Husband noted that he could pick her out in a crowd because of the huge plaid pocket I put in her pinafore. I couldn’t go to the first performance because I was working, but I went to the second performance, which was also the closing performance. It’s so funny seeing the whole show come together after spending all that time running lines with her. There is something very mechanical about running lines and I was so impressed by how comfortable she was onstage. (In the program, the 12 year old thanked her parents from runnign lines with her!”) And the whole production – I mean obviously the production values aren’t terribly high because it’s middle school, but it had it’s own handmade charm. There was one scene with a couch, and then the couch had to move downstage for the next scene so we watched the kids move it and afterwards I asked the 12 year old why the couch wasn’t on wheels? And she said, “Well, we borrowed it from the Teacher’s Lounge.” Which I think perfectly sums up the whole thing.

In the program, the twelve year old thanked, among others, “…her parents who helped her prepare for auditions, run lines, an boost her confidence.” I thought that was really sweet of her.

And that night after she came home from getting ice cream with her cast mates, she started crying because the whole thing was over and oh how I know that feeling – I think that is one thing that makes theatre so special – that high you get from doing something ephemeral and the low you get from realizing that it’s ephemeral. And even though you know you can audition for more shows, you’ll never repeat this very exact show again with these very exact cast mates.

The night after the 12 year old had her shows, I opened my show. There was a very fancy party afterwards. I wore a dress – the other dress I bought at Macy’s in March when I bought that red jumpsuit that I wrote about last month. This dress probably isn’t quite fancy enough for an opening night party, but it is comfortable and forgiving – the smocked waist is elastic – and flowy, which I like. I wish it came in another colour, because black/white/grey isn’t my favorite color palatte. I don’t wear make-up, and have no clue what to do with my hair now that it hasn’t been cut for a year and is looking a little overgrown, so I think maybe the whole look is a little unpolished – but there are limits to what I want to do with myself and hair and make-up don’t quite make it into those boundaries right now. I did wear heels, though, so there’s that.

The party had all sorts of tasty Asian inspired food, a photo booth, lots of loud music. I had fun talking to people I don’t usually get to talk to. The best thing, though was the fried pickled ginger. Who would have thought to do that? It was DELICIOUS.

The opening night party was the Saturday before Mother’s Day, so it was nice that I kind of had a pass to sleep in (until 8am!) then next morning. All week, the kids had hinted that they had planned a special Mother’s Day. Not to be a grinch, but I kind of don’t love celebrating Mother’s Day. (Or my birthday, or anything where I have to be the center of attention). I don’t like surprises, so the family was going to tell me what they had planned, but then they were giving out tickets to teh White House Garden Tour for Mother’s Day Sunday, and I asked the Husband if he wanted to go. And he said, “But we’ve planned Mother’s Day!” and I reminded him that my father was in town and he could watch the kids and when would we have a chance for free childcare while we go out together again? And he said okay. So on Mother’s Day Sunday, the 11 year old made French toast (perhaps with help from her siblings – I’m not sure since I was in bed), we ate the French toast, I took the 4 year old to her agility class and then when I got home, the Husband and I took the Metro downtown.

First stop was coffee. The Husband had wanted to check out this Indonesian coffee shop for ages, but we were never in the area at the right time. It is a fifteen minute walk from the White House so it was the perfect pitstop. I had a chai and a cherry croissant. The chai was delicious- bitingly spicy and just a hint of sweetness. I asked afterwards who made the chai mix and the barista enthusiastically pointed me to the company, Soul Chai. Definitely check them out if you like your chia spicy and not sugary. I’ll be ordering some for sure.

After coffee, we proceeded to the White House. Now getting tickets to the White House Gardens tour is not exactly a rarified thing. Thousands of tickets are passed out for each weekend of garden tours, and they are free. (Honestly, I’d be annoyed if they weren’t free…) However, I was able to get tickets through work, which meant that I didn’t have to stand in line at 8:30am to get tickets. tl:dr – I found the whole experience rather… underwhelming and would not stand in line for tickets unless you were an American history/government fan.

I think calling it a “Gardens Tour” was a little bit misleading. It was more of a “Grounds Tour”. The pre-ordained path allowed people to view the gardens from a distance, but there weren’t a lot of flowers to be seen as we walked along. My take away – the White House grounds is a lot of grass and trees. Which, I supposed makes sense – grass because you need to land helicopters, and trees because it seems like planting a tree is a beloved activity for past residents of the White House to leave their mark and/or honour an occasion. And I guess if I’m being honest, while the horticultural side of the garden tour felt pallid, the historical part of the tour did feel quite momentous. Here was a tree planted by the Obamas, here are the windows to the Oval Office, here is the Rose Garden and that walk way seen so many time on the West Wing. So I suppose what the garden tour lacked for me in actual garden, it made up in weighty historical significance and that did make for some pondering.

After the Gardens Tour, we decided to take in a museum. The White House is next to the Renwick, which is an American Art Museum that focuses on craft and handiwork. I’ve seen several things there, and really found it intriguing so I was eager to go again. I thought there was an Amish quilt exhibit there, but when I arrived, I found that the Amish quilt exhibit was at the American Art Museum in Gallery Place/ Chinatown, which was seven or eight blocks away. Oops. We took in the exhibits at the Renwick anyway, the best being this exhibit of nets hung from the cieling. It was visually appealing, but also relaxing experience because you had to lay down on the floor to get the full impact:

After we took in the other exhibits in the Renwick, we decided to go to the American Art Museum and see the Amish Quilt exhibit after all since the restaurant that we picked for dinner was in that direction anyway.

I thought this exhibit was stunning and though provoking. What struck me, apart from the visual aspect of the quilts, was the idea that all these quilts hung in a museum, yet they were all labelled “Artist: unidentified” – it made me ponder the tension between quilts that are quite skillfully and and artistically assembled – the patterns and colours are quite intricate – and the Amish who are a modest, attention shunning people. Highly recommend this exhibit.

After the exhibit, we went to dinner. Recently the New York Times published and article entitled “The 25 Best Restaurants in Washington, DC Right Now.” (Hilariously, the comments are full of people noting that a lot of the restaurants on the list are in the Maryland or Virginia suburb, so the title of the article is misleading. I’m surprised by the vehemence of some of the comments.) Some of the restaurants on the list I’ve been to, but many were new to me, especially those in the city since we very rarely eat out in the city. There is no where I feel my suburban mom-ness more than in a hip DC restaurant. At any rate, we decided to check out a restaurant on the list, Baan Siam, a Thai restaurant in Mount Vernon Square, near Gallery Place. This isn’t like your standard Thai restaurant – pad thai and drunken noodles are nowhere to be seen. The food is from northern Thailand. The Husband and I ordered fried pumpkin, fried spicy mushrooms (enoki mushroom – this was novel because I’d never had fried enoki mushrooms and the long thin shape made it well suited for finger food), spicy chicken in banana leaf (very spicy, but also sweet, sour, and funky in a good way), shrimp chili paste fried rice with fried pork belly, and a small cucumber salad. It was all super flavorful and tasty. And for dessert, we had mango with sticky rice, because of course.

After dinner we took the metro back home, arriving back at the house aroun 7:45pm. When we got home, things were pretty quiet, so the Husband and I snuck in the back door and collapsed on the living room couch waiting for someone to notice we were home. No one did. Everyone ended up going to bed super late- not ideal for a Sunday night, but it was all fine.

Grateful for – the Tech Week edition:

-Blue highlighter. This is sort of a weedy work hack, but – There is one entrance I cue (the green post it) that is in the middle of an orchestral interlude. I like to think I read music pretty well, but I always felt iffy about this entrance, never confident that I was cuing it in the right place. Reading a piano reduction of the orchestral part can be confusing because there are so many notes in the page and I have to figure out which notes correspond to what I’m hearing, and if I don’t count it completely accurately, I get easily lost. Most nights it was kind of a prayer and a “feeling” for where the cue was. So one day during tech, I took a blue highlighter and highlighted the notes of the melody. And suddenly, I could see what I was listening for and I could follow the music and cue the sequence perfectly. Sometimes I just have to highlight what I need and ignore the rest of the notes and I won’t get lost. I’m sure there’s a life lesson in there somewhere.

-dropping my flashlight. One of my backstage tools is my mini Maglite. It is essential for lighting the way backstage when everything is dark. I converted my light with a kit so that it is push button operated instead of twist. Anyhow, at the start of tech, it was working somewhat sporadically which was kind of annoying and I was going to order myself a new one. Then at one point, I accidentally dropped the Maglite on the floor and it started to work! Yay!

-The Husband who held down the fort – handling pick up and dinner and bedtime on his own all week. Also while dealing with a whole slew of plumbing problems at our rental house. And then he even brought all the kids to my dress rehearsal, even though it meant a late night for everyone. I think the 4 year old fell asleep in the last act, but the other two kid watched the whole thing.

-middle school drama programs. For giving my kid such a great experience. For giving her an outlet to be silly and make friends. For giving her a place to go after school. For bringing the community together to cheer these talented and enthusiastic kids on.

Looking Forward To:

-Being home in the evenings – now that my show is open, I’m looking forward to being able to pick up the kids from the school bus, make dinner, put kids to bed and zone out in front of the tv with the Husband watching Brooklyn 99 or 30 Rock or maybe we’ll get to that third season of Ted Lasso.

-Swim Season – We’ve signed up for the pool, and I’m excited to spend time at the pool and to cheer the 12 year old on at swim meets. There were a couple days last week that were blazingly hot and I thought how it feels like summer, but we’re not quite there yet.

-Dirty Meat Party – There is currently twenty pounds of meat marinating in my fridge in preparation for the grilling party that we have every time a certain colleague/friend of mine is in town working on a show. It’s probably the biggest party we throw every year and while I don’t always like having 25 people descend on my house, I do love seeing everyone having a good time. There is some rain in the forecast, which makes me a little nervous because I am ill equipped to put 25 people inside my house. But we can’t postpone it because then the meat will be over-marinated. Also – the party has always been called the Dirty Meat Party, but maybe I should reconsider because as the 7 year old ran to the school bus, he called out, “I can’t wait to eat dirty meat!!!!”

-Reading this – middle aged female pirate goes on adventures. It’s proving delightful so far. I’ve laughed out loud so many times while reading it.

What we ate:
The only dinner I made at home last week was Friday night, my day off. I made this Pearl Couscous with Creamy Feta and Chickpeas . I added some shrimp in the last 5 minutes of baking. It was very tasty, but I wish there was a way to make it a one pot meal. perhaps just cooking it all on the stovetop and not baking it?

In lieu of the other dinners that week, here is another “At Work All Day” lunchbox picture:

Lunch: broccoli quinoa salad, which I had made last week and still working through. Plum.

Dinner: marinated beans with potatoes and arugula. Avocado and a boiled egg to eat along with.

Snacks: cut up apples and hummus, protein bar (from Costco, really just a glorified candy bar), two carrots (yes, I just toss them in whole. easier that way), beef stick (actually for the drive home to snack on when I get sleepy.)