Fun in the Choir Loft

Church choir was interesting today, since there was no Sunday School and I had my little buddies up in the loft with me:

Madeleine spent most of the time drawing with a pen on the back of various papers that I was able to spare. She even made a list of words she knows how to spell, such as "on" and "no" and "go."  Attempting to sound out a word, she whispered to me, as I was singing, "Mama?  Is 'look' with a C or a K?" After I responded with a "k," Madeleine set out spelling the word look: "LK."

Close! 

Madeleine's grand masterpiece was this detail-filled drawing:

(Julia's collaboration went as far as writing her own and Madeleine's names.)

ME: (pointing to the beatific smiling figure on the left of the rainbow) Madeleine, is that Jesus?
MADELEINE: (brightly) Yes!
ME: (pointing to the beatific smiling figure on the right of the rainbow) And who's this?
MADELEINE: Uh, TWO JESUSES!  Two Jesus dolls!  They're BOTH Jesus dolls!

Ahh, it's Jeezy!  Now I see.  She even drew the stitched-on beard.  Bears quite a close resemblance, I'd say!

Jeezy in the flesh.  I mean cloth.


Julia spent her time singing along with the choir, and I was pleasantly surprised to realize that she knows the music pretty thoroughly, all from having heard it from down in the Sunday School pew every week.  We seem to have a budding young chorister in our midst!

Julia also surprised me by reciting the Creed from memory, something I hadn't known that SHE knows.  Not that she necessarily understands some of the complicated words she's saying.

JULIA: (reciting) In one holy, catholic and apostolic church... Mom?  Is an "apostolic church" the kind of church Daddy sings at?
ME: Uh...well, it's a Congregational Church, but there is such thing as an Episcopal church.  Is that what you were thinking of?
JULIA: Oh!  Yeah.
ME: Yeah, that's a different thing from "apostolic."  Apostolic means believing the words of Jesus' apostles.
JULIA: Oh.


Seeing as earlier in the service Julia had pointed at the word "Epistle" in my choir book and asked if it said "apostle," I can only imagine how confused she must have been feeling.

Madeleine joined in a few of the choir responses herself, only causing a momentary distraction when she attempted to lean on my music stand, lost her balance, toppled forward off the riser step and bonked her chin into the tray of the stand.  Don't worry, she only repeated that accident ONE MORE TIME later in the service, so all in all she didn't attract any attention.  (In reality, I couldn't have asked for better behavior from both girls up in the loft.  Thank goodness Madeleine loves to draw.)

During the priest's sermon, Madeleine had obviously caught the singing bug from her foray into the choir, because she decided to sing a song from "My Little Pony: Rainbow Rocks" the entire time that the priest was speaking.  (Either that, or she was having a divine moment and singing with the Holy Spirit inside her.)  Whatever the cause, she was totally feeling the music and she just HAD to share it.

Madeleine continued her singing, this time singing a made-up song, as she sat at the table eating her lunch getting distracted by her new Snowy Owl Beanie Baby.  When Auntie Shannon walked through the room and joined in the strain of the song that Madeleine was repeating over and over again, things came to a sudden halt.

MADELEINE: Uh, no, you can't sing along with me, because you're not very good at doing a British ACCENT.

Wow.  Madeleine sets the bar high as choral director.

At any rate, it was a fun morning for all of us; I enjoyed having my little singing buddies with me, Julia was beaming with pride at knowing all the words and melodies to the liturgical music, and Madeleine got to draw pictures instead of sitting still, so it was a win for all of us!