The Littlest Star in Brightmoor

My Tuesday afternoon class of Urban Art students at City Mission not only performed at Kensington but they performed for the tutoring classes at their Christmas party. They performed The Littlest Star. We had a ton of fun and the kids did a great job reading their parts!

God Works in Monetary Ways

I have to wonder what other people are thinking when they see a person listening on their cell phone and the individual gets a HUGE smile on their face. I would probably get happy and smile right along with them! Well, I was that individual that people were probably staring at today. As I was listening to my voicemail, the message that was left said that a family from New Community Kids is donating $200 to cover the expenses of purchasing new dresses, pants, and dress shoes for our Urban Art kids to perform in the Christmas performance in December. What an AWESOME blessing! I wasn't sure how we were going to get the outfits, but I knew the kids would end up wearing something. Now, these girls and boys have a brand new Christmas outfit that THEY OWN! Don't worry, pictures will be posted as soon as we get them:) And THANK YOU to whoever the family is who is so generous by giving the money!

Sista Circle Class 7-PERFORMANCE

"My arm hurts." "Well, you can still get up there and sing." "My throat is really sore." (said in a raspy voice) "Well, you can just mouth the words." "I think I broke my toe." "Then I will help you up on the stage and hold your hand."

I heard these excuses for first 30 minutes while the girls were waiting to go on stage. They were nervous, as was I, but I new it would be a good experience for them. After a long wait, the girls ended the program with their reading of the Maya Angelou poem and singing a Kirk Franklin song. The poem went pretty well. The sound wasn't that great, due to the system, but the girls stuck with it. The song started off really well, then all of the sudden, they came in a measure early and wham...the words were off with the music. I do have to say that they continued to sing and had great attitudes all the way through. Even if the performance wasn't perfect, i'm happy the girls got up there in front of the audience and did a great job! Here are some pictures to enjoy from that night.Laura, Eyvette and me after the performance.(Renee not pictured)
Sista 2 Sista Group with their paper plate awards.
Reading the poem.

Sista Circle Class 6-Dress Rehearsal

I took a big breath, said a quick prayer and walked into the building. Chaos--the girls from my class were coming down the stairs from our classroom as Renee and I were going up. The teacher before us never showed up so the girls were "doin' their own thing"..(whatever that was). We had to round everyone up and go up three flights of stairs to our room. I said another prayer. I really needed to have a better night with the girls. This was our last night of class and rehearsal before next week's performance. Well, the Lord answered my prayers because the night went pretty well. The girls got down the song and we really worked hard on the poem. Attitudes were fairly good throughout the night. So, next week we will see how many of the girls will show up. I hope all of them, but some were threatening not to because of being scared or embarrassed. I know they will do a great job!

Sista 2 Sista class 1

I just got back from my first evening with 10 awesome middle school girls who live in Detroit. CDC, Central Detroit Christian, has a great program going where dinner is provided, tutors are available, basketball is open court, and different types of classes are offered on each Tuesday night. My friend Renee, who is helping with the Urban Arts, and I volunteered to teach a 7 week class to get these girls interested in the arts. I have to say that they seemed pretty interested, they just had not had the exposure to it. I guess both of the middle schools they came from cut the music and drama programs. So, I started off with explaining pantomime and demonstrating one. We had some fun with that. Then the girls started practicing with me. We played a drama game and then it was Renee's turn to do the music side of it. She warmed them up, explained the importance of correct breathing and we did some fun vocal exercises. She worked on rhythm and introduced a song that we will do for the performance. All in all, it was a good night and flew by! I am praying and hoping that these are some of the girls who can come to the camp this summer.