Wobbly smile

A huge day for this kid. We left home at 8,30.., she had ensemble practice, clarinet lesson and theory class then we got in a (only vaguely known friends) car and drove to Manchester. It took nearly 3 hours and she was beginning to stress as the time we should have arrived approached, came, passed... but we made it. To her first ever National Children’s Orchestra Northerlies rehearsal. She was nervous but she didn’t falter once as we arrived. She went off and didn’t look back. 3 hours later, I was greeted with a ginormous grin. They’re playing Pirates of the Caribbean in their repertoire this year, to her delight. She was desk partnered by the section helper. She’d been warned that parts of it would probably be too hard, but she had a go at everything and wasn’t phased. She said the helper thought she’d done really well. She was thoroughly delighted to be allowed three biscuits at break time. she loved sectionals, where they played Happy. She broke a couple of bits of her clarinet but did ok dealing with it all.

We got back in the car and it was a total nightmare getting out of the city. We stopped at the first motorway service station 90 minutes after leaving. As I took her to the loo, she slipped her hand in mine and said “mama you’d have been so proud. I had way more fun than I even thought I could and I tried it all and it was so incredible”. I am so proud of her. She’s the youngest in the orchestra, but we thought she could well be. And she LOVED the whole experience. We’ve made new friends in the delightful son and father that took us. Katie and R have clicked brilliantly and we both enjoyed the 7 hours (eurgh!!) that we’ve been travelling with them today. It took us almost 4 hours to get home and she’s only now succumbed to sleep, after a brief “im so tired that I can’t function” meltdown. Blown away by this kid today.