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In late summer, my church runs a children's music camp. It's kinda like VBS except the kids learn a musical for the week, then there's a performance on Sunday. Basically the adult choir volunteers run it, teach music and dance, drama and props and costumes. The kids pay for the cost of thier camp t-shirts and that's about it.
Now my involment with this started in 2007 with "You know how to sew right?". So I was drafted into the costume department. The music camp has 7 or 8 huge plastic tubs full of props and fabric that people have donated, and we sort through them to make costumes. At the time there was nearly the entire adult choir volunteering. The costume department was 4 people. Now over the years, we've lost people and what's happened is that I've become the sole person in the combined prop/costume department and now to be fair, we have to make sure that everyone gets a costume.
/end BG
This year we had about 100 kids. And yes it was only yours truly in the prop/costume department. Well, me and my sewing machine. We always have a few high school kids who come to help out as well, but they mostly sit around gossiping instead of actually helping.
Every year we have a different musical, but a lot of things are always the same. The kids will always whine and bitch about how thier costumes are not 'fashionable'. To which I always respond that if they'd like to go buy their own fabric, I'd sew it into a costume for them. Normally the kids are sent into my area to pick out costumes and then to make props, but this year they only kept them in the main area to work on music/lines. Makes it difficult when I'm getting asked where the costume is for 'lead character' and I have things set aside, but I don't know the size of the child. It's also a lot of fun when they add in new characters on thursday who need a costume and props. Then we have kids who show up monday and get a costume, then we don't see them again until the performance. That's always fun.
And of course every year, we have stage moms. So much fun to be bitched out by some screeching harpy while her kid is standing wide-eyed behind her. I think a lot of the parents forget that all of the money they pay for the camp is only for the T-shirt. We're all volunteers and when we need supplies, we buy them ourselves. Most of the kids actually like me and make excuses to hang out in my area and help me. The younger kids usually help out more then the teenagers do.
This year we had one kid that was just a pain in the butt. She was one of those snotty know-it-all types and wouldn't listen to anyone. Also she was about 9. She's already complained about every little thing she can, from the musical we picked to the costumes to the snacks etc, etc. Friday one of the other volunteers bought doughnuts for the other adults. Apparently this was a great insult to her highness. She stomped into my area and demanded to know why the grown ups got doughnuts and she only had animal crackers. By this time I was so done with her BS, so I politely let her know that all of the grown ups had given up other things that they wanted/needed to do to be there so that kids like her could complain about costumes and snacks and props. Her little cohorts burst into giggles and ran off.
I am so glad to have my sewing machine back home and back to a somewhat normal routine again
Now my involment with this started in 2007 with "You know how to sew right?". So I was drafted into the costume department. The music camp has 7 or 8 huge plastic tubs full of props and fabric that people have donated, and we sort through them to make costumes. At the time there was nearly the entire adult choir volunteering. The costume department was 4 people. Now over the years, we've lost people and what's happened is that I've become the sole person in the combined prop/costume department and now to be fair, we have to make sure that everyone gets a costume.
/end BG
This year we had about 100 kids. And yes it was only yours truly in the prop/costume department. Well, me and my sewing machine. We always have a few high school kids who come to help out as well, but they mostly sit around gossiping instead of actually helping.
Every year we have a different musical, but a lot of things are always the same. The kids will always whine and bitch about how thier costumes are not 'fashionable'. To which I always respond that if they'd like to go buy their own fabric, I'd sew it into a costume for them. Normally the kids are sent into my area to pick out costumes and then to make props, but this year they only kept them in the main area to work on music/lines. Makes it difficult when I'm getting asked where the costume is for 'lead character' and I have things set aside, but I don't know the size of the child. It's also a lot of fun when they add in new characters on thursday who need a costume and props. Then we have kids who show up monday and get a costume, then we don't see them again until the performance. That's always fun.
And of course every year, we have stage moms. So much fun to be bitched out by some screeching harpy while her kid is standing wide-eyed behind her. I think a lot of the parents forget that all of the money they pay for the camp is only for the T-shirt. We're all volunteers and when we need supplies, we buy them ourselves. Most of the kids actually like me and make excuses to hang out in my area and help me. The younger kids usually help out more then the teenagers do.
This year we had one kid that was just a pain in the butt. She was one of those snotty know-it-all types and wouldn't listen to anyone. Also she was about 9. She's already complained about every little thing she can, from the musical we picked to the costumes to the snacks etc, etc. Friday one of the other volunteers bought doughnuts for the other adults. Apparently this was a great insult to her highness. She stomped into my area and demanded to know why the grown ups got doughnuts and she only had animal crackers. By this time I was so done with her BS, so I politely let her know that all of the grown ups had given up other things that they wanted/needed to do to be there so that kids like her could complain about costumes and snacks and props. Her little cohorts burst into giggles and ran off.
I am so glad to have my sewing machine back home and back to a somewhat normal routine again
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