Tom's First Nativity

Our star

So we had a lovely day yesterday as we got to see two performances of 'A Little Bird Told Me' - Tom's nativity play (as nonreligious as you could get it which was good).

All of Tom's class were stars.  Thankfully the school provides the costume - we just had to provide the underclothes (white) which meant I wasn't stressed  - phew!  (I've been dreading the whole dressing up / costume thing)

The story centred around a robin who was cold and wanted to go somewhere warmer.  A flock of birds told him to go to Bethlehem where it is warmer and where a special baby had just been born.  (Not sure of the accuracy of this - Bethlehem is colder than here at this time of year!).

There was a part in the play where the birds were flying in the star light and it was at this point that Tom's class got on stage and did a little dance number.  Twinkling with hands, turn around, shuffle to the left, shuffle to the right etc etc.  It was really lovely to watch.  Unfortunately Tom was at the back and is one of the shortest so we couldn't see him do his dance.  Not to worry though, for the rest of the play he was sat right at the front and he stood up to 'sing' along to all the songs.  'Sing' is in inverted commas because I can't put my hand on my heart and say he sang his heart out.  More, he stood up, looked behind him, to his side, behind again, looked at the boy next to him, but not really forward and I couldn't hear his voice in any of the songs even though I was about a meter away from him!  In fact he clearly hadn't picked up the words to quite a few of the songs.  I guess singing isn't his thing (don't think any of his genes are particularly musical). Two of his class mates made up for him though and belted out the numbers.  None of the songs were ones that I recognised, and to be fair to him there were a lot of songs and most of his class mates were distracted and not word perfect either.

Mary, Joseph and Jesus made an appearance right at the end, but they didn't even have a speaking part.  It really was lovely.  I must admit I welled up when they first filed in in their costumes - Tom looked so so so small and super cute (not helped by the fact he was next to the biggest child in the class who is head and shoulders above him). The play was performed by what I would call the Infant School and is now called Key Stage 1.  All the children in the top class had a speaking role - I guess that wouldn't happen in a big school, one girl performed a solo and was brilliant - I'm not sure I would have been able to cope if I was her mother!

One funny thing though - there was no mistaking where in the country we were.  I guess little children sing with their speaking voices as every song was sung in a very strong northern accent.  There were also lots of jokes put in for the adults - but I don't think the children realised they were being funny as it was done in such a dead pan manner.

Normally the school allow videos to be taken, but I think there are some children in care in one of the classes so I'm afraid no videos, and we aren't officially allowed to put up any photos on a website - but this isn't read by anyone other than close family and friends and this photo doesn't show any other children so I can't see what harm it can do.  More pics are available to see when you next visit us.

I can't wait for next year!