A Surprise Evening with Luke!

Last night wasn't unlike a lot of evenings that we experience here in the Deti Household... Hayley had her basketball Jamboree (team pictures and a short practice game) and we also had to make an appearance at the Reflections District Art Exhibit for Luke (because his artwork had advanced from the school level to the District level).  At first we were going to 'divide and conquer' as usual, so our plan was to have Hayley get a ride to her game and for me, Wes, and Luke to quickly go look at the art exhibit and then run down the hill to see the ending of Hayley's game, but this was going to be quite a time crunch with Hayley's game starting @ 5:45 in downtown Kent and Luke's art exhibit starting @ 6 on the other side of Kent. 

In the past when we've got to the District Art Exhibits (for Hayley's art), it has been an extremely anti-climactic and disappointing event.  Basically all of the kids artwork was just set up in a high school lunch room and you'd walk around and look at it and then leave.  It'd take 20 minutes at the most and at most there would be a couple dozen people with you looking at the artwork.  Well, neither of the kids participated last year, so I was unaware that they've stepped things up a bit (quite a bit)!  So, this year we get to the high school expecting to be in and out within 20 minutes and then on to see the end of Hayley's game.  Well, we pulled up to the school and there are hundreds of cars in the lot!  The exhibit was going on as usual, but they've actually added an awards ceremony (complete with a powerpoint presentation).  I just thought this was awesome!  It was so nice for all of the kids to receive some extra special recognition.  Anway, you get the idea... I didn't think this was going to be a big deal... we were really just going because we did the same for Hayley and we've got to keep things even for the second kid, right?  This will also explain my horrible photos and why Luke looks like a complete stinky slob (in crocks)!  I wasn't prepared... didn't bring the right lens, etc.  I've really got to take a class...

Soooooo, to make a long story a little bit longer, we get seated in the auditorium for the awards ceremony and they call Luke's group (Primary Visual Arts) up to the stage.  I think there were about 35-40 kids up there with him and they're calling names one by one to give them their participation certificates.  Well, it comes down to four kids on stage and the emcee says that she's down to first, second, and third place awards.  It truly wasn't until that point that I realized that Luke was possibly one of the winners.  I was just thinking of putting our time in at this event and racing to Hayley's game to make the tail end.  Well, anyone who really knows me will be surprised that I was this oblivious because I'm a highly competitive person!  So, back to the stage and the top three awards... remember I said that there were four kids left on stage?  Well, it's at this point that I'm realizing one of two things:  1)  Oh my gosh, my little guy is one of the top three! OR 2)  Oh my gosh, poor Lukey Bear, we sent him up to the stage to sit with the wrong category of kids!

Well, maybe you've guess the outcome by now... Luke won First Place!  Wes and I were so, so, so shocked and surprised!  I can't tell you how much fun that was!  We were all just tickled.  We were (and are) so proud of Luke! 

This is Luke just after receiving his award.  Not sure if you can see the tears of pride forming in my eyes... :)

Wes doesn't look thrilled here, but that's only because he didn't want to be photographed crying!  He was so extremely proud of Luke.

The theme of the Reflections Program this year was:  "Beauty Is..."  Luke loves fall leaves, so he chose to paint a picture of a tree changing colors in the fall with Mount Rainier in the background.  He used oils on canvas.  Luke's artwork is headed to state (wherever that may be...).