At Nutcracker rehearsal this afternoon, Kai was told that he got the part of Ben Franklin. Ben and Betsy Ross are life sized dolls that burst out from under the Christmas tree and get caught up in the battle between the rats and the toy soldiers. Kai is excited about it, but it also means extra rehearsals. Unfortunately, extra rehearsals mean that he can't do the St. Mark's Players show of Assassins. Kai is very disappointed about it -- he really wanted to do it and was excited about it. I'm feeling very sorry about leaving them after we all had made the commitment that Kai would do it. Now they need to find another 9 year old boy and fast. We need to chalk this up as a lesson that Kai -- our whole family, really -- has a bit of a tendency to over-commit.