Spring Piano Festival

It's that time of year again! Time for the Spring Piano Festival!

Hailey played two long and fairly difficult pieces this year. I can't believe she has only been playing for about 3 years and she really does well on the piano.
Not sure if I mentioned it earlier but she got a "Superior" again at the National Junior Piano Festival again this year. I think that makes her eligible to go for the gold cup next time around.


To finish off the festival this year Hailey and her friend Bethany performed a duet - It was quite a difficult piece also and very powerful.

There was also a competition amongst all the students to try to increase their practice times! Bethany took first place but Hailey was a close second by, I believe, one hour!

Hailey has really enjoyed playing the piano, but the sad thing is that the piano teacher has her house up for sale. We can only hope that she doesn't go too far away so that Hailey can still get instruction from her. She is a good teacher and a very sweet lady.

The Speech Project

Kids and school projects, it's just the way it is. I can't recall how many school projects I have worked on with my kids. Everything from posters and dioramas to mini books they have written with full color illustrations! I have also been up till all hours of the night the night before these little beauties were due trying to help my child who chose to procrastinate.
This project took off on a whole different direction.

Hailey's assignment was to write an informative speech and do either a power-point presentation or make a poster but it must be able to be seen at the back of the classroom. We don't have power-point and Hailey was very much NOT interested in doing another poster. She emailed her teacher to see if she could do a diorama. He was excited by her ingenuity in thinking up another type of project but reiterated that it must be able to be seen at the back of the room.

Hailey chose the topic of "Light and Sound Technician" - due to the fact that she has worked with her Dad in this and finds it interesting.

My idea was to use a large box and some BBQ skewers wrapped in Aluminum foil to make a front visual of a truss and we would go from there with my craft staples of glue, construction paper and dress shirt cardboard. . . . I asked Kurt to help cut the big box in half because it was too deep . . . this wasn't good enough for Kurt. He had his own ideas. The cool thing about it was, for the first time EVER I didn't have to do a lot! Yippee!
There was going to have to be a complete replica of an actual stage . . . Mind you, this took TWO DAYS to complete!

Kurt is trying to center a shoe box lid for the main part of the stage.

Drilling holes for the dowels for the beginning of the truss system.

I am amazed at how good of a job Hailey did at building these trusses!

I asked her if maybe she still wanted to be an architect after all! She did all the cutting, fitting and gluing. . . quite impressive!

Kurt is out in the garage with these little wooden biscuit things shaping some speakers that are going to hang from the trusses!

Here he is spraying Hailey's truss setup with metallic silver spray paint to look like aluminum. It looked just like it! Even where Hailey used the hot glue on the edges gave it a soldered look.

Here is Hailey painting the speakers that will fly from the truss.

There they finally are! These are probably the only flying speakers that our friend Tanya won't be afraid of!!! Kurt is starting to install the "lights".

Wooden blocks made into Mains.

Lights are on and ready to go!

Here it is finally all finished . . .working lights, canopy, backdrop. Stage and drum riser have fabric skirting. There are toothpick mic stands and little wooden monitors for each musician!

You can't see that they also made a Monitor Board that sits off to the side of the stage.

Now where are those musicians . . . They are never on time!

Sure can't beat that with construction paper and BBQ skewers! It looks great! In case you wanted to know, Hailey and Kurt got an "A" on their project!

Winter Concerts . . .

Well, it's that time of year again - time for the Winter Concerts! This year we were able to attend two different concerts! Hailey's, who has been playing Violin for about 4 years now and Hayden who is playing in a concert for the first time on his Cello!

Both these concerts were held in the same week, just a a few days apart!

Hailey's concert was on Tuesday December 8Th - this was also exciting because they finally got their matching Orchestra Uniforms and they looked quite spiffy!


I don't like the fact this picture is blurry but it gives you an idea of how long the dress is! The top part of the dress has black sparkly bead things and it really is pretty. It sure gave the kids a very polished look.

This was taken right as we were getting ready to leave. Tyler likes to have his picture taken with the "performers"! Someday it will be his turn and if it is up to Grandma he will be sitting behind a drum set! (earplugs anyone?)

This is the only picture we got of Hailey at the Concert itself! This camera takes awful pictures indoors so only the close up ones will show up!

The kids played beautifully!

Now onto the next concert! Hayden's was on December 10Th. . . This was almost a heartbreaking event for us. We were sooooo excited to finally get to see Hayden play!

Here he is before we left for the concert.

We were soooo sad because we had major "technical difficulties" at his concert. Originally we get to the gymnasium early and sit near the top of the bleachers where we can plug in the video camera. When we got there the gym was PACKED!!! It was standing room only!

So we didn't have the use of the video camera :( and then the regular camera doesn't take very good pictures indoors and then it kept saying "low battery" or shutting off. I brought 4 sets of batteries and it did it to all of them! (this is when a mother's tears begin to flow).


Here is a VERY BLURRY picture of Hayden playing. He is second Cello on the left!

This was the most annoying part of the whole evening. Since there was only standing room we chose to stand on the Northwest side of the gym so we could at least see Hayden's face while we played but we had NO IDEA who we chose to stand next to.

This picture is of the majority of the 6Th grade choir and part of the 7Th and 8Th grade choir. This group of kids talked, wiggled and hand gestured the WHOLE ENTIRE TIME! It was soooo frustrating. Even though several of us standing by the wall had told them to Shush it didn't work.

We could barely hear the Orchestra playing across the gym.

After having to stand for over an hour and trying to ignore all the commotion and noise to the side of us, we were still so happy for Hayden though! He said at first he was nervous but once he got going he didn't have any problem at all and he actually said he can't wait to perform again! I think he grew up a bit inside himself that night!!!

After sharing with him the perils of our technology, Hayden was kind enough to let us take a few more shots when we got home!

Here he is pretending his Cello was a Violin! Don't worry Grandma, he was extremely cautious when doing this!

And here is our "Tyler with the Performer" shot! The boys had fun with this one!

It is always wonderful to get to see your kids perform. In another instance it tugs at your heartstrings because it just shows you that they are growing up right before your eyes!

Great job Hailey and Hayden! We can't wait to see you play again! But, this time, we are standing no where near the choir!

Hailey's First Concert of the Year!

(This should have been posted in October)

Hailey's first concert as a member of Rocky Mountain High School's Orchestra!

Hailey has sure come a long way from when she was 11 and just starting out. I love to watch her play and work with others to create beautiful music. She didn't feel confident that they were going to be very good but I thought they sounded great!
This was also the first time that we have gotten to watch her perform in an actual auditorium! Normally all of her performances have been in gyms. The sound is SO MUCH BETTER!

I can't wait to hear them again!

My camera doesn't do too well in a dark environment but here is the picture anyway!


They were finished but I had shut off the flash to see if it would help but when you do that usually it makes things blurry, so here you go - pretend it is a sharp picture!

Our little violinist after her performance!

Tyler - not sure if the picture is blurry because of the flash or it's just that Tyler moves a lot! :)

Hi Tyler!

Got a picture of Hayden when he was getting out of his seat.

I didn't get any of Kurt - but that is okay. He had put his back out a few days ahead of time and wasn't in the best of conditions. I was thankful we were in the auditorium versus the gym because I don't know if Kurt could have handled sitting on bleachers in his condition.

And of course, Kurt and Tyler took a look around to check out the sound system. Now how many parents do you think do that?????

An Evening at the Symphony!

Not quite the Philharmonic but I had a great time! Kurt got the great job of running sound for the local Meridian Symphony! Hailey helped him set up and me and the boys got dropped off by Grandpa Ray so we could spend the evening together and ride home with Kurt.
I would do it again in a heartbeat!

The show was located at our newly built Meridian City Hall. They really created a scenic and cozy courtyard at the front of the building.

What I think is neat is that all of the people in this Symphony are volunteers and you could tell they all enjoyed what they were doing. The conductor mentioned that one of the musicians has volunteered now for around 20 years!

There was a pretty good turnout! There were stairs to sit on but a lot of the people brought their camp-type chairs and just carved out their little niche. One lady was just kicked back in her chair with her drink and a book, reading away while they played!

This conductor had a quick wit and very likable personality - you could tell he also enjoyed what he was doing. He had little stories and thoughts he would share between pieces. He was very funny. This group played their rendition of a Beetles tune, "Oba-dee Oba-da, Life goes on" it was a very fun and upbeat tune!

Kurt and his assistant!

Yes, the boys are sitting and listening. I was hoping that since Hayden is starting Orchestra himself this year in Middle School that maybe he would get fired up if he could see a Cello in action!

At performances I have realized that Tyler's "sitting still" limit is about 30 minutes then things like this start happening!

Time went way too fast and before I knew it, the great music, funny stories (and motorcycle muffler sounds across the street) were all over!

Ran into Shelley, Tanya's sister there - I won't say how I embarrassed myself by not recognizing her but glad I figured it out. I didn't know her husband was in the Symphony but we had a very enjoyable conversation and she informed me of more concerts in the future. I definitely would like to check them out!

Told the boys to pretend they were "working"!

Hayden tried to hide from the camera and not really sure what in the world Tyler is doing off to the left.

As people cleared away we started helping Kurt tear down the equipment. I told him I think we should buy stock in the company that he buys all this black tape from that he uses to tape all of the cords down so people don't trip on them.

Hailey telling me that there is a certain way to coil these so they don't get tangled. Kurt also tried to show me but he ended up taking it away from me and I just helped with getting the tape off of the other items. Hey, we all have our learning limits!

Tyler found all of the water features HIGHLY IRRESISTIBLE!

I really had to keep my eye on him!

What a ham!

This is what I TOLD Tyler to do . . . .

This is what Tyler WANTED to do!

I hadn't seen the new City Hall finished and I loved this courtyard walkway area they created! I could have lazily wandered there for quite some time! But it is only like thirty yards long - not too much wandering space!

Hey, when you see a photo opp, you take advantage of it!

The kids and I had fun.

I think in this picture Tyler might be related to James Dean! Hayden is too tough to talk to and Hailey is just enjoying herself!

Tyler just couldn't leave the plant alone. If you look at the previous picture the plant looks fine, then look at this picture and for some reason part of the plant is in his hand and another piece of the plant is bent over. . . . had to give him a speech about respecting things that aren't his.

Believe it or not, without my knowledge Hayden had walked across this waterfall part and when I saw them Hailey was attempting to walk across it with a whimpering Tyler in her hands in Flip Flops none-the-less! I put a stop to it - quickly!

Kurt had no idea where we had disappeared to and was a little confused on where all his help had gone . . . so back to work we went . . . . slave driver! :)