All County Choir

For those who do not know, All County Choir is a choir of different age levels that kids in the county get to try out for. Only the best auditions make the groups. I say best auditions because just because a kid has the best audition doesn't mean they are the best kids from that school. Kids are busy these days and usually the best are also the busiest. This will be Shannon's last year for All County Choir. I personally did not go to this concert, I had a previous engagement in the form of a Mary Kay party/dinner. Which I planned before I knew about All County. I found out about All County about 12 hours before Shannon had to be there; thank you for the fair warning little sister. Well without further ado here are the songs my dad recorded in no particular order.

Blue Days


And this is what happens when Shannon doesn't try out for a solo....

Shadow of Your Smile


Georgia on My Mind


And the best for last...

I Don't Know Why

SHARKTOPUS!

That just happened...for ten bucks at walmart. For those of you who don't know sharktopus is the offspring off mega shark and giant octopus...awesomeness

Evening Music Club

Last night Shannon and Morgan were both in the Monday Evening Music Club. Morgan in the middle school jazz ensemble and Shannon in both the madrigals and as Christine from Phantom of the Opera. Morgan's first tune was 'Old Devil Moon'.

Sorry they start so zoomed out, apparently in record mode I don't get to enjoy the full range of my camera's zooming capability. It takes me a few songs to figure it out unfortunately. In this last video Morgan is the shorter of the two alto saxes playing the duet. The next song is 'On Broadway'.

I didn't record it as one long performance because the jazz instructor Mr. Burke, who was my band teacher, talks...a lot. I loved having rehearsal with him because there was always a chance you might not even have to play your horn because he would talk for the entire rehearsal. A couple of things he did mention were that the songs he had the kids play were hard songs for middle school kids, possibly songs that a normal instructor would not chose; but the kids are doing great. Also the tenor sax player is a 6 grader, which is awesome. Without further rambling here is the last song 'Saint Thomas'. (Morgan has the alto sax solo)

Next starts Shannon's portion of the show. First is the madrigal choir. Shannon is the girl in the center back standing next to the tall guy. The following two videos are of 3 movements from Requiem.

Next are some songs from the High School musical. The musical this year is 'Phantom of the Opera' and Shannon is Christine! (in case you don't know that is the lead) First up is 'Music of the Night', in this song Shannon is just a 'prop'. She is in the scene in the musical, but doesn't have a speaking/singing part.

Next up is the 'Managers' Office'. Shannon is not in this one at all, but her friend from across the street(Malory) plays Carlotta (the girl that comes in screaming about a letter) and she is in this one.

In the 'Phantom of the Opera' there is a play called 'Il Muto' where Christine(Shannon) plays the part of The Page Boy, a silent role, and Carlotta(Malory) plays the part of the countess. So yet again Shannon has no speaking part, but if you are wondering why she is acting like a boy that's why. So here is 'Il Muto'.

Next up is Shannon and Dillon's duet! It's just amazing, so without further ado here is 'All I Ask of You'.

The last song is 'Masquerade'. One thing you don't get to see is the dancing and poses, which I hear are pretty cool. On a personal note this is my favorite song in the whole musical, the kids do a pretty good job.

Overall the concert was great. The kids are so talented. This song brings the concert and this post to end.

Flooding Already

You can always look forward to a good spring flooding in this quiet little town, but this year it decided to be an 'end of winter' flood.

This lovely little river is usually low enough that you can stand on the pebble strewn bank and easily skip rocks to the other side. Oh yeah, and this time of year there is usually a small amount of ice, but not this year. The bridge in the bottom picture is currently closed. Lets take a look at other parts of town.

This is behind the high school and the parking lot that goes with the ball fields. In case you were curious where the river usually is; it would behind the tree line and down a bank. On a normal day you would not see the river in this picture or the seagulls. And now onto one last part of town.
That's right, it's the bus garage! Can't have pictures of flooding and leave this one out. The river is a) usually not in the parking lot and b) usually hiding back by the tree line past the field. It's been awesome. The best part, this was from yesterday, last night it rained, this morning it snowed, and there is still a fair amount of snow just laying around. All I have to say is thank goodness I live on a hill top. =)

SNOW DAY!

I woke up today around 6am. I'm not going to lie, I hardly ever see 6am; I'm a college kid still, so sue me. As I'm getting ready for class, not looking outside, my mom finally come up to me at about 8am and informs me I'm not going to class. I told her she is crazy and yes I am. She then tells me to look outside and this is what I see out my bedroom window.
Needless to say, classes where canceled. That is our driveway with my boyfriend's car in it. He also had a snow day from work. That bush marks the turn in the sidewalk that leads to the stairs that you can't see.

Mom tried to open the front door only to let the snow in. To give you an idea how much snow is there, we have a step up into our house. The crazy thing is yesterday, no snow. Not like, 'oh it didn't snow today thank goodness it won't add to what we have' or 'look at that not even flurries to cover up the snow and ice we already have'. No snow on the ground, it all melted, and then it started raining yesterday before the snow; it almost felt like spring...almost. Thank god we got someone to plow the driveway. Morgan, Brian (my boyfriend), and my self went outside to play naturally. I leave you with this amazing discovery we made and one warning, beware of snow monsters.