The Blues: of Grassy and Moody Varieties

It's been a blues-filled week. (I may be stretching a little bit by tying these two events together, but I like to think of it as "being creative.")

First, on a quick, unrelated note: I had a birthday. There's not much to report on the subject, but it seemed a little weird to just go past it without acknowledging it. So: I had a birthday. It went by pretty uneventfully, as I was in dress rehearsals for my show at the time. I bought myself some new clothes (from Matt... he got away easy this year), had a little dinner with my family, and got some books, craft stuff, and more clothes for gifts. It was nice, and now I'm older. That's all.

Anyway, back to my bluesy week.

On Tuesday, I went out for what I hope will become a new summer tradition. There's a fun restaurant up in Lyons, Colorado called Oskar Blues. This place is known for its good beer and fun music events, and every Tuesday night is bluegrass night. My friend, Rachel, and I headed up for dinner and some good music.

Rachel and Stumpy (her cast).

I hadn't realized that there would be no organized bluegrass band performing for us. Instead, a ton of bluegrass musicians gathered around to jam. With no plan and no set list, these people just came together and played music. It was pretty awesome.

Bluegrass jam.

Yay, music.

As the night went on, more and more musicians kept coming in. The circle grew, with many people standing around the edges. At one point, I counted over 25 musicians.

Lots of bluegrass-ers.

Rachel and I got lucky with a front row table to the whole event. It was really cool, and we hope to repeat the fun many times this summer.

After bluegrassing it up on Tuesday, my blues became... blue-er. (I'm really pulling this out of nowhere now... oh, well.)

This weekend, I closed the show I've been working on for the last month or so. It was very sad for me.

See. I'm sad. I'm about to perform my show for the last time.

I'm totally suffering from the post-show blues. But I tried to enjoy the opportunity while I still had it. I had a blast performing this weekend. In fact, I think Saturday night's show was one of the most fun performances I've ever been involved in.

I went a little picture crazy during the last show. I just had to capture the memories!

Men getting ready.

Women getting ready.

Me and Mom.

We had a little drama before our final show. Our hero and leading man was late! He was driving from a dress rehearsal in Larkspur to our show in Brighton (a really long way, for all you non-Coloradans). We knew he was doing his best to get to the show, so we weren't too worried. But it is a little nerve-wracking to be missing the star of the show.

Our director, on the phone with Jack Swan.

Our show was supposed to start at 2. He still wasn't there.

The cast, waiting and worried.

Finally, he has arrived. I'm not sure if I've ever seen anyone run across a parking lot that fast.

Our hero.

Finally, our show could start. It was pretty ridiculously awesome.

Mother McGoof and Captain Bermuda.

Me and the director/Carlota.

Rawhide, eating his sandwich.

The preacher. He tried to marry me.

Now that the show's over, I can let out the secret: the damsel does not end up with the hero. We're tricky. I end up with this guy:

Lt. Lorne Order and my future husband. He's 6'8", so he pretty much looks like this to me when I look up at him.

Scary villain.

Showing off my bloomers. They were cute.

After the show, Jack Swan took the time to meet one of his biggest fans, my niece. She liked him.

Hero and villain after the show. Now they can be friends. How nice.

As is usually the case, post-show is the time for parties. We had a last hurrah together at the cast party.

Food and party.

Now it's over, and I've got the post-show blues. I usually get pretty sad when shows end, but this time I'm really sad. Now I'm back on hiatus until I finish grad school. It's really hard to walk away from this much fun, knowing that I have no more theatre in my near future. Of course, I wasn't planning on being involved in this show until I got pulled in at the last minute. So, I guess you never know what will happen. In any case, there will be more shows. Just maybe not for a while.

Dark Deeds Are Afoot!

Yup, it's true. Even though I told everyone (including myself) that I was giving up theatre while in grad school, here I am in another show. I just couldn't turn down the opportunity to play the damsel in a ridiculous melodrama. Doesn't that just sound like tons of fun?

Well, it is.

Though it made my life a little crazy and stressful at times, I'm really glad I decided to accept the role. It's been such a release from the stress of work and grad school. I have had a blast!
Last weekend, we opened our show to great (if small) houses! Tomorrow night, we continue our run! If you're in the Denver area you should definitely come check us out. Just look at how much fun we have:

Damsel, Bertha Birthright (me) and the villain, Montague Leech

Getting ready for the show. Look, it's my mom.

It's been a lot of fun getting to be in a show with my mom again. This is only the third time in my life it's happened, and the only time as an adult. I was five and thirteen during each of the previous shows we've done together.

I'm a pirate... before I turn into a damsel.

Tai Pan.

Our hero, Jack Swan, and the evil villain.

Jack Swan, saving me from... something. I look a little scared. I think it's because my giant dress is eating us.

Even heroes need to be saved some times. Lt. Lorne Order to the rescue!

Me and one of my men...

Oooh, scary. See this show has everything.

Damsel and villain. We're obviously not in character or he would be doing something mean and I would be crying about it.

Carlota Castanet de San Diego. Dead... under mysterious circumstances (or resting during intermission).

As you can see, this show is ridiculous. But it's also hilarious and tons of fun! I had originally thought that I didn't have time to participate in theatre and keep my sanity. Now I'm thinking that being involved in this show has helped me to keep my sanity. It's been such a relief to stop thinking about special education for a couple hours, and just play and have fun!

Come see Dark Deeds at Swan's Place (or Never Trust a Tattooed Sailor) this weekend: Friday and Saturday at 7:30, Sunday at 2. For information, visit the Platte Valley Players website!

Months later, and I'm still "Crazy!"

A very long time ago, my mom and I designed and constructed costumes for a local production of "Crazy For You." You may remember reading about it here. I said that I would post pictures once I received them, and I meant to keep that promise. Sadly, I requested a copy of the production photos, but I didn't get any response. After additional requests and many months of waiting patiently, I finally have pictures to share! So you may not care much after nine months, but here are pictures of the awesome job my mom and I did.

Zangler's Follies. Nine identical poofy dresses, constructed from scratch. The three best looking dresses are the ones I made. (Probably not really...)

The whole cast. I have no idea why they're doing the Les Mis thing. In fact, I hate that shows like to have an omage to Les Mis for no reason. So just look at the costumes.

Cowboys.

The easiest costumes. Thank you thrift stores.

Two Zanglers!!

Zangler's Follies again. We found a few of these costumes in their stock, but we had to make more using the garments as a pattern. I did most of the work on these, so I'm pretty proud. Bet you can't tell which are the originals and which are ours!

Admittedly, there are quite a few issues I wish we'd had time to take care of. Unfortunately, we were thrown into the whole thing kind of late in the process. We only had about a month and a half to put everything together. That is not a lot of time when there are 32 actors (each with multiple costumes) and both designers work full time jobs! But given the circumstances, I am unbelievably proud of what we did.

Maybe I should quit my job and become a costume designer...

Pictures courtesy of Perfomance Now Theatre Company.

Cold Weather Things

Well, my show just ended last weekend, and I've already been out looking for the next one. This week, I auditioned for You're a Good Man Charlie Brown with these nice people:

The directors of the show I auditioned for. Soo nice; I had to take a picture of their crazy happy faces!

I was called back for a second audition, and I was very surprised that they wanted to see me for Lucy. Not Sally, but Lucy. I'm not a Lucy, but I think I could do Sally pretty well. In fact, I've even played Sally before.

Sally Brown. Frightening, I know.

But I tried my best, and I think I did a pretty good job at reading for Lucy. I didn't get cast, but it was fun! On to the next audition, I guess.

My job has not been a lot of fun for me this year, but it has given me at least one good thing: tickets to a Rockies' game! Somehow, our district was given lots of tickets, so I got two for free. We went on Wednesday night, and it was cold!

Bundled up at the game.

It was a good time, though. And it ended up being an important game in clinching the Rockies' spot in the playoffs. So, that's cool.

We were so cold that we ended up leaving in the eighth inning. But we were really far ahead, and we ended up winning the game!

The score when we left. Final was 10-6. Yay Rockies!

The weather was much colder this week, which I generally don't like at all. But cold weather is good crafting weather! So this week, I worked long and hard on making the invitations for our Halloween party. I'm still new at the whole paper-crafting thing, but I had a lot of fun.

My mess of tools and goodies.

The cards I've made so far.

After our Halloween party, I get to start making Christmas cards. Yay!