Seniors' Last Concert, continued

Here are couple of more videos of Jacob's last high school concert.   The soloist is Mrs. King, the choral director. Jacob's on the first row, third from the left.





The Senior song is "Don't Stop Believing."  This is sung by the audition Choir "Encore."  Jacob was actually not happy that this was the song the seniors voted on. Too many echoes of "Glee" for his taste.  In this one, at least, he has a tiny solo.  He's right around 58 seconds.  There's also a really talented gal at 1:56.  I love the hugs at the end. This is the last song for the seniors.

 

Time for a Hoedown!

Isabel had a second grade dance last week.  So cute!  They're at the age where girls want to dance with the girls and boys are OK dancing with boys because, ew -  Cooties!

She was SO EXCITED.  You can see her every once in a while, hopping in place.  Ants in her pants.

Here she is, getting ready to go.  YouTube automatically starts playing them at the lowest resolution, but you can change them.  I took them in hi-def.  Click the little cog and change the quality.













There are more, but this is enough.  She had a great ole time.

One Last Concert

It's a time for many "lasts" for my son.  So bitter-sweet,  May 14th was his last choral performance as a high school senior.  I wish his senior year had been as awesome as his junior year, with regards to choir.

He did not get into any choir classes this year.  Try as they might, they (guidance and Jake) could not figure out a way to fit a choir class in, so everything he did this year was because he met with the choir teacher before school, during lunches or after school.  Because he was not in any classes, he didn't get many solos.  He also had conflicts with drama that hindered his choir rehearsing.  He sings well; I wanted more for him his senior year, but c'st la vie.  That's what he gets for taking FIVE AP classes.  Crazy.


Here are the first of several videos from Monday night's performances.  First up we have "Teal Sound," a five-man acapella group Jacob is in, singing "Come Travel With Me."  Jake, of course, is the hairy-faced one second from the left.




Next we have "Encore."  Encore is a mixed auditioned choir; you have to audition to get in.  This one's long and you can't see Jacob well; he's the 3rd guy in from the left side.  Here they are performing a "Phantom of the Opera" medley.

 

I'll post more later.  I have "Isabel" videos to post!  :)

April 2012 Reads

• "The Magician" (The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel book 2) by Michael Scott
• "Austenland" by Shannon Hale
• "One of Our Thursdays is Missing" by Jasper Fforde
• "High Five" (Stephanie Plum book 5) by Janet Evanovitch
• "Grave Peril" (Dresden Files book 3) by Jim Butcher
• "Out of Oz" (The Wicked Years book 4) by Gregory Maguire
• "Midnight in Austenland" by Shannon Hale

My year is slower than last.  Booo.  Oh well.

The Magician is a continuation of a YA series I started.  Immortals, twins with power, etc.  Good stuff.

"Austenland" was ok. Not great literature, a quick read.  Being an Austen fan, I gave it a go.  Deals with an American heading off to England to immerse herself in the full Austen experience.  I thought it was a little odd, all those actors working on this property.  The money to pay to go to this place must be RIDICULOUS if you and a few other guests are splitting the cost of all these actors and grounds keepers, etc.  See? I think these logical things and ruin things for myself.  Suspension of disbelief, suspension of disbelief.  Must keep chanting.

So what do I do?  I see "Midnight in Austenland" by the same author at the library in the new release section and pick it up.  Because I am an optimist, right?  *sigh*  Same exact idea, different main character.  

Another great, crazy Jasper Fforde "Thursday Next" book.  His most recent, actually, so I will have to wait for more of his insane humor in the Next series.

I'm going to skip to "Out of Oz" by Gregory Maguire.  It's the last of his "Wicked" series.  I thoroughly enjoyed "Wicked."    "Son of a Witch" was ok, not as good.   I listened to "A Lion Among Men" in the car, so I don't count it as a read.  I was not a fan of the 3rd book and wondered how I would feel about book 4.   The book was much better than book 3, right on par with book 2.  I felt more empathy for the new character Rain.  Maguire writes characters that sometimes just fell like they have no feelings. It's odd.  Rain started out like this, but her character evolved into someone I liked very much.  We see Dorothy again, Brr the Cowardly Lion, Glinda is still vapid, and we never really know what happened to Elphaba, and that made me a little sad; I wanted to know!  

Last Play

Jacob's last one-act play was at the end of April.  He took part in something they call a night of one acts.  These were student-directed plays.  There were 4 plays, each lasting around 25 minutes each.

Here's the one Jacob was in, called "Line."  They changed up a lot of the play, especially the ending which was a bit sad really.  I don't expect everyone to see this all the way; it's long.  Mostly this is for my family - die-dard Jacob fans.  :)

Also: SOME ADULT LANGUAGE AND CONTENT

Jacob plays Flemming, the first guy you see in the baseball cap and colorful shirt.


PS - half an hour before the play, I ATE the prop.  I did not know he needed it, so we swiftly ran to the grocery store to buy another!!

Writing on Walls

I have a friend who writes on her walls.  Really cute saying all over the tops of her walls at home.  I would LOVE to do this.  Love, love, love, but for one thing. I write like a 5th grader.  No joke.  My handwriting is HORRIBLE.

I was perusing Etsy because I <3 Etsy and found several stores selling vinyl wall art.  I found a seller who had some Harry Potter quotes, Bush Creations, so I had a conversation with her regarding fonts and such and ended up buying one of her items.

Since I am handicapped at the moment (still) with my knee, I had Jacob do the work.  This is for the upstairs movie/tv/pop culture loft.

Yay!

Senior Yearbook Quote

I.....am a proud mama.

My son got his year book today.  Being a senior, he gets his own quote in the book.  What was his quote?

Clicky-Clickey to "enbiggen"

(*Verklempt* Tawk amongst yourselves.)

Congratulations Joss

Congratulations Joss Whedon on your devastating arse-kickery this weekend!

Slight spoilers in this post; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

The Avengers WAS FAN-GIRL-TASTIC.

Of course I am going to think it's fantastic, right? It's Joss.  Hello, look at the title of my blog?  It's a "Buffy" episode title, for Pete's sake!

But you know what? So did all the people who gave it over $207 Million in just domestic sales.  This Fan Girl is SO happy for him!

Joss balanced having sooo many characters and soo many back stories quite nicely with the time he had.  Everyone got a little bit and I very-much enjoyed it.

My eyes are a little tired from all the eye-candy too.  Loki? Hawk? Thor? Captain America? Stark?  Hellloooooo Nurse!

Captain America's loneliness was very-much felt. Poor guy.  I love his old-fashioned was of behaving and talking and liked that he ended up being the leader by group consensus.  They all gravitated towards his honesty and integrity.

Stark is Stark; great lines, self-absorbed, narcissistic but he did have growth in this film.  A selfless act?  No way! 

Ruffalo's Banner was great.  We were a bit worried; another Hulk?  Joss wrote the perfect angst, the perfect contained rage.  When Banner says his secret is that he's always angry, it made me so sad for him.  Such a poignant statement.

As the Hulk, Joss had me on the floor!  The entire audience at my sold-out Saturday afternoon screening was clapping, cheering and laughing to bust a gut at the Hulk's sucker-punch.  His scene with "puny god" Loki was the best.  Hulk stole the movie.

I'm not too familiar with Hawk the character, but Renner is an old Whedon Alum (Angel) and I am glad for his success now that he's paid his dues.  And he's hot.

The Black Widow is another character I don't know, so I can't say if Joss wrote her true to form, but I can say he wrote her well.  She can "work" you when you think you're working her; it was fun to watch first the Russian and then Loki realize their mistakes in front of her.  Also nice to see Joss writing yet another strong, powerful female.

(Hold the Phone:  Alexis Denisof played "The Other?"  What?  Wesley Windham Pryce?  Whaaaaaa? )

I could hear Joss in the script: "He's adopted."  "Not so much."  "Clench Up, Legolas."  I heard Joss' voice  I could also see his Firefly-esque camera shots in the main New York fight scenes.

It was action-packed (Duh) and will be a great jumping-off point for "Thor 2" and  "Captain America 2" as well.

Way to go, Whedon!

*doing Snoopy Dance*

And Then it Doesn't

Last post I ended with "It can only get better."

It did not.

I was in a car accident with my daughter in the car.  Airbags deployed and we both got airbag burns and I have bruising on my arms, but we are both OK.

I was driving Jacob's car because it's automatic and better on my knee.  It's totaled.  I owe him a car, I suppose.

The knee is fine. I am fine. My daughter is fine.

That is the mantra I repeat, over and over and over, every time I get a panic attack and start crying.

The knee is fine. I am fine. My daughter is fine.

Knee Update: The Unveiling

The Saturday after surgery was a non-eventful day.  Just more coloring on it by Isabel, more pain pills in my mouth.  The pain was steadily getting worse, not better.

Sunday, a horrible pain day,  I was finally able to take off the darned wrapping!!

It's not gross, but maybe it is, I don't know.  Just....be warned I guess.  (If you're on the main blog page, click the "read more" link)