Crazy Weekend . .

. .to be followed by a crazy week!

Saturday I took 11 ninth and tenth grade girls to region choir auditions in Waco. Our bus driver turned out to be one of my other students' mothers, so the ride was actually pretty entertaining. She's a fun lady.

7 out of our 11 students made the region choir. I was so proud of them! I judged tenors and basses with two of the directors from Bryan ISD. Thank goodness I was with other judges I knew because otherwise I would have been miserable. It was slightly painful anyway. We had the largest number of auditions out of all 5 rooms and a high number of the students DID NOT know the music. This is the first year we have not made part CDs as a region and it shows. I have a feeling it will be changing next year.

The auditions ran about two hours longer than we had planned, so we didn't get back to the high school until nearly 8. I ran home, got my stuff, then drove the hour to Huntsville to be at Tristan's party. The boys had a "military" theme going with all their costumes so I was an army girl (big thank you to Krystle for helping me get everything!!). I was super cute and all the boys looked great, too. I stayed up waay too late, but I did actually manage to sleep at Tristan's house, even though the party lasted another two hours after I crashed.

Sunday morning I drove BACK to CS at 6:30 so that I could sing the Bluegrass Mass at A&M UMC. I did NOT feel well. Lack of sleep and the gross fast food I ate the night before had a lot to do with that. I managed to sing both services, but I wouldn't be surprised if I never got asked to sing with them again. I hope they know I just didn't feel well and I wasn't just being a flaky wimp. Oh, well!

Sunday night (after I had a looong nap!) Tristan came over to CS and we went to eat @ Chili's, then rented Mario Party (which stunk) and played Wii Play and Mario Galaxy. I love silly game nights with him!

Yesterday I had a chance to ride Casey. Which means today I am really sore but the exercise was good for me and my horse. Not to mention, I am crazy busy the rest of the week, so it was nice to have a little time for the equine-boys.

Today we have a parent meeting, rehearsal with BHS and Rudder HS choirs for our Patriotic concert next Tuesday. Wednesday our kids are setting up a Homecoming Carnival booth to sell Caramel Apples to benefit United Way. I'm sure it will be very fun, and very messy! Thursday we have another meeting about our trip to Austria and Friday our Seniors and Chorale members will sing at the Homecoming Game. Needless to say, I will be sleeping A LOT this weekend! As it is, I went to bed at like 9:30 last night. I'm sure tonight will be the same.

I hope everyone had a good Halloween!!

Until next time . . (whenever that is!!)

FLOOD!!!

Soo I woke up this morning to about 3 inches of water in my kitchen . .which turned out to also be in my bedroom. Lovely.

Thankfully Tristan had stayed another night so he helped me sop up the worst of it in the kitchen. My landlords worked on the bedroom all day with wet vacs and fans. As of right now, my bedroom carpet is still drying. I'll be sleeping in the guest room tonight. Tomorrow a carpet company is coming to clean and de-odorize. My property manager felt so bad she bought us a gift card to Chili's. At least I got free dinner out of the deal!!

Since I had to call a sub anyway, Tristan and I spent the rest of the day playing Mario Galaxy and just relaxing. What a way to waste a sick day lol.

Maybe God just wanted me to slow down.

Maybe my weather proofing just sucks.

Either way, I'm really glad for the extra day I got. =)

Back to the grind tomorrow . . .!!

First Choir Concert!

My first choir concert as a high school director was last night. My mom was in town for the whole weekend and Tristan, Krystle, and Lee came to watch the concert.

My girls did a really good job. Not perfect, but really good for our first performance together.

I have a lot of work to do on my conducting but all our entrances and cut-offs were together, so I guess that's good enough for the first time!

I have to say it was a little surreal to be introduced as the high school assistant director and have parents thanking me for working with their children. As Tristan says, I'm a "grown up." I have to say I'm loving [pretty much] every minute. I mean, how many other people get to sing everyday as part of their job? And most of the time, I get to teach students who really love music and want to do their best for you. Most of the time being the key part of that sentence. ;-)

We're starting Christmas music now. I think it's a little weird to start singing "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" before Halloween, but when you think about it, we only have about twenty five rehearsal days before the concert. Yikes!! And I also have to find time to schedule an appearance for my girls @ the Festival of Lights (or whatever it's called) in the park. Guess it's time to start gettin' in the spirit!

I'll be really glad when the weekend comes. Tristan and I had a long time in between visits this round. Granted, I saw him last night, but it's not the same when I'm running around getting ready for a concert and then work the next morning. *Sigh*

Good news, I may have found a church to go to. I visited A&M UMC on Sunday with my mom. I really liked the contemporary service and the music minister (who I've met before due to stuff with region) has asked me to sing a Bluegrass Mass in November and possibly sub for him as director in January. It will sure be nice to be part of a church community again.

Oh, aaaannnnnndd this weekend I got a car! It's super cute and not a gas guzzler like my truck. Yes, I still have my truck. I realize I am a 22-year-old with two vehicles. Don't hate me. My truck's gas budget was killing me. And my truck keeps having costly things happen to it. Soooo, to help extend both my budget and the life of the big truck, I got a cute Honda. It gets about twice the mileage and it's five years newer than the truck. Hello, car payment. Oh well, I THINK it's worth it!!

Ok, I've done my blogging duty. Now I'm off to snuggle up with some *HOMEMADE!!!* Sangria and a book I've been dying to re-read.

Hope everyone has a fab week!!

Until Next Time . . .

Wow . .sooo

I never update. But I really am going to try now.

We're into the second six weeks of school. Our first concert is Monday. I am super nervous about my conducting and whether or not my beginning choir will master their German by then.

But I'm really happy. I love my students, I love my job, and I realize how lucky I am to be able to spend every day of my life surrounded by music.

Tristan and I just celebrated our 3 year anniversary. He is definitely one of the best people I have ever met. I enjoy every moment I spend with him and I really look forward to the future with him. To OUR future, I hope. =)

I really am going to try to do more with this blog.

I think I need to.

Until Next Time . . .

TCDA and Doggie Anxiety

TCDA in San Antonio was a blast. I had a great time with Andrea, Robin, and Henri (the girls I roomed with). I also got to hang out with Joey, the assistant director from my student teaching school. I haven't seen him since May so it was a lot of fun to go out and visit.

I went to several music readings and unfortunately wasn't impressed by too much. I just feel like a lot of composers aren't trying anymore. Joey commented that a few pieces seemed like something the composer had turned in for a theory final in college. And the texts that are being set are so depressing and woe-is-me. I joked with Robin that the emo/punk culture has finally caught up with classical music. Anyway, I did find a couple of nice pieces and a few pieces that I'd like to find in an SSA arrangement for my Concert girls. We'll see. I'm hoping to make a trip up to the school today to look over some music and maybe figure out my program.

Unfortunately I got to show my head director my wimp side due to a horrible migraine attack Friday morning. I really need to get on some steady medication. Those unpleasant experiences need to stop asap.

Since TCDA I've just been reorganizing my house. Which has been somewhat hard because I am not motivated at all!! It's slowly coming together, though.

So the other half of my title, Doggie Anxiety. Tristan brought my dog, Buddy, to CS on Saturday after I got back. Buddy was abandoned by his previous owners and apparently now has horrible separation anxiety. We were slowly making progress until last night when I went to dinner at Krystle and Lee's and then to Adam's softball game with Matt. I was gone about three hours and when I came back, Buddy had ripped open a package of water bottles, torn down the sheet covering the window where he had previously torn down the blinds, and torn down and chewed one side of the blinds in the living room. And I even had those blinds pulled halfway up!!

I googled the issue and found a couple of helpful articles. The problem is that fixing this issue takes time, and tomorrow I will have to be gone for 8 hours straight for GT training. I'm just going to work on some things today in hopes that tomorrow only portions of my house will be destroyed =/. I just wish this were an easier transition for Buddy and a less expensive one for myself!! Time will tell, I suppose.

Until Next Time . . .

Moved and Exhausted

The title pretty much says it all.

Tristan and I made a hurried trip up to Dallas to get furniture from my grandmother's house Sunday and Monday. Some of it was fun, like dinner with Cayo and Kami at my favorite Italian restaurant and Ice Age 3 with Tristan and mom. Some of it was sheer torture, like the wait to get the U-Haul, my personal pickup breaking down, and my dog deciding to destroy half of my mother's windows when he thought I was abandoning him.

But, thanks to lots of prayers and good friends, I live in College Station now in an oh-so-cute duplex of my very own. I leave at 10 am for the TCDA convention in San Antonio.

Whoo . . .I think lol.

Pictures and more to come later.

Until Next Time . . .

Even Teachers Have Homework

Still packing, cleaning, and counting down to move-in. 5 days left!

I have been able to fit in a few meetings with my new boss (aka the "head director"). And besides all my work moving, I also have lots of work to do on music before school starts. Mostly because, drum roll please . . .I will be teaching TWO women's choirs by myself!! Of course, I will have help, but these will be "my" choirs. I am excited and overwhelmed at the same time. There's just so much to do. I have to learn all the All-State audition music, learn and teach an arrangement of the Star-Spangled Banner that all our choirs will sing, and program concert music for my two new choirs. But I'm not complaining. I couldn't be more excited. I just really want to do a good job. I don't want my head director thinking he made a bad choice by trusting that I could handle all the responsibility he's given me.

I also got to meet a few of our choir officers. Since it's just been one director in the program for a long time, the students have been taught to take on a lot of responsibility. Which is nice, but something that's going to be difficult for me to get used to after doing everything I can possibly do, both as a student and as a student teacher. But it is nice that the students are used to doing a lot of work for the good of the program. I think it builds character and pride and a sense of ownership over what they do. The students learn to work as a team and better appreciate the process.

Anyway, just wanted to share the good news on my "assignments" for next semester. I've still got a ton of work left to do on my house, and it's hard to get much motivation. I keep realizing how little my roommate did to help clean up when she moved out a little over a month ago. The good thing is that I'm also learning how much it helps to do a bit more cleaning throughout the time you live in one place. I have a feeling my new place will be in a lot better shape when I move out, thanks to my move-out experience here. LOL.

Until Next Time . .

Countdown to Moving Day!!

Well, great news is that I now only have to move once!!

July 28th is the infamous move in day. Tristan and I are going to have to make a quick trip up to DFW to drop off my dog and cat for my mom to babysit, pick up a U-Haul, and get several pieces of furniture from my grandmother's house. Then we drive back to the 'Ville, load up my house there, clean, and head over to CS the morning of the 28th.

Not to mention the VERY next morning I leave for San Antonio for Texas Choral Director's Association convention (www.ensemble.org). All of this is super exciting, but by the time I get back home I am going to be exhausted. The good thing is I managed to put off a couple of my inservice classes so that I could get my house in some semblance of order before I start working again.

I'm very excited to get a new place of my own. My current house doesn't even feel like my house right now with all the boxes and clutter. I'm slowly packing up everything I don't immediately need and cleaning as much as I can. The cleaning is semi-difficult because 1) I HATE cleaning and 2) it's hard to clean around all the junk still in my house.

I do have to say, things are really falling into place. I finally started praying about the whole moving situation after my last post and a long talk with two of my favorite ladies at my church. I'm so type-A and stubborn that it's hard to just have faith.

The older I get, the harder it is to turn things over to God, and the more I tend to question what I actually believe in. Oh, to believe like I did when I was younger. I'm not sure the questioning is a good thing. Sometimes the questions that pop into my head scare me. I guess that just means that somewhere inside, past all the worry and mistrust, I still believe that there HAS to be a God that loves me and has control over the happenings in my life. Otherwise the questions wouldn't seem scary and there would be no debate, right? The other part of that is that while I know God wants us to believe like children (how I would love to get that kind of serenity back!) I also don't think he wants us to have BLIND faith. I mean, anyone who has been around children knows that they are always asking questions and wanting to see proof of things. And proof doesn't always have to be concrete. Think about this: How do you know if someone loves you? They can tell you, but how do you know? Their actions. Sometimes they buy you dinner or bring you flowers. Those are very tangible acts. But sometimes it's just a matter of that person listening to you, or sitting with you-the act of simply being there. And while you see them there, other people may not always understand the significance of the situation or how just their presence made you feel loved.

That's kind of what I'm trying to see with my faith. I'm trying to see how God has a hand in things even when I can't see how a situation is going to work out or the purpose of it. One thing that really has been a struggle for me was Maura's death. For anyone reading this that doesn't know who Maura is, she was a voice major at Sam. We were friends, but not super close or anything. A year ago she was diagnosed with cancer and fought a long, hard battle, finally passing away this past May (www.mauraupdate.blogspot.com). Maura was one of the bubbliest, most beautiful, most kind people I've ever met. And she had this awesome faith. Like I said, we weren't all that close, but I was really affected by her whole situation. Why would God allow that to happen to someone so young, with so much potential? How could He take her away from her friends and her family? How was that FAIR? How does that show God's love? I'm still struggling over that. It's just so hard to understand the whole situation. And I know things like that happen every day. But I don't think I've ever actually known someone my age that died. Even now, I'll think of her and the frustration almost chokes me. I don't know why her situation has become such a fixation for me. And I don't feel like I can really talk about it because there are people I'm around who were very close to her and who are probably way more frustrated than I am. I'm just seeking a purpose in this life. And a reason why things happen.

Whoa, I totally didn't know that's what this post was going to turn into. Just some things I've been bottling up, I suppose.

The point is . . (or at least the point I'll make, anyway) that I am trying very hard to turn things over, to have faith, and to be a more positive individual. Life is too short to be bitter, to complain, or to be selfish all the time. I know I have a tendency to complain and to think of myself a little too much. But as I look forward to the new beginnings I mentioned in the last post, and to moving to a new house, job, church, and group of friends (or re-uniting with old ones), I am trying to make the most of my life. As Tristan likes to say, I'm a "grown up" now. It's time to start fitting into my new role and using my strengths to help other people and become the person God planned for me to be.

Until Next Time . . .

New Beginnings

Well I have posted before, but I decided to renew my blog since there are a lot of other new things going on in my life.

I am officially a college graduate!! Summa Cum Laude class of 2009 from Sam Houston State University!! I also have a job-Assistant Choral Director at A&M Consolidated High School in College Station.

I am working on moving to a new house and a new horse stable. There are lots of changes going on, which is scary and exciting at the same time.

My moving situation is probably the craziest thing. As of right now I'm going to have to move twice, which is s major pain. My current landlord needs the new tenants to be here before August begins, and I can't be in my new house until after that. Oh, and the Texas Choral Director's Association Conference is in the middle of all this. I know things will work out, but it's really difficult to not be in control over the situation.

Aside from that, I'm just working to beat the heat and save up by teaching riding lessons and working at church. I feel like I'm in a holding pattern right now just waiting to see what happens next.

Until Next Time!