Officially, I'm two days late with this post--sorry all!
I guess work is a large part of what kept me procrastinating on this. The last time I posted this, I was probably also late because I was enjoying work. This time not so much. Life in the Education department is tense. We've begun HR proceedings against our boss for what essentially amounts to bullying. So our CEO decided to talk to her on Friday (yay-ish!) before he left for Korea for a week (wait, what?). That leaves us with at least another week of limbo, during which time our boss thinks we hate her as a human being (not necessarily true, we just don't think we can work with her because she's a bully) but still is working with us. Laurie found some depressing statistics about how often the victims of workplace bullying leave and not the bully, but I'm hoping to bend those the other way in this case. Unfortunately that means a long, tense wait.
This is compounded by the continuing work we have to do, so I've been spending most of my time working on a Van de Graaff generator which will make insane amounts of static electricity in a visually impressive fashion. You can read all over the internet how you can basically slap this thing together out of anything. I haven't found that to be true. Very frustrating.
Theresa is still doing poorly--her stomach/appendix has been on the fritz recently causing her a lot of pain and downtime. Doctor's appointments haven't been too helpful and even been lost in paperwork so the one we had the most hope for ended up not being scheduled at all. We're keeping at it though because that's what we do.
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12.07.2015
11.29.2015
Tolleson Tapestry
Hello Family!
We're counting down the days to Christmas break! As always, October and November were packed with many fun-filled events. We made a trip to Bedford, PA for our friend Karen's wedding the weekend of October 17th. You may have met her at our wedding. She married a wonderful man named Kyle in a beautiful Jewish ceremony. Bedford is a historic small town with ties to President Washington and the American Revolutionary War. There are a lot of covered bridges, and being there in the fall meant that the leaves were stunning. We did manage to be there during a cold spell, so we experienced rain, sleet, hail, and snow all on the wedding day :).
Our Fall Concert was scheduled for Friday, October 30, but the weather had other plans. We spent over an hour in our tornado shelters that morning and experienced flooding in the orchestra room (thankfully no damage). The district canceled all after school activities which meant our concert was canceled. We will be playing some of the pieces on our Winter Concert, Monday, December 14. November 3rd was our annual Fall String Festival, which fell on the only sunny day between two bouts of rain and floods.
Thanksgiving marked the end of the very busy Fall semester of recruitment events for James. Applications to the University are up again, which leads to an always-busy season of application file reading. His class, Organization and Administration of Higher Education, will meet for the last time this Monday and then require a final paper.
For Thanksgiving, which also happened to be our 4th anniversary, we drove out to James' relative's ranch outside of Blanco, TX. There was a bridge destroyed by the floods and a few other detours along the way. His relatives were not able to get into their property for over a week due to flooding. To get to their house, you have to drive through a creek, which makes for access problems when the water is high. The house is up on a hill and safe from the floods, so thankfully there was no damage to buildings, just the dam, rocks, and trees around the creek. After a nice lunch at the ranch, we drove back to Austin for the UT football game. It's a good thing we had ponchos! It rained on and off the whole game even during the half time show which featured Jimmie Vaughan (including him famously playing the guitar behind his head).
Before we head to Kansas for the holidays, we have our Cedar Park Winds Concert, which will include a Sousa march, Grainger's Molly on the Shore, the Leroy Anderson traditionals (Sleigh Ride and A Christmas Festival) as well as a few other nautical themed pieces. I will perform with our choir on their concert and conduct on two band concerts in addition to an orchestra concert. Let the concert season begin!
Many Blessings to you all this holiday season!
Hannah and James
We're counting down the days to Christmas break! As always, October and November were packed with many fun-filled events. We made a trip to Bedford, PA for our friend Karen's wedding the weekend of October 17th. You may have met her at our wedding. She married a wonderful man named Kyle in a beautiful Jewish ceremony. Bedford is a historic small town with ties to President Washington and the American Revolutionary War. There are a lot of covered bridges, and being there in the fall meant that the leaves were stunning. We did manage to be there during a cold spell, so we experienced rain, sleet, hail, and snow all on the wedding day :).
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| The supposedly haunted 1760s Jean Bonnet Tavern. Excellent ambiance and food a short distance from Bedford! |
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| Austin ISD's Fall String Festival 2015 at Zilker Hillside Theatre! |
Thanksgiving marked the end of the very busy Fall semester of recruitment events for James. Applications to the University are up again, which leads to an always-busy season of application file reading. His class, Organization and Administration of Higher Education, will meet for the last time this Monday and then require a final paper.
A 360 view standing by the creek at the ranch for Thanksgiving.
For Thanksgiving, which also happened to be our 4th anniversary, we drove out to James' relative's ranch outside of Blanco, TX. There was a bridge destroyed by the floods and a few other detours along the way. His relatives were not able to get into their property for over a week due to flooding. To get to their house, you have to drive through a creek, which makes for access problems when the water is high. The house is up on a hill and safe from the floods, so thankfully there was no damage to buildings, just the dam, rocks, and trees around the creek. After a nice lunch at the ranch, we drove back to Austin for the UT football game. It's a good thing we had ponchos! It rained on and off the whole game even during the half time show which featured Jimmie Vaughan (including him famously playing the guitar behind his head).
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| Pretty good seats! We were on the 55 yard line. Thankful for ponchos! |
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| Duncan posing with the pumpkin. |
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| Rimsky helping with Christmas decorations. |
Many Blessings to you all this holiday season!
Hannah and James
11.23.2015
Exciting Events Passed and Coming Soon!
Hello everyone!
My apologies for the tardiness on this post. My life has been nothing short of crazy due to the schedule I've been keeping. Fortunately, I seem to be maintaining my health through all of it which makes me feel much better about my ability to continue to work and function with my disease taken in consideration.
My fall has been the busiest I've experienced for quite some time. First, in August, after I took a trip with Mom, Dad and Grandma Johnston, I auditioned The Fox on the Fairway and haven't stopped since then. Immediately following Fox on the Fairway, I went into the Follies.
The Follies for those of you who don't know is a community event that is done every five to ten years and organized to help a local non-profit; this year that was the Reno County Veterans memorial which was raised $85,000 by the event. It is organized by high society and due to my connections developed through Stage 9, I was tapped to assist with this year's version. Unfortunately, it was an extremely rough go for me because I was assisting in development and planning of an event that had not taken place in 15 years. Any institutional awareness of how The Follies typically "worked" was gone and so it was re-inventing the wheel. I served many roles during the production (even though my title was Assistant to the Artistic Director): production adviser, scenic designer, vocal coach, properties designer, co-lighting designer, stage manager, managing director and finally, actor. It was a process that I will never forget and am told by many who are "In the Know" that I was credited with rescuing the Follies. High compliment indeed.
Of course, I'm not one who can just sit and do nothing. In the summer, I agreed to take on a project with the Hutchinson Symphony. We'll be collaborating on a pantomime version of the Milhaud ballet "The Ox on the Roof". The presentation will happen during the December 3rd symphony concert. Think of it as a mix between a Charlie Chaplain silent movie and Cirque du Solei's Ka which is a production that is done with jibberish. Our version will of course have no flying involved.
I've also been leading the promotional effort for the 2016 Season. This has been a particularly difficult task because the Hutchinson Theatre Guild is now Stage 9 and we have a brand new brand which I am solely in charge of maintaining and executing. Its been a challenge but one I have sincerely enjoyed. We finally stuffed the season brochure yesterday and it should be hitting the mail tomorrow and people's mailboxes on Friday assuming all goes well.
And speaking of the 2016 Season, the first production, The Complete Works of William Shakespeare [Abridged] auditions on December 5th and I'm already in full prep for this. Its going to be a fun ride especially since in this production I will be in the director's chair. I acted in this production in high school during my sophomore year at HHS. Check out more information at stage9hutch.com.
So, I've got a busy year that doesn't show any signs of slowing down until May. But I wouldn't have it any other way. Hope all of you are doing great!
Love muchly, Charles
My apologies for the tardiness on this post. My life has been nothing short of crazy due to the schedule I've been keeping. Fortunately, I seem to be maintaining my health through all of it which makes me feel much better about my ability to continue to work and function with my disease taken in consideration.
My fall has been the busiest I've experienced for quite some time. First, in August, after I took a trip with Mom, Dad and Grandma Johnston, I auditioned The Fox on the Fairway and haven't stopped since then. Immediately following Fox on the Fairway, I went into the Follies.
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| The Fox on the Fairway |
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| The Fox on the Fairway |
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| The Fox on the Fairway |
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| The Fox on the Fairway |
The Follies for those of you who don't know is a community event that is done every five to ten years and organized to help a local non-profit; this year that was the Reno County Veterans memorial which was raised $85,000 by the event. It is organized by high society and due to my connections developed through Stage 9, I was tapped to assist with this year's version. Unfortunately, it was an extremely rough go for me because I was assisting in development and planning of an event that had not taken place in 15 years. Any institutional awareness of how The Follies typically "worked" was gone and so it was re-inventing the wheel. I served many roles during the production (even though my title was Assistant to the Artistic Director): production adviser, scenic designer, vocal coach, properties designer, co-lighting designer, stage manager, managing director and finally, actor. It was a process that I will never forget and am told by many who are "In the Know" that I was credited with rescuing the Follies. High compliment indeed.
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| The Follies |
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| Auditions for the Follies |
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| Follies' Opening Number |
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| Mimi and I at an early rehearsal at Memorial Hall |
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| Did I mention I was a star of the dinner theatre? |
I've also been leading the promotional effort for the 2016 Season. This has been a particularly difficult task because the Hutchinson Theatre Guild is now Stage 9 and we have a brand new brand which I am solely in charge of maintaining and executing. Its been a challenge but one I have sincerely enjoyed. We finally stuffed the season brochure yesterday and it should be hitting the mail tomorrow and people's mailboxes on Friday assuming all goes well.
And speaking of the 2016 Season, the first production, The Complete Works of William Shakespeare [Abridged] auditions on December 5th and I'm already in full prep for this. Its going to be a fun ride especially since in this production I will be in the director's chair. I acted in this production in high school during my sophomore year at HHS. Check out more information at stage9hutch.com.
So, I've got a busy year that doesn't show any signs of slowing down until May. But I wouldn't have it any other way. Hope all of you are doing great!
Love muchly, Charles
11.15.2015
Fall Things
For those of you not living in Kansas, I hope you have enjoyed fall as much as we have.
The trees have been exceptionally beautiful this year.
We attended the Hutchinson Follies which was a fund raiser for the Veterans Memorial for
all the veterans in Reno county. Charles had a big part in this and it was an excellent program.
Perhaps you recognize the veteran below:
Halloween was a busy one. We had our usual amount of trick or treaters (approx 100) but these
beauties and the beast were special.
We are looking forward to Thanksgiving and of course Christmas.
Happy Thanksgiving to everyone.
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