United States Army Field Band and Soldiers Chorus

Yesterday the United States Army Field Band and the Soldiers Chorus came to our town to give a concert, so we went.



Before the concert started the director and a couple of the performers spent some time telling about the band and chorus and answering questions from the audience. I guess I just always assumed this band must be composed of folks who are in the army, and just happen to also play musical instruments. Not so! The audition process to get into the band sounds pretty arduous. I learned that people who are not in the army can audition, but if they are selected, they do have to enlist and go through basic training, etc. as well as pass the physical fitness tests just as regular soldiers have to do. It is apparently made more difficult by the number of days a year they spend on a bus traveling to their next concert site.

The same process is true of the chorus as well. As you can see from the tiny picture below..(I borrowed it from the internet), the men wear nice dress uniforms and the women also have a dress uniform with a long skirt.



Someone in the audience asked if you need an education to audition for the band. The director said anyone COULD audition, but then pointed out that 17 members of the group had doctorates, while a larger number had masters degrees in music, so it seemed a pretty elite group.

When some of the chorus members did solo numbers we realized they were highly trained singers. One woman could have been a serious opera singer.

Apparently they are quite a highly sought after group for concerts in spite of the conditions they set for performing. They have to be sponsored by an organization who will find a venue where they can perform at no charge to them, as well as media to publicize the concert at no cost. Also...the admission to the concert must be free of charge. In spite of that I believe they said they perform something like 230+ days a year.

Of course, one of the most popular parts of the program was the Armed Forces Salute where they played the songs of the Navy, Coast Guard, Air Force, Marines and Army and encouraged any who had served in any of those organizations to stand as their song was being played as well as their families. The woodcarver was proud to stand for the Navy, Marines and the Army as he had served in the Navy Reserve, the Marines and the Army National Guard.

Baby Animal Days 2011

I always love the baby animal celebration in the spring. For the past 2 weeks, various school groups have been coming to the farm for a more personal look at some baby farm animals. The weather was pretty miserable, but we got the job done.









On the weekend, members of the public are also invited to pet the baby animals. It is even more fun to see the animals with a couple of grandchildren. Before seeing the animals though, we checked to see what was new at the woodwright shop. Can you believe it? There was even a pony to ride in the shop!





The children's area has lots of kid-friendly tools to work with now.



And bigger kids, with the help of the woodwrights, can practice using old-fashioned planes.



I am not sure what the interest is, but everyday, numerous folks want to get their pictures taken in this very spot...so one of the woodwrights finally brought in some fake lilies to enhance the pictures.



The lambs felt like warm, fuzzy blankets.



How many kids can you see in this picture?



This little calf loved Garrett soooooo much, that it wanted to suck on his finger.



Who can resist the baby ducks?



OK...horses are WAY bigger than ponies!










For the last day of Baby Animal Days, the weather was great and so was the company.

Little Boy Blue

Little Boy Blue has matching eyes and tongue...along with a generous helping of freckles. Or maybe it is some dire disease!


Meanwhile, his little sister just couldn't keep her eyes open. Just moments after the picture was taken, she did a face plant on her tray.

Battle Scars

After the baptism in the previous post, we went to visit another great young man who has been having a hard time the last week.

From the picture, you might think he was not having such a great day, but it is the day he was released from the hospital, so I think that qualifies. Certainly it is a better day than about 5 days ago when he started feeling sick! I think he was happy to tell that appendix good-bye forever. Sadly, he missed the last day of school before Spring break, and is allowed to go back to school on Tuesday...coincidentally the first day of school after break. I guess at least he'll have a good story about how he spent his whole vacation.

Baptism Day

I need to start remembering to bring along a better camera for these momentous occasions so the pictures are not so blurry! Yesterday we got an early start and drove through the stormy weather to spend some time with this young man who recently celebrated his 8th birthday.

We were able to be with him as he was baptized and are very proud of the choice he made.

April Fool 2

There's an old saying, 'Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me!' The weather for the 2nd day of Baby Animal Days was much like the first day. Some changes were made from the first day to accommodate the weather. The outlying sites were closed (as several inches of new snow fell in the night) and the baby animals and other activities were brought to a more central location by the livery stable, mercantile and opera house. Visitors were picked up by wagons at the main entrance and delivered to the livery stable area. Consequently we had one very realistic frontier street for a rainy/snowy day....huge muddy ruts.



Maybe it is just me, but when visiting a farm on a sloppy, muddy day, I would expect to find poor walking conditions. Thus, I would consider wearing sturdy shoes or boots. Now imagine the lady seen walking down our street today, complaining that her shoes were being ruined.....her stiletto heels that is!

The baby animals didn't seem to mind being the center of attention.







I had a wonderful surprise today at the woodwright shop...a visit from cousins I had never met in person. It was great to see them there!

April Fool

It is well past April 1st, but nonetheless, today was definitely an April Fool Day. For the last couple of months we planned for our daughter and her 2 children to come visit yesterday afternoon for the purpose of doing a couple of painting and woodworking projects. They planned to stay overnight and then go to the annual Baby Animal Days event at the living history farm. That was the plan. Yeah.

So around noon yesterday our daughter called to say that our grandson was sick. She took him to the instacare doctor and was told, in spite of the nausea and stomach pain, grandson was fine. This morning she took him to his regular doctor who decided to send him on to the nearest childrens hospital to try to find the cause of the problem. It didn't take them long to figure out that they needed to remove his appendix. He should be feeling better soon...though not soon enough to participate in Baby Animal Days Maybe it is just as well.

The weather also played a joke on us. April reminds me of Spring...flowers, new leaves on trees, warm weather, etc. Instead, this is what we got today:

The only warm thing I saw all day was this little fellow: