4 posts tagged “winterguard”

Not just for the odd, bizaar and freaky vids that you might happen upon there, but when it comes to uploading videos of your own, it never tells you if they were uploaded!  I tried to upload a video of my guard in practice some weeks ago.  The upload seemed to start ok, and so I sat...and sat.....AND sat, waiting for the little "busy downloading) icon to stop revolving.  45 minutes later I just shut down the whole thing figuring I had done something wrong.  I tried again with same results. So gave up.

In practice on Tuesday, one of my returning members told me that someone had put up a vid of one of our practices. What? I said, Yeah, she said, someone named wildreams or something...Hey thats me! Sure enough its up...God knows how I did it, but I did...so here you go - our winterguard show last season:

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This is just a random picture I took about two years ago, the light and showdows impressed me.  I am a sucker for geometric designs....

So anyway, I have a bit of a busy day ahead...I am starting summer practices with my guard.  I quickly looked through my posts at the time I was talking about clinics and try-outs for this coming years guard and think that I never mentioned just what the tally was.  Remember I was overwhelmed with the amount of people who turned out for clinics and they mostly all stayed.  I had a few that stopped,  probably realizing that it was not for them and that is ok.  in the end I ended up testing 20 girls at Friday's tryouts. It was a hard decision and I am one who believes that a small guard is much more impressive when doing things correctly then a large one who looks like a mess on the field.  So in the end I have 19 members.  Now I still expect a few of them to change their minds over the summer and that is ok too.  Its inevitable.  So if I end up with 14-15 I will be thrilled.

So today is our first practice and have already been informed that a couple of them will not be there.  Thats ok too.  I have scheduled 5 practices and because it is summer, I am allowing them to miss 2 with no explaination.  Vacations and all. But if any one girl misses more then 2 practices then their position on the team is in jeopordy. 

Now for the real exciting news.  This Friday is my birthday and my husband has planned a long weekend in Vegas for us.  He was good, he managed to keep this secret for about a month while he was planning it.

I love Vegas, even in the dead of summer.  Always so much going on.  We can manage to get up to quite a few things adult and non-adult related. One of the highlights of the weekend is an air tour we are going to take to the Grand Canyon! I am so excited...you can bet the camera will be right next to me on this one.  Here is a funny little factoid about me, I have lived in Arizona, oooo about 40 years on and off and I have NEVER been to the Grand Canyon!!! OMG how pathetic is that!  So this is my chance to memorialize it.  We still plan on taking a drive up there one of these days, but for now this is a great alternative and I just can't bloody wait!  We are also going to see Cirque du Soleil's KA, I think it is at the MGM Grand.  I love Cirque du Soliel.  We have seen Mystere' and was enchanted with it.  Also saw La Nouba in Florida when I was there several years ago with my late husband and daughter. 

So those are the hilites of the trip, other then that its pretty open.  We have plans to eat at a Brazilian rest. also will do some clubbing and of course drinking which usually ends up getting us into some pretty unique circumstances.

So be prepared for pictures of this little fling as well.

Ok off to do my practice planning.  laterz

Today is the first official day of my week long break from all things student, guard, band, related.  Well except for the fact that my daughter is around - in addition to her being my very lovely daughter, she is also my guard captain, and as would be expected our conversations usually turn towards guard related things in the course of any given day.  At the current time we are putting the finishing touches on our current show in preparation for the championships on April 19th.  After that we will be visiting the feeder Jr Hi's on a recruitment drive and then we have clinics and tryouts the first part of May.  I also intend to get a jump start on the field show for next year as soon as my director choses the music, Celi graduates in May, but she will be returning as a tech for me next year.  Her choreography skills are a great addition for me and as is my preference I will be choreographing the show instead of purchasing a "pre-fab" routine from one of the many "pre-fab" designers out there. I embrace a show much more closely when it comes out of my head as opposed to someone elses whom I have never met and looks like they belong in a cirque du soleil performance.

We competed in Gilbert this past Saturday and did phenominally well.  Our placement wasn't great (7th out of 10 in our division) but they increased their score by 5 points over their first competition, and as an instructor that is my main goal - progression FORWARD and not backward as sometimes happens, much to an instructors good intentions. We took "roadies" this time and they really helped ALOT.  We have a huge 300lb floor that we have to strong arm and muscle around to perform on so the addition of 6 strapping percussioners helped out immensly.  Of course they were a distraction to the girls, like most boys are, but they were good boys and I enjoy their company.

At the bottom of this post you will find pics of the winterguard and one with them and their "roadies" or "groupies" lol.

So I start out my lovely week off today and have lots of good intentions - that will more then likely not come to fruition, but it is fun to plan for a week of paid holiday.  Cheers

Oh and PS, please take note of the VERY cute uniforms I have put my girls in this year, remember we are doing Pink Floyds, "Another Brick in the Wall" and so they are alluding to a school uniform - all designed and sewn by yours truely.