Go, Go, Goers!

The RHSMB won the BOA Regional in Des Moines last weekend! They were Class 3A champs, swept the caption awards (general effect, music, visual), and then went on to win the championship in the finals (with the same caption awards!). They've made it onto HornRank's "on the bubble" list, which is kinda a big deal. Today (Saturday), they're performing at the Youth in Music competition at US Bank. 35 bands from several states will compete for top honors, plus it's the Minnesota state championship. Fingers crossed that RHSMB has a great showing and holds onto their state title. Can't wait to see them perform! This past week was a busy one. No surprises there! We went to the Jack O'Lantern Spectacular at the Minnesota Zoo, like we do every year. This will probably be Arya's last time joining us, as she'll be at college next year. Wahhhh! Might be the closest I get to going to Paris with Scott On Wednesday night, Arya and I headed to the MoA to find he...

We visited our most favorite apple orchard last Sunday (Fireside in Northfield), and Darren gave us a grand tour of the property in his side-by-side. He kept giving G apples to eat... at last count, G had five different apples! The weather was perfect, and it was lovely to do something as a family, especially since we've been so scattered lately. G loves the Koi pond! They have a fantastic rose garden, and it was blooming so nicely last weekend. G was taking the camera from Arya, and a bug came flying around him. They also managed to take photos of the shadow's action shot at the same time. Ha! Special tour! We were able to peek into their cold room (?) where there were SO many apples waiting for the next step. This represents only a small percentage of what was in the room. Brand new to the orchard this year is the barrel train. One of the employees painted all of the barrels (you can only see two here), and Tiff was the lucky driver today. It was the fifth warmest September o...

Whoa! It's been a minute since I posted anything. But, I'm ok with that. We are deep in a season of busy activity.  The RHSMB performed in their first competition at a neighboring high school on Sept 6, and they did great! They captured several caption awards, as well as the highest score of all bands at the festival. It's nice to see them kick off the season with such a strong showing. Happy to be sitting by friends and family on a really chilly evening! The following weekend was our turn to host the festival. Over 2100 performers, and between 3000-5000 spectators descended on our high school for one of the largest festivals in the region. And it went great! It was a warm day, but no rain. I volunteered at the high school on Friday to help prepare for the event. Then, my mom and I volunteered at the check-in table on Saturday morning and afternoon. I went back several hours later to help with garbage duty (yuck.) But no one had signed up, so another band mom and I took one...