RUSH

Last weekend, Nick performed in the Rush show at the School of Rock. The students are divided into 5 groups, and each group is assigned to a particular show. This season, they did The Clash vs The Sex Pistols, Rush, Women That Rock, King Diamond and David Bowie. If Nick couldn't get King Diamond, Rush was his second choice, so he was happy. They rehearse for for almost 3 months and each show is performed twice over its own weekend. Last Friday and Saturday was Rush. And the kids were great!

When I think of Rush, there're probably only a handful of songs that come to mind. To fill an evening with 25 or so songs, I knew there would be many that weren't familiar to me. Didn't matter. They were all fabulous!

I marvel at these shows. They're so professionally presented. The musicians are amazing and they have amazing poise and confidence. On stage, they're all business. You forget they're the same kid who at home has to be reminded three times to clean up his room.

I asked Nick on the way to the show on Friday night if he was nervous at all. He said no. Just excited to finally be performing. He was confident and he was ready. And it showed.

It's a good day to become a blogger

And so I have.

Usually, I can't remember what I was doing a year ago on any given day, but today, I do. I was glued to the television most of the day, as it was the inauguration of President Barack Obama. I was also catching up on my 52Q for 2009. Starting it, actually, 3 weeks late. The news today is all about Obama, analyzing his first year in office.

I figured it was a good day to start blogging, as we had a weekend worth writing about. Now, we think all of our weekends are worth writing about, but this one is worth sharing. At least with family! Which is one of the reasons that I've started blogging. So the Grandmas can keep up with what's going on here, oh so far away.

The other reason is that I'll now have a more proper place to post my weekly list challenges for 2010, that up til now I've been posting only on FlickR and FB.

But first, the weekend. It was busy with Nick's Classic Rock show at the School of Rock.

The shows were Friday and Saturday nights, and with Marc away, Gaby and I were left with trying to figure out how to both video and photograph the night. We certainly didn't get it figured out the first night! Gaby had trouble with my camera, and when I thought I was zooming in and out with the video camera, I was actually turning it off and on. The photos from Friday night weren't bad, and we had the chance to redo the video Saturday night. Nick said he was more concerned about the audio than the video. Good thing, cuz it sounded fine, but anyone who suffers from motion sickness might have trouble viewing it! I really enjoyed this show. Much more than his last, I must confess! The last show was Thrash, which is just not my thing! This show was awesome. Those kids rocked it!

Since it was Gaby's birthday last week, this was also the weekend for her to celebrate with her friends. She pared it down a lot from parties past, and we both liked it much better. Two girlfriends, an afternoon of swimming, dinner at Bertucci's and a sleepover. Much better!



Our long weekend wrapped up at CLC. Philly's 15th annual Martin Luther King Jr Day of Service. CLC's 8th. The Pelletier's 7th. It starts at noon with a lunch for everyone, followed with a movie or video, which gives us time to set up our activities. This year, we baked dog biscuits for a local animal shelter, made tissue paper flowers for residents at a local nursing home, wrote letters and coloured pictures for troops serving overseas, made scarves for the homeless at Project H.O.M.E., made valentines for the residents of Paul's Run, and made journals for the teens of Covenant House. The journals were my baby, and I prepped paper strips and labels for 50 composition books. Thankful for paper trimmers and my Sizzix! It was a fun afternoon and a great way to wrap up a fun filled weekend.

So Grandmas, can you spot your granddaughter?! You won't find Nick, as he helped set up, and then was off to rehearse with his friends. The life of an aspiring rock star.