Thought you might enjoy Casey at the Puppet Show...

Luau pages for our book!

So I'm trying to keep up with the MadCAP photos and getting them all in books. Here are two pages from the Luau-I thought you might enjoy some of them!

kj

So much to do!

It's getting so close to our performance dates! Can you believe it? It sure looks like people are really serious about this rehearsal, huh?

Musically, I think we're just about set (please review the notes for the parts in the final number. Last numbers are always the "neglected children" of any show, I think.)

Meanwhile, Tom Conry is preparing for his role in the other MadCAP show, "A Year With Frog and Toad" which goes up at the same time! All together, Tom and I are going to be giving 15 performances in two weeks with these two shows! (I've got a few more performances with music studio stuff and the younger ensembles). Crazy.

Also, I've been working on my sister's travel journal...got a few more stickers for her pages and have made list of things I'd like to make sure I do. What's on your top list of attractions?

I'd like to make sure I see Kilimanjaro Safaris in the Animal Kingdom (I've never been to that park)

I'm curious, too, about Tom Sawyer Island. I've never actually been in that part of the Magic Kingdom and it looks like fun. Here's a map that looks interesting http://www.wdw-photos.com/102103/tomsawyer.GIF.

Also, I'm anxious to see what this "soarin'" ride is about...

We leave for our trip in 32 days. We perform in Disney World in only 33 days! Who's excited?

Hooray for the Luau!

Things went very well at the MadCAP Carnival Luau and Silent Auction. A big thanks to Emmy and Emma who worked so hard to pull it all together. We did meet our fundraising goal of $2000, so that covers all of our bills for our trip and our production!

(Once on This Island did have some shared expenses...and those of you around for the summer in 2006 learned that shared production costs for the show alone are in the thousands...and that doesn't count any of the teaching time. Tuition covers the teaching time, but we rely on ticket sales and fundraisers to cover things like theatre rental, royalties, staff time to hang lights, set building, prop materials, and all of those other things) I am so proud of all of the work you've done--you are all amazing.

Speaking of amazing, can you believe we leave for our trip in just 36 days or something crazy like that! This means we are in the theatre for ISLAND before that and we still have so much work to do on our choral reviews!

Let's try to be sure we use our last three rehearsals for Island wisely so we are more than ready when we get to the theatre.

We went over the Tour Handbook the other day in our Tour gathering...let me know if you still need a copy!

Here are some highlights from our itinerary:

Friday, March 2 · Meet at MadCAP at 8:00 AM · Fly out of Rockford airport at 11 · Arrive 3 PM Sanford International Airport · Check in All Star Music around 5 · Transfer to EPCOT for dinner and laser light show · IllumiNations; Reflections of Earth shows at 9:00 PM · After the show, we’ll head back to the resort for lights out, etc · *The swimming pools close at midnight each day. Lifeguards are off duty at 10 PM. Saturday, March 3 · PERFORMANCE DAY! We will perform in the early afternoon. The performance/orientation process takes about four hours. · After our performance, those of us with booked reservations will head over to Norway in EPCOT for the Storybook Dinner feast at the Akershus castle. (8.20 reservations) · Others dine wherever they choose Sunday, March 4 · Breakfast with Animals in Wild Kingdom! (and first “tea train” to Expedition Everest) · Festival of the Lion King show as a group · Animal Kingdom Jungle Parade at 4:00 · Transfer to Magic Kingdom late afternoon or early evening for EMH · SpectroMagic Parade at 8 & 10 PM · Wishes Fireworks show at 9 PM · Magic Kingdom PM Extra Magic Hours · Some attractions are open during Extra Magic Hours after the evening fireworks & parade (Philharmagic, It’s a Small World, Space Mountain, Big Thunder Mountain, Haunted Mansion, Splash Mountain, Pirates of the Caribbean, etc) Monday, March 5 · This day has no real plan! · Animal Kingdom EMH AM · Transfer to MGM later in the day for Fantasmic! At 7 & 8:30 PM Tuesday, March 6 · Mears Transportation picks us up at 5:30 AM for transfer to the airport · Arrive back in Rockford around 11

our hotel at disney!!!

guys this is probably the coolest hotel ever

Luau Carnival is a HUGE success!

Thanks to all of you who were there to set up early, entertain, and all of the many other things you did. We did make our $2000 goal, which is very exciting. Here are some highlights of the evening!

Silent Auction & Luau Carnival

You guys were busy on Saturday! Things look great. I'm so proud of all of you, and am continually impressed with your organization, work ethic, creativity, and the fun you have while you do all of it. Here are some shots of how things are looking now that they are set up for people to start bidding.

I'll see you all on Thursday (off book--lets' keep the momentum of great rehearsals going!) Happy Monday!

It's hard to tell, are you having any fun?

wish

I've been thinking in one word phrases these days, and I have an ornament on my desk that looks like this

Part of me still wishes for things all the time...like wishing on a star.

I'm really looking forward to our trip, and one of the great things we'll get to see is a show called "Wishes". You can try an interactive show of the fireworks here: http://disneyworld.disney.go.com/wdw/entertainment/entertainmentDetail?id=WishesAMagicalGatheringsofDisneyDreamsEntertainmentPage

...so I know you may not have guessed it, but I'm Norwegian. I love the Norway section in EPCOT; in fact, it was my favorite country to visit the last few times I was there. I'd love to go to actual Norway to see THAT Akershus castle...

but I shall have to be satisfied for now with a visit to the EPCOT Akershus.

I made our reservation today, and we've secured one of the large banquet tables in the main hall of the castle. The menu looks pretty good, and I have read that the food is delicious!

Things are coming together and we're getting closer to our departure date.

Are you excited yet?

I am.

Things to look forward to...

Sometimes at the beginnings of weeks after nice relaxing weekends, I am a little bit sad to face the stress of work, etc. It is then that I need to think about nice things...like The Festival of the Lion King (which we will be seeing in roughly 50 days)

Or perhaps the delicious dinner we'll enjoy in the company of Princesses (I used to want to choose "Princess" for a career. Now I think it might just be too much stress. Plus I don't really like to wear dresses all that much).

Or perhaps it would be nice to think about enjoying a show where OTHER people will be doing the performing and we can just sit back and enjoy the music, lavish costumes, sets, and incredible production values!

January 20 from 3-6 PM at 100 North Hamilton Street!

Thought you might be interested to know that this day in history...

1992: Voyage of The Little Mermaid, a multi-media presentation, opens at the Disney-MGM Studios in Florida. It replaces Here Come the Muppets.

We're on the news!

Guess what! We were great on NBC 15 this morning!

I just watched the tape, and I thought you all sounded great, looked great, and I didn't even sound like an idiot in the interview.

Royalties have been applied for in regards to this show: http://www.mtishows.com/show_home.asp?id=000275 and I should hear from Uriah relatively soon. I also ordered a perusal copy of the script, so we can look at that when it comes in.

...and one last picture to remind you all how fabulous you are! Yay!

All Star Music

Read a review of the resort we'll be staying in on our tour...you'll find it here:http://www.allearsnet.com/acc/faq_asmrv.htm

The Three Caballeros in the guitar pool above

...and a shot of the outside of Broadway Hall at the All Star Music Resort.

(*note: I'm actually not sure which hall we'll be staying in while we are there, but I'm sure it will be great. If you read the review, you can look at a slide show of all of the room views and building exteriors.)

Getting ready...

props building, rehearsals, preparations...and tomorrow morning we're on NBC 15!

VMK { Virtual Magic Kingdom }

So, there's a program called Virtual Magic Kingdom (introduced on the DVD we watched at Ally's by "LUKE" and his hair)...In any case, you can play the online game and apparently win prizes of all sorts. I think the way you do it is to play online and earn points on your account. When we are in the Magic Kingdom I think you can redeem these points for real life (non-virtual) prizes. If anyone is interested, here is the link to the site: http://vmk.disney.go.com/vmk/en_US/index?name=VMKHomePage, so knock yourself out!

Thought you might be interested to know...

...what happened on This Day in History at Disney World.

1977: At Disneyland's Frontierland, the Mine Train Through Nature's Wonderland attraction closes. (It will later be replaced by Big Thunder Mountain.

Incidentally, I read somewhere earlier today that Big Thunder Mountain Railroad was so realistic that a family of rattlesnakes tried to move in when the Imagineers finished working on it.

You can find out more about what happened on each day in history by visiting http://thisdayindisneyhistory.homestead.com/

CafePress Shop is up and running!

All of our CafePress gear is available for order and can be found at http://www.cafepress.com/madcap_sr_ens.80621029. With every item ordered a small amount of money makes its way to our fundraiser...

Meanwhile, you can still find info about our trip at the official Disney trip blog located here: http://disneyyouthgroups.disney.go.com/leader/edit_group/890