Camel Races in Virginia City

 

This was our first time going to the Camel Races in Virginia City

There were ostrich and zebra races too

it was pretty funny watching all the human-animal interactions

the races were only about 10-15 seconds, and the animals didn't always 

want to rush to the finish line

they had some fun skits and audience activities between each race, one

of them was having some little kids chase after ducks

this was when they did a little skit with the Grinch and Santa and had different 

sections of the audience sing different songs, it was pretty funny

This was Teresa's race

Teresa's camel behaved pretty well and trotted around but didn't go directly 

towards the finish line, so another camel got there first

Andrea came and sat with me

it was all sold out

Andrea and Brent got tickets in the shaded bleachers, but my ticket was for the sunny bleachers, 

so I had to sit by myself for a while

This gang got to sit in the VIP tented bleachers

We bought some seats for Nan and Melvin as a present for Nan's birthday

food trucks

It was a really fun show - totally worth it!

they had a cool banner out front

Making ornaments for the Nevada Christmas Tree

 

We met up with Andrea in front of the Carson City Museum to make some ornaments for 

the Christmas tree that will be displayed in the nation's capitol. 

They had multiple crafting tables with lots of paint markers and 

slices of tree trunks, wooden and plaster and plastic shapes and 

stencils, beads, glue, rocks

Smokey the Bear was there

i was trying to figure out what my plan was

Andrea decided on a mining cart painting on plaster, and I just focused on 

red and green colors for mine

Keith painted a pre-moulded shape 

they had paint markers and pieces of wood, plaster and plastic shapes

lots of really creative ornaments

some were pretty big 

California Bluegrass Association Summer Camp in Grass Valley

 

Courtney, Nabby and I went to the California Bluegrass Association Summer Camp 

this past week. It started on a Sunday and went through Wednesday. 

It was held on the fairgrounds in Grass Valley, CA

Nabby took a Bluegrass Band class and Courtney took a mandolin class.

I took a beginner bluegrass fiddle class - we met every morning and afternoon

for an hour and a half under the trees. The instructor was Brandon Godman, he plays fiddle 

professionally and is part of a bluegrass band. He also owns a couple of fiddle shops. 

He was a super chill teacher and he would choose fiddle solos and break them down

into small parts for us to learn and practice. 

We didn't have any sheet music - this is a fellow student's notes. Brandon would play about 2-3 measures of a solo and repeat them for us and we would play them by ear. We recorded

him playing the parts on our phones so we could listen to them for practicing later. 

This was the concert on the last night we were there - the instructors are all

super talented musicians and they put on a great show. 

We all met a lot of nice people and had fun learning a lot of new 

things about our instruments, about playing them and about performing onstage. 

It was a vey well-organized camp and the staff were super nice. 

It was a great experience!