Author: Superpaige (Page 13 of 180)

My new career as an act-or

August 5, 2014 / Superpaige / 0 Comments

It was quite a week last week.
Monday night was closing night of our awesome play.
Tuesday night we had our cast party.
Wed night was bells.
Thursday I got to film an infomercial. At my house. In my bedroom.
My friend had given me a couple of these pillows to try for a bit and then asked if I could do a testimonial. By testimonial, that means, the camera crew comes to your house and films you for over an hour talking about how much you LOVE that pillow. Insane amounts of love for that pillow, I tell you. Good thing I have no trouble being overly enthused for something (it’s called acting). The good thing was that she gave me plenty of warning so I could get my bedroom clean. What a mess it was. So that right there, it’s worth it to do the commercial. And I’ll get paid about $50 or so.

No pictures of this shoot, sorry. It was really funny when they had me “nap” on my bed with this pillow. They arranged me just right, and then I couldn’t move. Eyes closed, no laughing, no moving while they filmed me sleeping.

What?

On Friday, I got up early to get dressed and get out of here so I could be to a house in Mapleton (about 40 minutes south of here) by 8:30. I had applied to be an extra for BYU’s sketch comedy show, Studio C, and they emailed me this week to see if I was available. They said to wear something fallish and bring options, in case they didn’t like the color. I was supposed to be there from 8:30 am to 1:00 pm. When I got there, there were people setting up all through the house, and we 6 extras just sat on the couch and stayed out of the way. We watched while they did Mallory’s make-up and wig, and gave each cast member thier outfits for the day. We just stayed out of the way. (We had been warned in the email that this was not a time for autographs or pictures. It’s not a meet and greet and it’s a busy day, it said.)

Eventually, Bronwyn, the production assistant said, “Did someone give you guys your lines?” LINES? We have lines? She wrote down our line, then sent us each to talk to the costumer, who told us which of our clothes we should wear.
When they moved the filming to the room where we were, they sent the extras upstairs. Then we could look over the balcony at the set up.

They touched up our hair and makeup for us.

(These pictures aren’t the greatest. I had my camera, but I didn’t want to look to FAN STALKER ish, so I just used my phone to take pictures.

This guy, Stacey, was SO nice. He shook hands with all of us and was talking and asking us questions. He didn’t mind taking a picture or two.

We also got to partake of the snacks. I had a bagel and a banana. Didn’t want to seem too greedy or anything.

When it was my turn (they called for extra number 9, that’s me) I went down to the kitchen and they placed me and got the lighting right and cameras set up. The theme of the skit is that people want to set up all thier single friends. I say, “he’s really unique looking” while eating a piece of pizza. Then I say, “He’s got that classic farmer look”. They had me do it again and again and say it in a few different ways, taking a bite of cold pizza every time. Hey, I get to film with studio C, I will EAT COLD PIZZA! Yep, five hours for that.

When I went back upstairs to get my stuff, someone said, “Did you have to eat the pizza? We should have told you that we NEVER eat the food they give us. We usually spit it out.” Oh, well. I didn’t have anywhere to spit, and I’m not going to complain about the pizza being cold. I could be on TV!

No, we don’t get paid to do this. It’s just cool, so I would of course do it for free.

It was so fun. I love seeing how things go on, and all the work it takes to make a 5 minute sketch. If I make it past the editing process, I’ll be sure to let you know when and where you can watch it.

Even a poor tailor deserves some happiness!

August 1, 2014 / Superpaige / 1 Comment

What a wonderful experience we had in Fiddler on the Roof.

Wow.

We did that show in High School and I’ve seen it a couple of times since then, but I never really got the depth of the messages of that play. It’s about a family living in trying times, trying to hold on to their faith and their traditions and their way of life while everything around them is changing. Traditional marriage is challenged by three of his daughters, and they eventually lose their home and have to leave and find somewhere else where they can practice their religion in peace. Through it all, Tevye strives to treat others with kindness and compassion, even when he is not being treated fairly himself.

As a company, we experienced many trials, more than in any other play I’ve done. First there were major set backs with the new location, the sets were weeks behind schedule, which was a huge problem when it came to dress and tech rehearsals. Someone who had seen the show on opening night said he laughed so hard when Golde was meant to go through the door of the house. Her mic was live, so it picked up her whispering, “The Door. won’t. open!”

Then there were the injuries. I think the count was 7 people injured or out of commission by the end of the show. One guy had to jump into the role of Lazer Wolf at the last minute and do the last 4 shows. He had 24 hours to learn his part. He did a great job, but I’m sure he was praying pretty hard. Backstage he ONLY ran lines. No chatting, eating, or anything else. Great guy.

One of the best things about community theater is meeting new friends. I hadn’t done a show at Alpine Community Theater for the past two years, so when we started auditions and I saw so many people I knew, it was like coming home. And I love the new people I met this year. What a great group of people. I hope we actually see each other around and don’t have to wait until the play next year.

It was fun doing a show with Natalie again. We were in only one scene together, but it was still nice to have her there. She stepped up and came at the last minute to fill in for someone on one of her off nights. I called her at about 6:30 and told her to get ready, I was sending someone over to pick her up to bring her to do the show. She missed the first scene, but filled in for the rest. She was a trooper.

My big complaint about the experience was the heat. The stage is indoors and air conditioned, but the dressing room/green room/ back stage area is OUTSIDE. Yep. So, on Saturday, when we had to do a matinee, it was torture being outside in the heat in our big costumes and makeup. Then we had to turn around and do another show that night. LONG, exhausting day. I must apologize to my fellow cast members for the things I said in my misery. I just can’t take the heat like that.

I LOVED playing Fruma Sarah. SO much fun!! Because of the much makeup and set up involved in that costume, on my Fruma Sarah nights I didn’t get to be in any other scenes, but that’s ok. I got to do all those villager scenes the next night. And my fellow ghost sister wife and I got to be great friends. After auditioning for three other plays and getting rejected, I was kind of feeling like I had no talent at all. But to be able to do this part, this “steal the show” part, it was a great boost to my confidence. Never mind that it’s only one scene, it’s the most fun scene of the show, and I LOVED it! The director never really told me how to do that part, so I just went full out crazy with it, and had so much fun. I figured if she didnt’ like what I was doing, she would tell me to do it differently, right?

The show ended on Monday, and we had a cast party on Tuesday. It was a little bit of a let down, but we’ll get over it. Be thankful that it happened, not sad that it’s over.

Guess what?

July 24, 2014 / Superpaige / 0 Comments

Chicken Butt.

John got ahold of my camera today and took some pretty good pictures.

Ok, they aren’t all good, but still fun.

I like this one of Jenna. He did pretty good with the zoom.

He claims that this picture of Jack is the perfect picture, because Jack is actually looking at him.

Good job, John.

Tradition

July 20, 2014 / Superpaige / 0 Comments

Our opening number in Fiddler on the Roof is TRADITION. We sing of families and how each person in the family is important and has a role to play.

We have many family traditions as well. For the past decade or so, we’ve held a Coleman Family Campout. Most of the time it’s at Payson Lakes, which is about an hour south of our house. Some bring their nice big trailers and campers, and some of us are setting up tents. Sadly, we are still of the tent variety. The way it worked out with our schedules, I took the kids (plus Larissa) up on Thursday, we stayed over night that night, then Ryan came up on Friday, and I took Natalie back home with me Friday afternoon to get ready for our play that night, and Ryan stayed until late that night, and brought everyone home.

We were pretty full with our tent, 6 chairs, 6 sleeping bags, and our stuff AND our food.

One suburban doesn’t hold all of that stuff too well, but I didn’t want to have to haul up a trailor, so we stuffed it in.

I decided to stop at the Grotto trail so we could take a little hike as a family.

It’s a short hike so we didn’t have to haul water or snacks with us, and it’s fun to cross the bridges back and forth over the tiny river.

When we got to the top, there was the small waterfall and a little pool. I guess if you go in spring that pool is bigger and you can wade deeper, but right now it’s just a few inches deep, which is PERFECT. SO cold, though.

It was fun to get our feet wet, and Natalie even put her head in the waterfall.

And of course we had to take some selfies.

What’s that on Larissa’s knees? Oh, she went roller blading the day before our camping trip and wiped out. Major road rash. I feel so bad. So, we bandaged her up the best we could, but the bandages weren’t sticking, and what with going camping and all, we didn’t want her wounds to get dirty, so we secured the bandages with duct tape.

When we got up to the campsite, we were pretty chill, reading our books and relaxing. Later, after the tent was set up and we had eaten dinner, we went to the lake for a bit. It was beautiful.

I’m so thankful my mom was so organized. We planned our meals together so I didn’t have to figure out by myself what we were going to fix for a couple days, and we even cooked it inside their trailer.

That night we roasted marshmallows and made s’mores. Can you believe Larissa had never had a s’more before? Shocking, I know. We played some games, then went to “bed”. There was plenty of room for all our sleeping bags, but it just wasn’t comfortable at ALL. Add to that the fact that we hadn’t put the rain fly on, so the top window was open, made it too cold in that tent. I’m used to sprawling out on a King bed, not confined to a sleeping bag, and I tossed and turned all night. Oh, and the COWS. The COWS were MOOOOOOING all night. It sounded like a cow was in distress, mooing and mooing for his friends to come and find him, or help him out of a barbed wire fence. I don’t know what the problem was, but that cow kept us awake for a very long time.

Anyway, we made it through the night. The next day, after breakfast, we went to the lake to play.

Everyone got a turn in Grandpa’s blow up canoe, some kids swam, we talked, they played with cousins, and it was a very nice day.

I’m so glad that we have this tradition.

Opening Night

July 11, 2014 / Superpaige / 2 Comments

We have finally arrived at Opening Night for Fiddler on the Roof.

I am so lucky that I get to play Fruma Sarah in this show. It really is the best part, even if I’m only in one scene of the whole show (I do get to play a village woman as well, in half of the shows). I LOVE this part.

I mean, who wouldn’t want to play a dead first wife who only exists in Tevye’s mind? There are no rules and I can be as over the top as I want. I have come to love my double cast buddy, Celeste. I think she looks creepier than I do, but I just couldn’t do the contacts.

There have been major obstacles and challenges with this show. The logistics of staging a play in a new location have been enormous. The theater is an old theater, but it’s been unused for years, so it has to be refurbished for us to use it. Painted on the wall by the stage, it says Saturday’s Warrior 1999,and My turn on Earth I heard from a friend that they filmed the My turn on Earth production at this stage. With new carpet, new lights, new sound equipment, there have been boxes everywhere, and things weren’t ready for us.

Our set designer, set construction team, music director, and stage managers are all new. The sets have had huge set backs and haven’t been ready, most of them, until last night. When we should have been rehearsing, they were assembling set pieces on the stage. Set pieces that don’t really fit in the wings, and the stage crew hasn’t learned when and where they go.

In addition, we’ve suffered injuries and other afflictions. Our assistant director sliced her hand open on a work day and had to get stitches. One of our stage managers has kidney stones. Two nights ago our other stage manager dropped a 40 pound block of dry ice on her foot while getting it out of the car and broke her toe. Our costume director wasn’t there for our final dress rehearsals (and won’t be there for the next week) because her brother died suddenly, and she needs to go and be with her family.

There is no greenroom and hardly any backstage area, so the cast sets up chairs outside.

There’s supposed to be a big tent for us to congregate around and under, but the wind often comes up quickly and threatens to whip our tent away, so we’ve just had the tent frames up for a couple of nights.

Last night was our last dress rehearsal. Amid sudden rain, everyone pulled their chairs back into the theater and we congregated mostly in the back foyer or in the theater.

Among these challenges, our Tevye has been amazing! He wrote today,
Tonight is opening night of Fiddler On The Roof. We have witnessed miracles in how fast things have come together. There have been significant challenges for this production. It is as if someone doesn’t want this musical to happen. That tells me it really needs to happen.

I have really loved performing as Tevye. I do hope you will take the time an come see it – not because I am in it, but because the message of this production is profound. The message of tolerance and love is needed today more than ever. Hold your families close.

When you think of Fiddler on the Roof, do you think, “Oh, yeah, we did that play in high school. Fun!” like I did? Or do you think, “That old thing? Why are they doing a show about Russian Jews in 1905?” Maybe. But Fiddler on the roof is about keeping your family and your beliefs, even when among strong opposition. The story centers on Tevye, the father of five daughters, and his attempts to maintain his family and Jewish religious traditions while outside influences encroach upon their lives. He must cope both with the strong-willed actions of his three older daughters—each one’s choice of husband moves further away from the customs of his faith—and with the edict of the Tsar that evicts the Jews from their village. Does this relate to our lives today? Absolutely it does.

We need to have tolerance and acceptance for others, but at the same time, we can not let go of our own values. In a devotional address delivered on September 11, 2011, Dallin H. Oaks said, “Our tolerance and respect for others and their beliefs does not cause us to abandon our commitment to the truths we understand and the covenants we have made. That is a third absolute truth. We are cast as combatants in the war between truth and error. There is no middle ground. We must stand up for truth, even while we practice tolerance and respect for beliefs and ideas different from our own and for the people who hold them.”

While I always discourage people from coming to a show on opening night, I do hope we have an audience tonight (and every night). I hope we can properly convey the importance of family and religion and hope that we can touch some hearts with this show.

Museum of Curiousity

June 24, 2014 / Superpaige / 1 Comment

I may have mentioned my love for Thanksgiving Point. It’s SO fun, and so close to me, and such a great deal if you have a family pass (which we do).

I love that we can take a couple of friends and just go for a few hours, and not feel like we need to see every. single. thing in order to get our money’s worth.

So, on Monday, I invited a couple of John’s friends to go to the new Museum of Curiosity with us. It’s half price for any guests that we bring, so it was only $6 each for his friends.

We’ve already been twice, but it’s always fun, especially with 10 year olds that I don’t have to worry so much about them getting lost. I stayed in the same general area and told them to stick together so we wouldn’t lose just one of them. They started out in the jungle area, climbing, climbing, climbing.
Then we went to other areas and tried out experiments with movement.

They loved racing things to figure out which one would go faster, or maybe, being boys, they just love RACING anything (these three tend to get competitive).

In Kidopolis, I was reading my book out in the center, not really sure where those boys were, and John came out and called me in to watch their play. Sure enough, they were in the cutest little stage, where there are a couple of backdrops and some costume items, and they did a “play” for me.

Then we went over to the movie making area and they made a short stop motion film and then a movie with the green screen.

If you haven’t taken your family to this amazing museum, you might want to try it out. Go with a friend who has a membership (like me) so it’s half price!

Dreaming about my Grandma

June 23, 2014 / Superpaige / 0 Comments

I seem to dream about chickens a lot. The kids tease me that I dream about chickens more than I dream about them. Hmm. Last night I dreamed I was at my Grandma’s house. I was there to water her lawn and plants for her while she was gone. My grandma passed away several years ago, but I could still hear her voice telling me to make sure to water the roses. Then I went and collected eggs from her chickens. I was thrilled to collect SO many eggs, and I didn’t even know she kept chickens.

Funny. Now I miss my Grandma, AND I want my chickens to lay more eggs.

First week of summer!

June 8, 2014 / Superpaige / 0 Comments

We’re coming to you live from summer break. Looks like we made it through the first week of summer with very little injury, and not TOO much complaining.

We tried to do some fun this week, and I think we accomplished it.

We went to Thanksgiving point farm

We oohed and awed over the animals, went on a carriage ride, John got to ride the pony,
and ended up purchasing 5 more chicks (you can never have too many, I always say).

Jenna taught two of her art classes.

Natalie and I went to 3 rehearsals for our play, “Fiddler on the Roof”.

Megan went to work 4 days.

John went fishing with a friend.

Natalie went to a party at the park.

Jenna spent LOTS of time playing with her friend, Marin.

Paige had two bell rehearsals.

We played with our birds.

We went to the museum of Curiosity at Thanksgiving Point.

Ryan rode about 80 miles on his bike this week. Jenna, John and I joined him on a bike ride on Saturday night and we went 7 miles. Today my butt hurts.

We also read a lot, did a bunch of weeding, pulled out two dead bushes, the kids each had a turn to make dinner (with my help, of course), had 3 piano lessons, and we implemented FOLD Friday, where everyone is supposed to fold their laundry. It didn’t go over too well, but we’ll try again next week.

I would say we did pretty well for our first week.

Kitchen paint– failures, flops, and finished

June 6, 2014 / Superpaige / 2 Comments

I was all excited to paint my kitchen. I bought paint that I thought would work and got right to it.

Unfortunately, the lighter of the two colors (called cucumber something) just looked like hospital green,

And the darker of the two colors (called gumdrop) I liked at first, but after painting all day, wasn’t so sure.

It was just too….. Bright Kermit the frog green. Too…something. While I like that color and it makes me happy on it’s own, with the hickory cabinets, it was just too much. I put a picture up on facebook and commented that I wasn’t sure about it, and got many comments. Many more comments than I wanted. It’s not THAT bad, folks. But, that prompted me to figure out what color it should be, and to repaint it even though I had spent a whole Saturday painting already.

So, I searched the internet for greens, earthy greens, greens that go with hickory cabinets, etc. I even tried the gold paint that I have in the front room, thinking that might look good. It didn’t.

For someone who can usually pick a paint color pretty easily (and I scoffed at my neighbor who has repainted her kitchen 3 times and had painters tape up for months. How cocky I was. No more), it was frustrating to not be able to paint. And I had kind of lost my confidence. I finally ended up on the shirwin williams paint site, and uploaded the picture of the bad green paint behind the stove and used their little program to visualize how different colors would look there. It’s hard to get a good shot of the kitchen, so many shadows from cabinets, etc, but I finally thought I had found something. I went to the hardware store and had them make up two samples for me.

Oh, yeah, that looks good…. NOT.

I tried in a different spot.

I decided to go with the lighter of the two samples, which, turns out, was called “Bengal Grass” (only someone who knows my high school mascot would realize how awesome that name is), and went and bought a gallon in semi-gloss. Thankfully, since I had already done the scrubbing, the taping, and taking off the plug covers, it went pretty fast to cover up that bright green with the darker, more earthy green.

But then I had to start on the wall above the upper cabinets. Climbing, vacuuming, dusting, cleaning (who cleans up there? NOBODY, that’s who!), climbing back down…ick. And so exhausting! Kind of frustrating that it took me so long to paint up there, plus, there were some spots in the corners that I didn’t know how I was going to paint. Need longer arms.

I got a lot done the day that Megan got out of school by 10 am or something. There I was, up on a ladder, and she agreed to help me. SO much easier with another person to hand you things, joke with, and who actually paints.

Oh, and she fits back behind the fridge better than I do, too.

I got most of it done that day, but was still frustrated about the parts I couldn’t reach, even with a ladder. When I came home from an extra bell rehearsal last Saturday, I was surprised to see that Ryan had finished off those difficult parts for me! Hooray! He said he ended up sitting ON the fridge to get that top corner spot.

I’ve been meaning to post a great picture of the finished room, but it turns out my kitchen is clean for about 2 seconds and then it’s a disaster again. Plus the lighting is not great in there, with just the one window over the sink, and I haven’t gotten a great picture that shows off how nice it looks (at least I think it’s nice, and since I’m the one who does the cooking in there, it’s my vote that matters the most, right?), but these will have to do.

I’m happy with the color. I’d better be, because I don’t anticipate that I will be wanting to do that again real soon.

My husband is such a geek

May 28, 2014 / Superpaige / 2 Comments

Ryan is such a geek. He doesn’t even try to hide it. He embraces his geekness. I don’t mind. It’s good to have a little geekiness in the family. Like when my computer isn’t working, or when the neighbor’s computer isn’t working and he calls to see if Ryan can fix it (he had two such calls this weekend).

He’s always got some project going, and since he got the lawn mower fixed (Hooray!) with minimal cost, he’s got to move on to his next project. He’s building a 3-d printer. Since we have this budget thing going on, he has been patient and bought the parts out of his discretionary money a little bit at a time, until he had this whole thing made out of wood and parts that he bought.

He also bought this plastic filament that feeds through the printer, melts, and lays down a thin layer of plastic in the form you have specified, then it goes over it layer by layer, adding height to make the THING that you are printing.

At first, he would bring me his failed or almost succeeded parts.

Finally he got most of the bugs worked out and then he started printing parts. Parts for a 3-d printer. It seems the wooden one he made was just a first draft, and he’ll be using these parts and some aluminum pieces to make the “real” version of the printer.

Kind of like making your own legos. But not really. When asked what he will use this printer for, he doesn’t really know. It could be used to make parts for things that break, to make art, to make clamps, clips, blocks, I don’t know. But it’s cool, whatever it is.

Saturday, as I was painting the kitchen green (turns out I don’t love the green and I’ll be painting it again) and it was wet outside so he couldn’t mow the lawn, Ryan was working on this printer. When these parts take four hours each to print, it’s a long process. Usually he can start it, make sure it’s going correctly, then check it every half hour or so, but he had one that the computer went to sleep halfway through the print and it ended up just goobering out plastic waiting for the instructions to come through. Darn.

But he’s had success, too, and he’s almost ready to build the NEW 3-d printer.

It’s good to have hobbies, right?

Author: Superpaige (Page 13 of 180)

My new career as an act-or

Even a poor tailor deserves some happiness!

Guess what?

Tradition

Opening Night

Museum of Curiousity

Dreaming about my Grandma

First week of summer!

Kitchen paint– failures, flops, and finished

My husband is such a geek

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