Mudpuppy Studio

So we've been working on Mudpuppy Studio over the long weekend: hanging drywall, taping drywall, mudding the drywall. And the interior is taking shape. A little more mudding to do, then some painting, and Kristen will be close to moving her pottery studio from all over the house to the Mudpuppy Studio in the backyard.

This coming weekend, Connor and Eric are setting off on an a mini-adventure with Kristen's dad to Los Angeles, to check out some potential colleges for the young filmmaker. We'll share some photos when we return next week.

Silver Spoon Film Festival

Connor Anderson, filmmaker:
















With his cast and friends outside the theater....

A semi-blurry shot of the award-winning "Ping Pong" on the big screen is above.

The 2006 Silver Spoon Film Festival was held at the Rialto Theater in Loveland last nigt. 49 student films from around Northern Colorado were submitted, 19 were unspooled on the big screen. Connor submitted two comedies and both were shown at the festival, and his "Ping Pong" was named best comedy and got second place in the best of show competition. It was a fun night.

Concert season

So just a quick catch-up on our adventures: We've been super busy on concert adventures. Working backwards in time, Connor's school band played last Thursday, Reade played with her high school chamber orchestra on Tuesday, Connor's pop-rock Where's The Fudge? band played twice on Sunday morning at a Unitarian church down in Denver, after which we went and saw the touring cast of "Les Miserables." The day before, on Saturday, we saw the live taping of "A Prairie Home Companion" over in Loveland. The week before both kids played with their jazz combo at a school concert (noted below).

Now, going forward in time: tonight we attend the Silver Spoon Film Festival, to which Connor has submitted two films and we don't know yet if either have been selected for screening; tomorrow morning Connor's Fudge band plays again, on Wednesday we go to Denver to see "MacHomer," a one-man version of the Shakespeare play done by the cast of the Simpsons, and then on Thursday we attend a fundraiser for the Rocky Mountain Fiddle Camp which features bluegrass celtic fiddle musit with local talent, plus Andy Stein and Al Franken.

It's fun to be busy!

Jazz monsters

So we got to hear the Little Monsters, the kids' school jazz combo, again tonight at a school concert with Reade on swing fiddle and Connor on drums. The group sounded great, and a nice surprise was when Reade was presented with a special citation from the International Association of Jazz Educators for outstanding musicanship for her solo playing on Sweet Georgia Brown when the group played at the Greeley Jazz Festival in April. We were very proud, and she becomes the second in the family to earn such an honor, after Connor earned similar awards the past two years for his drum solos. We're very proud parents.