1st Oklahoma City gig, yummy restaurants and a nail in our tire.

We opted to drive the 5 hours from Kansas City to Oklahoma City on Monday night. We left at 10pm after a fabulous home made steak dinner on the grill, a glass of red wine and great conversation. I drove a couple hours and Neel drove 3 hours. It definitely wasn't the most relaxing drive we have yet, due to the deer crossing. As we left Kansas City we were overly warned of the dangers of the darting deer all along the highway. So, I was watching for deer more than I was enjoying the peaceful ride. LOL Thank God we made it safely by 3am.

Tuesday we visited with family, as Neel's parents and sister all live in Oklahoma. We noticed the city has grow a lot since we were last here. Neel kept pointing out the new developed areas and restaurants. I even ate at a Vietnamese restaurant for the first time and really enjoyed pho soup. (Just another name for beef noodle soup). ;)

We were trying to post some of our show posters around town, to promote the OCU gig coming up on Thursday and decided to stop at the local tire place. Neel said the tire air pressure light had been on since Kansas City. The mechanic looked at the tire, tested the pressure and sure enough the front right tire was low. So we roll the tire around to see if there was a hole in it or a nail. Nothing. Finally at the last minute the mechanic saw and pointed out to us the nail like shard that was in the side wall of our tire. Damn it! Almost through the whole tour with no car problem. Oh well, better safe than sorry. We got two new tires.

This morning I drove to Christ the King Catholic School, where my kids gig was located. It was in a very nice neighborhood called "Nichols Hills". The school is beautiful and large. I was escorted to the Gymnasium, where the show would be held. I quickly realized how much I like performing in that size space. It was wonderful to be in a big open area with no chairs! The show started at a 12:30pm and I made it a USA themed show. All of my songs were prefaced with a "freedom" explanation and I incorporated other patriotic songs including "This land is your land, America the beautiful, National Anthem and Oh When the Saints go marching in". It was sweet to hear the children, of all ages from 4 to 10 years old singing the songs too. AND when I did the song "STOP" it was sooo much fun to see the kids following my lead around the whole gym laughing and laughing and doing the musical freeze game together.

When the show was finished a soldier, who's son named "Hunter" was at the show, came up to me. He said he loved the show! That was nice to hear. :) I actually was very moved myself when I saw him standing in the back with his hand on his heart singing the "Star Spangled Banner" too. I'm glad this show was about "freedom". I sure am appreciative of that.

The school director asked me to come back during the school year. She said she'd like to get the PTO to sponsor me to come back and accommodate my stay. :) I'd love to be back anytime, I told her.

I could really get used to this! ;)

Neel and I went to a Mexican restaurant after the show. It is called "Ted's Cafe Escandido". AMAZING food! I have never had better Mexican food. Fresh, yummy and great service! They gave us free chips, salsa, cheese dip, soft flour tortilla app and free sopapilla dessert. All home made! Best! That's sayin' a lot coming from South Florida. Hahhahaaa. I guess Oklahoma has a lot of good restaurants.

Tomorrow is our last show on this tour. It will be in an auditorium with 488 seats at the Oklahoma City University. We tried to promote it as much as we could. I'll be very curious to see how many people show up. :0

Kansas City Gig, No GPS and the bridges of Madison County.

Got into Kansas City close to 9:30pm because we made an unexpected detour to the beautiful bridges of Madison County on our way. I loved that book and the movie. I even got to play my guitar on the bridge. YAY! How it happened, that we got to see the bridges is we missed a travel/rest area stop and had to drive for miles and miles more til there was a little town. All farms and crops in this part of the country. We asked someone where we could find a restaurant and they said there was one 30 to 45 minutes away. I never thought we'd be relieved to see a McDonalds. LOL. On top of that, this McDonalds took an extra 30 minutes to make.....my salad. Really? Salad? They acting like they've never gotten that order before. Atleast I knew it was fresh. LOL

Sunday we hung out with Neel's cousin in Shawnee, KS and played with the kids at "Power Play Zone" near by before my gig. I left them there and on my own attempted to GPS the address of the Country Club where I was doing a kids show. Well, I am not kidding. I sat next to the 435 South and 435 North entrance ramp signs for 10 minutes waiting for the GPS signal to appear and it never did. So, I called the club and Neel and found my way there. I guess I need to rely on the old fashion way of doing things around here. So much for independent, fly by the seat of your pants!

The gig went fine and everyone had fun. It was a small and very attentative group of kids. Afterwards we had an ice-cream social and I sold some CDs while meeting the parents. That was weird, meeting the parents afterwards. Not that I don't talk with the parents....but usually they are with their kids, participating, taking pictures or whatever. Not this crowd. They just sent their kids to the ballroom dance floor, on their own, and watched the whole time. It was different, but worked out just fine. The kids probably listened even a little better, that their parents weren't directing them. hahahhaa.

Last night we met some of Neel's friends in Kansas City at the Plaza and had Jack's famous BBQ and brisket. We then walked around admiring the Spanish style architecture and took pictures near the beautiful fountains. There are lots of fountains every where. Kansas city has a lot to offer and is quite beautiful and peaceful at the same time. There's a skyline of buildings downtown and rolling hills close by.

Today we went to Deanna Rose Farmstead with the kids. FUN outside farm with poney rides, goats to feed, tents, bison and lots more.

Tonight we are being treated to a home cooked steak dinner and leave for Oklahoma tomorrow morning, or if we feel adventurous tonight. We'll see...

Two shows in Oklahoma and the last one is the Biggest, in a theatre that seats 488 people. Whoohoo! Can't wait!

Iowa City and live show with drums!

On Thursday evening we went for a hike, before dinner. It was gorgeous! Hills, streams and green paths. Such a nice change from flat Florida. I love being out in nature.

Yesterday Liz and I snuck out and played 9 holes of golf! FUN! The course was peaceful, green and even had lots of water. Which made it interesting. ;). Neel watched the kids. :).

Later, we all went to downtown Iowa City. We drove through the beautiful University campus and ate dinner at a very progreesive-all organic restaurant that served an excellent variety of food. We had hummus, steak, calamari and fresh mixed greens. Mmmm
Meanwhile, the kids played on the playground directly across from our outdoors table. There was even a live jazz concert outside. tons of people filled this hot spot supporting the musicians. That's always nice to see. The kids even dance a song or two.

I woke up this morning and heard from our friends that we missed another real loud tornado last night. Ugh! I told them to wake me next time. LOL. I guess that's normal here.

Any way, we all got ready, packed up the van and headed for the Iowa Children's Museum for our gig. We got there around 11am. Early! This gig was different because Neel was playing with me. Yay! So happy to have some interaction on stage from another adult. LOL The auditorium was awesome! About 100 racked seats and room on the floor for another 50+ kid. There was a beautiful scenic backdrop too, very colorful and looked like a jungle.

We set up, plugged everything in and rehearsed a little. The cool part was doing almost all the songs live and adding new songs that no one's heard before, that aren't on the first CD. Great to test out newer songs and see the reponse from the audience. :)

Just before the show Neel and I waited behind stage. That was fun too, to have someone with me waiting in anticipation. We both made our entrance to a full auditorium and... really from there on, we were on automatic pilot. The kids ranged from all ages and participated a lot! I made a horrible mistake of asking one of the older kids to be my helper on stage. Well, because the stage was so low to the ground, all and I mean all of the kids thought that they were supposed to come on stage. So, I had to quickly change gears and go into the audience, to get them off the stage. Heeheehee. Yikes! Lesson learned. They got the hint and stayed off the stage the rest of the show. Too funny!

We sold CDs and got great feedback!

Needless to say, It was hard to leave our Iowa friends and their family. I really wish we all lived closer.

Driving to Kansas City now. Next kids show is tomorrow at a country club. We will be staying with Neel's cousin til Tuesday. This sure is one way to visit family and friends! ;)

Iowa gig, tornado warning and corn crops!

We arrived in North Liberty, Iowa last night at dinner time. All I could see for miles, on the ride in, were corn crops and hills. Also, I've been noticing the gigantic wind mills. How resourceful to use the wind mills for energy...and they are quite beautiful and peaceful to watch. The entire country should have more of them!

Went to bed pretty soon after a yummy taco dinner.

You forget that people are actually supposed to be working, during the week. It's only Wednesday, "Hump Day" as most employees call it. So, our friends were working most of the day while we lounged around their house.

All of a sudden a noise started to sound and lasted a long while. It was the tornado warning! Yikes! I've never been in a tornado, but would LOVE to see one. LOL The television said the warning was until 4:45pm. I was planning on going to set up for my gig at 5pm. Would it be cancelled?

Around 5pm the warning was diminished and the weather was actually nice and sunny. Neel helped me go to the North Liberty Library and set up the sound equipment. There was no one there 20 minutes before the show. I could tell the librarian was a little nervous. But just as all good parents do, everyone showed up at 6pm - show time! It was packed, in between book shelves and computer monitors. hahahaha! Lots of dancing and singing! At first everyone was a litle hesitant. They probably thought I was crazy! But by the end, the little ones didn't even pay attention to my strip of tape that sectioned off "My area". I had to say "Mom and Dad come get your little ones off my speakers and back them up before I bonk them in the head with my guitar". I'm kidding of course, but come on people! LOL ;)

My little girl, Emma was in the front row with our friend's daughter and her other 6 year old friends having a great time, participating, raising their hands and loving the show. On the other hand, our 4 year old boy, Sage is OVER the whole Mommy's show experience. He was sitting on the floor, in front of course, and just refusing to do anything, to make space for others to dance around him and all he wanted to do is suck his thumb. LOL So, I signaled for Neel to come get him and he was fine hanging with Daddy. He says he likes to "Roar like a lion and sing ABCs, but doesn't want to dance". I'm sure by now he's bored with the same ole songs...hhahahhahaha poor little guy. I can only understand. I guess I'll make more of an effort to give him the option to stay home. LOL He's a trooper.

The librarian asked me to do another show there whenever I'm back. Another audience person asked me if I lived in Iowa and was going to be doing music shows all summer long on Wednesdays. Too funny! Always nice to hear. ;)

Neel got some good pictures. I'll try to figure out how to post pictures on this blog.

Next gig is at the Iowa City Children's museum this Satuday at 2pm. It's my first show that is in the stadium/theatre seating style. I will have to edit my show and remove the square dance song. Other than that, I think children will be able to move around just fine in their seats. We'll see any way. Hahhahaaa. This one is special too because Neel will be playing drums with me. YAY! A real live sound.

Play day with the kids tomorrow. Water park, playground and fun. Then tomorrow night we are planning to go out with just the adults. What does that mean any way? It's been too long.
Til then....

2nd Illinois Gig for Private school.

The weekend in Chicago with my sister and both families was great! Everyone got along and laughed a lot! We went to all the touristy/famous places such as Giardano's pizza, House of Blues, Buckingham fountain, Willis a.k.a Sears tower, Millineum park, the Shedd aquarium and more. Good times!
Yesterday we said good bye and went our seperate ways. Hard to say good bye to family, but we now have a new outlet that will bring us together again. Soon I hope! :)

We had dinner with friends that Neel's known for over 20 years. Nice to have a yummy home cooked meal! It was the first time we met their daughter too. Good to see the kids playing together.

Later we drove on to Schaumburg, IL. Home to one of the world's largest malls. Ayi Dios Mio!

When we arrived at the hotel it was close to 10pm and it was just about to rain. Lightening and all. Yikes! As we started to roll our suitcases to the lobby the rain started. Sage was beyond tired and only wanted to be carried. Of course we couldn't because we all had suitcases in our hands and were trying to avoid getting soaked. He started crying more and more and...loudly. He worked himself up! We all made it into the lobby safely and Sage continued to cry. All of a sudden he started to motion as if he was going to throw up and before we could rush him into our room, three doors away, he...yes threw up in front of everyone, in the lobby. I rushed him to our room and he was fine. I didn't look back. Just thankful that Neel has so much patience. Ugh. LOL. Sage fell asleep asap. He was just exhausted. They don't call it the "witching hour" for nothing.
I woke up early this morning to get ready for my gig in Schaumburg at the prestigious Early Learning, private school called "The Goddard School". It was only a couple miles from our hotel. When I got there the Director asked if I could do two short shows, instead of one. That way they could have the younger students first and then the older group. It was a good thing she suggested this, because the young ones were ity bity! Barely walking. LOL. I went into Mommy and Me mode and got them all movin' and groovin' to old familiar tunes like "Wheels on the Bus and Where is thumbkin" and a couple fun originals. The Director said she's never seen them particpate so much. Yay! Then came the older kids up to 5 years old. There were about 60 kids. They were excellent listeners and we all had a great time! They asked me to come back as soon as possible.

I'd love to do this again in September! And there are atleast 7 Goddard Schools in the Chicago area. Hmmm ;)

We finished our Illinois trip with a visit to the super mall, of course. LOL. Now we're headed to Iowa where I have two kids shows. One will be with Neel playing drums! :o

Chicago Twin Gig!

Straight from a movie! Today was nothing less than a scene from a movie.

Last night we left Cincinnati and drove two hours North to our musician fiend's house and met his wife and daughter for the first time and stayed with them. Lots of crops and fields in Indianapolis. LOL

In the morning we got on the highway and called my twin sister to see what time and what exit we would meet. It worked like a charm. We met on exit 139 off of I65 at the infamous Flying J gas station. Quick potty break and souveniers, then we were all back on the road caravaning to Chicago. Our mission was to be at our kid's gig that started at 4pm at the Wonderworks Museum. We were doing great on time! Made one quick stop again for food and were just about to exit for downtown Chicago at 12:30am when all of a sudden my little boy NEEDED to go to the bathroom. Now, at this age, there is nothing we can do about #2...we HAD to stop some where fast! We exited. Both cars caravaning through Martin Luther King Blvd. Literally. We stopped at a gas station, bathroom was out of order. Then we stopped at Popeyes and they didn't have a public bathroom and finally we RAN to the KFC next door and all's well that ends well. It was funny!

We arrived at our hotel in downtown Chicago at exactly 1:45pm with plenty of time to freshen up, put on some make up and get the kids ready....when they tell us our rooms are not ready. REALLY? I mean, this is a nice hotel in downtown Chicago with plenty of space and rooms - AND we called ahead yesterday to confirm an early check in! No! Not available. So we were ushered upstairs, mind you, with my sister's two kids and husband and my two kids and husband all 8 of us, to the Spa area where we quickly got changed and made the best of it. Comical!

We raced down stairs to our vans and thought we had alotted enough time to get there. It was then 2:15pm and our gig didn't start until 4pm. We proceeded to hit every stop light, every detour and every wrong turn that we could. A bad thunder storm ripped through the city last night and left a lot of trees down and streets un driveable. Our GPS systems were turning on and off and confusing us even more, than helping! LOL!!! I finally broke down and called the Wonderworks museume at 3:30pm and said "I'm sorry buy we won't be there until 15 minutes til the show". They were super understanding and said they'd wait for us outside the front entrance. Meanwhile, several phone calls back and forth to my sister, we decided to just do an acoustic show! We made it to the Wonderworks by 3:48pm and started on time. No one knew the difference. We were able to improv a lot more with the unplugged new sounds of a couple songs and had a lot of fun mixing it up that way too. That's the beauty of kids shows, they are appreciative of anything you put effort into. Thank goodess the space is not too large and we were able to project! Ha!

We are now enjoying the weekend in Chicago together! Spent the night at the House of Blues restaurant and plan to see a concert in Millenium park tomorrow morning. Tons to do!
Next kids show will be on my own again in Chicago on Tuesday morning at 10:00am for the Goddard Private school. Should be fun!
Til then!

Cincinnati TWIN show!

Yes! I said TWIN show! My twin sister Jen lives in Cincinnati and she too has two children ages 4 and 6 years old.

We arrived in Cincinnati Tuesday night June 15th, after making a tiny detour to the National Corvette Museum. Love me some Vettes! ;)

Wednesday morning Jen and I practiced our songs together. She and I have both inspired each other to write kids songs. We have raked up the phone bills for the past 8 months, singing our little songs to each other and being good critics and encouragers. She got her guitar out and we ran through each song we planned on singing for the kids show. It was hard to not get a little teary eyed when we started to sing in harmony...such a familiar sound and good feeling. We have sung together our whole lives since we were 3 years old. Since we had kids we haven't sung together. This was a real special moment.

We then, went to downtown Cincinnati and had lunch with Andre, my sister's husband at Skyline Restaurant. Later we hung out at the Cincinnati Children's museum and let our kids play for hours! What a great place and huge!

That night, after dinner Jen and I went downstairs to the basement and set up all of the sound equipment and did a couple run-throughs of the entire 45 minute show. We worked out the silly banter in between and the song transitions, to make sure our show would leave the kids exhausted and happy!

This morning I woke up, rested and ready to do the kids show. I put on my "twiny" shirt.....yes we bought matching shirts that were different colors. One was green and the other was pink. We both wore white pants. I know cheesy, but it was fun! LOL

We arrived at the Madeira library at 10am. I was surprised the space, where we were performing, was open to the rest of the library. I knew we would be LOUD! But no one else seemed to be worried about it. It was a rather large library. As my sister predicted a lot of people showed up. There were over 140 at the show!

We sang and danced and laughed and "roared like a lion" and had so much fun! My sister and I interacted like we've been doing kids shows our whole lives. Hahaha! Little did the audience know this was our first kid's show together. The kids were all ages and really participated with gusto for 45 minutes! Lots of CDs were sold too. Bonus!

We met up with my sisters friends at the Swain park afterwards. It's a beautiful place Cincinnati.

Nashville Kid's gig!

"Here's your morning wake up call" greeted me on the phone this morning. Why they called at 7:55am instead of 8am, is beside me. Nonethless, up and out early!
Thank God for GPS. What did we do without someone reciting directions to us??? I jumped into my big ole van in downtown Nashville and listened to my GPS woman's directions to the Hillwood Country Club my first gig on this tour.
After a few minutes of driving through winding, hilly roads lined with huge, beautiful trees I arrived at the country club. It was gorgeous! I was greeted with smiles, posters with my face on it and show information every where! Fun! :) They escorted me into a big ballroom space. This gig was booked as a "Mommy and Me Music Class" so I set up my small sound equipment and got all of my puppets, instruments, scarves, bubbles and guitar ready.
Everyone trickled in and the show started 15 minutes late. Normal. It went well...lots of energy, participation and interaction from these Nashville kids and Moms for an hour. At the end, every Mom bought a CD and the director of the Country Club asked me to come back. With that, I was off.
I met up with my peeps outside of our hotel and picked everyone up to go to lunch. We met another old friend of Neel's for lunch.
Now we are on the highway headed to Cincinnati.
Can't wait!!!!
Cincinnati is where my twin sister Jen and her family live. She has children the same age as mine, 4 and 6 years old. We haven't seen them in two years since she moved away from Florida and up to Ohio. Should be a lot of fun for all of us! :)
Next gig is in Cincinnati on June 17th performing with my sister.

Closterphobia, Nashville and Friends

We made it to Chattanooga by 7:30am and decided to take a detour to the famous Ruby Falls, America's largest underground waterfall. It opened at 8am, so we waited outside and enjoyed the view of the sun rise and fog over the mountains and lake. Sooooo different than Florida. Beautiful!
The tour group started at 8:26am and as we descended 266 feet my heart started to feel squeezed. My thoughts started to panic that I was underground and trapped. No sooner did we land, that I asked to go back up. Ugh, I guess I am definitely closterphobic! That was scarey. Neel and the kids continued to the water fall and took pictures for me to see.
That afternoon we met an old roommate of mine, from Atlanta who now lives in Nashville. And later we met an old friend of Neel's too. Nice to catch up in person!
Before the sun set we walked all together down 2nd Ave and Broadway and enjoyed a long stroll in and out of Nashville's finest...tourist shops. Of course, we bought unique items and clothes that say "Nashville". Can't resist. Who knows when we'll be back here. Fun! Seems we missed the CMA awards and Bonaroo by one day. Bummer, that would've been cool to see and hear!
For dinner we went to Big River on Broadway and our 4 year old son fell asleep before his food arrived. What we forgot was, the time change! So, they felt as if it was 9pm when it was just 8pm Nashville time. So, Neel ended up carrying him back to our hotel up hill all the way. LOL
Tomorrow is my first kids gig at Hillwood Country Club in Nashville, TN at 10:30am. I really have no idea what space they have planned for me and/or how many kids. So, I'm planning to get there early to figure it out. This first gig I'll be doing on my own. Neel will play percussion on some of the bigger shows.
So, hopefully I'll find my way.

5am in Georgia!

Finally on the road! We left at 8pmish from Tequesta. A little later than we planned, but isn't that how it always goes? You plan to leave at a certain time and it' always something (like shutting the hurricane shutters or turning off the power sources, raising the air or throwing away all the garbage one last time).
Neel started the drive and I took over after we past the Georgia state line.
Even though it's pitch dark outside, the drive is awesome! The hills are like rollercoaster rides and there's nothing better than the funky sounds of the Red Hot Chilli Peppers to keep me awake!!! That and Red Bull! Ha!
We just switched again, just outside of Atlanta. Nashville here we come! The kids show isn't til Tuesday morning...so I am looking forward to exploring this musical city!

4 days til Tour begins!

It's Tuesday night and I can't stop thinking of all the things I need to do to prepare for this kids music tour. So much to do, so little time. I can now understand why entertainers have someone for each area of expertise or an agent that does all of this for them. Booking dates, confirming dates, emailing invoices and flyers, hotel rooms, locations, addresses, advertising the events in local papers, PR in general...ya da ya da. I guess I'll just touch on each area and hope that's enough to get me started. LOL

This tour will feature 9 Kids music shows and 6 to 8 cities...including and in order: Nashville, Cincinnati, Chicago, Iowa, Kansas, Oklahoma and maybe Dallas and Mobile.

These next few days I'll pack, do some last minute shopping for cute clothes that are bright and kid friendly (whatever that is) and get my house ready to leave for over 3 weeks.

I'm a Mommy of two children and lucky enough to have a super supportive, musician for a husband. I have been preping the kids for the trip for what seems like weeks. We still don't know how they'll do on the road for that long. Yikes!
We'll see....

Til then,
Patty