New Light

We have been so busy this week! We had two gigs yesterday and two gigs today and we are leaving in about 6 hours to go to New Jersey for the weekend! First we’re going to Ocean City - we have two concerts there and time at the beach/boardwalk! It should be a lot of fun! Then we head north to West Milford, NJ which is Erin’s hometown! We will sing at her church Sunday morning, then drive back for a concert in Harrisburg Sunday evening.

The past two days have been great! Lots of quality van time - and this is just the beginning! Today our concert was longer than we had anticipated and we had another gig to get to that was an hour away! It was all ok in the end. We set a new record for breaking down our sound system though - 10 minutes! It was pretty amazing.

Yesterdays gigs also went well… one in the morning then we came back to campus for a few hours, then we went to Lancaster and sang at Brethren Village. Then we went to get icecream with Jon’s parents and Mr. T - it was great! Then we drove back and it was storming so bad! So, naturally, we did what we do best - we sang about it! “A rumble of thunder, a rumble of thunder!” But you wouldn’t know what song that comes from unless you’ve heard us sing… so come here us sing! Harrisburg on Sunday night! See the “Travel Schedule” link on the right hand column of this page for an address and time.

Have a great weekend! Probably shouldn’t expect another post until Sunday night… maybe sooner… we’ll see!

Today we rehearsed, did group work outs, went to panera, and rehearsed more. After working out in the guys room it smelled awful, so Erin did the guys a favor and provided them with some air freshener. So now their room smells like lemonade.

Tomorrow we have two gigs! We’ll let you know how it goes!

Now it seems as though we are having a group tea party in the guys room. Haha. We’re such a crazy group.

:D

Today we went to meet with Shawn Spear, who will be leading the youth section of Roxbury Camp in August… It was a lot of fun… we played video games and hung out for a bit, then we went out to a Mexican restaurant for lunch, then we came back and did a few things. He had us write down our goals for ourselves and for the group for this summer, and we sealed them in an envelope and we’ll get them back at the end of the summer - it will be fun to see how things end!

Then we came back and rehearsed! Learned a few new songs, then we went to dinner at Dockside Willies and ate outside by the water. It was a good meal.

Then we came back and rehearsed more. We just finished and it’s almost 11 pm. Ew. But GOOD NEWS!! Tomorrow is our LAST scheduled rehearsal day! From there on out it will be concerts everyday! We are so excited!

Anyway. It’s been really great, and it seems that we’re prepared as a team to get on the road!

Sorry this is shorter, but not much has happened! We’ll have good stories soon, I’m sure!

Post again soon!

So today we had our first of many gigs and it went really well! We sang at two services at Mt. Gilead UM Church in Shermansdale, PA, which is about an hour from the College. New Light often begins their summer tour at this church, so they are used to being first

Yesterday (Saturday) we SLEPT IN! Then we had a brief rehearsal in the afternoon and then we went to the music store to pick some things up that we have been needing…We ordered a new head for the djembe. It took a long time. I would also like to take the time to introduce claire to you. Claire is the name of the GPS that we use. So if we ever refer to her in a later post, you will know who she is. She is also British. And the reason I bring her up is because we used her for the first time this weekend. She was a little bit slow at figuring things out at first. But, fortunately, we were able to figure out where to go based off of signs and common sense - I mean, hey… we’re in college… We got this. But eventually Claire kicked into gear. Now she’s ready for the summer.

Anyway, then we went to Melissa’s house, had dinner and hung out for a bit and played ladder golf - it was so much fun! We actually went back to her house for lunch & dinner today after the church services, hung out, and at one point we were all asleep on the floor, couch, or porch. But eventually we all woke up and we went outside hung around/played more ladder golf - that game is addicting! Some of us also played with the kittens that Melissa’s cats had. There were five of them around and they were so tiny! Kind of amusing to watch too… And even more exciting, Jon actually let the kittens nurse on his lap - he was also referred to as the nursing station. ha…

But yes, it has been a great first week and a half. We’re almost out of rehearsals - we have some rehearsal Monday and Tuesday, but starting Wednesday we’re all on the road! Ocean City, NJ next weekend… should be fun! And plus the adventures will only get better once we get on the road!

Ok, more later. And we’re also still working on pictures!

Today we had our mock concert and it went great! Eunice said something along the lines of this being the best mock concert she’s ever heard a new light group do, so that was encouraging.

So, that was pretty much all afternoon. Then this evening we went over to Bryan and Karah’s house, and they cooked dinner for us and Eunice came with her two grandkids and we watched the video of our concert from today (which had some very amusing parts too it. we had a good laugh), had icecream with warm brownies, and just hung out. mmm. it was great.

Other than that not too much has happened - we’re doing some rehearsing tomorrow afternoon to put some finishing touches on things for Sunday - which is our first REAL concert. It’s so exciting.

Hmm… what else… well.. we are working on figuring out how do to pictures… so as soon as we know, we’ll post pics. We have quite a few that are blog-worthy.

Hope you’re all enjoying summer! It’s finally supposed to be nice this weekend! It might call for another breeches adventure… we’ll see

So this past Sunday we were tubing on the breeches. Nice sunny afternoon - warm out. We bought three inflatable 2-person boats from Walmart. We began the journey with all of our tubes connected because we thought it might make the bonding experience a little bit more meaningful. Ha. Anyway, we were floating along doing our thing and then we got to the “rapids” section of the breeches so we unconnected ourselves. Bryant and Tim took the lead with their boat and the others followed behind. Before I go any further, I should mention that Bryant and Tim were the only pair that did not have a paddle. They were, in fact, paddle-less. So after the rapid section they were floating ahead of the rest of the group. All of a sudden we heard a loud *crack crack crack* and about 100 feet in front of them a HUGGGE tree fell and smashed straight across the breeches. Now when I say it was a huge tree, I mean that it was huge. At first we all just stared in awe as this huge thing fell across and blocked the majority of the creek. Then we realized that, had we been about 15 second further ahead, we would have died! Anyway, it left a gap of about 4 feet for us to squeeze our boats through to get around. Keep in mind Bryant and Tim were still paddle-less. They got around the tree just fine. Melissa and Rich also did great. Jon and Erin, however, had some issues with getting around the tree - it took them a little bit longer.

It was a special experience. The rest of the time on the breeches we were paranoid that more trees might fall on us. But it didn’t happen. We did see a water snake floating a little bit ahead of us though! We managed to avoid contact.

Somebody cut us off in the Messiah van tonight. They didn’t stand a chance.

Tonight we are all just kind of sitting around working on intros/powerpoint/watching a movie/doing nothing/eating cookies.

We can’t figure out how to upload pictures to this thing. Any suggestions?

First concert tomorrow! Kind of… it’s not a REAL real concert. But a mock concert. And we’ll be video taped and stuff. First REAL REAL concert will be on Sunday.

More to come soon!
That’s all. The end!

tonight for dinner we made frozen corndogs, and obsessive amount of macaroni and cheese. and grapes. and biscuits. we have leftovers.

And Jon looking rather full…

and we are still rehearsing.

p.s. we almost died. we’ll post about that in a later post.

We are currently on our dinner break for rehearsal day #2! It’s going really well so far - the group’s a ton of fun and we’ve learned a ton of music already. But yes, we have 7 more 12 hour rehearsal days ahead of us - mock concert next Friday.

We have rehearsal again in a little bit but first the guys have to go get matching shoes because in the morning we have our group pictures - sweet.

Yesterday was Melissa’s 21st birthday - we went to El Rodeo (the restaurant of her choice) to celebrate and they came out, stuck a sombrero on her head and sang to her… and of course - they gave her free dessert. Fun, right?

Anyway - it’s going to be a great summer. Again, for anybody interested, our travel schedule is posted in the “about” section of this blog, or you can click on “Travel schedule” over to the right of this post.

We’ll update again soon - and maybe post a group pic or two… we’ll see

New Light 2009 will be starting in just a few more days! We are excited for everything that is planned out for our group, and we have several months of traveling ahead of us!

For those of you that don’t already know, New Light is a traveling summer music ministry team made up of seven Messiah students. The team travels all over the country going to different places every year. We sing at community events, retirement communities, and churches, and we also serve as counselors and the ministry team at three different summer camps. This year the camps we will be going to are Camp Men-O-Lan, Memorial Holiness Camp, and Roxbury Holiness Camp.

Here is a little bit of info about the 2009 team:

Melissa Shumaker, 10
New Bloomfield, PA
Church Music Major

Erin Smidt, ‘12
West Milford, NJ
Music Education Major

Sarah Wingard, ‘11
Harrisonburg, VA
Music Education Major

Tim Agnolutto, ‘10
Dunkirk, MD
Public Relations Major

Rich Chagnon, ‘10
Windsor Locks, CT
Theatre Major

Jon Eastburn, ‘12
Chalfont, PA
Music Education Major

Bryant Vance, ‘10
Lowville, NY
Theatre Major

Please pray for our group as we minster to others throughout the summer. And please follow our blog!! We will constantly be updating this with pictures, new posts, and other fun information about what we’ve done and where we are going. We start our rehearsals on Wed. May 27!

Also, if you want to follow our travel schedule, click on the the “About” link at the top of this page!

Stay tuned!