New Car and New Job

Nathan and I have recently moved to Pennsylvania, right outside of Philadelphia, in Media. We moved Labor Day weekend to start our contract doing "Hairspray". We will be here for two months and are currently starting our second week of rehearsals. We open the show on September 26th and run the show eight times a week until November 4th. This show is such a blast and we are having a great time so far! Nathan and I are really enjoying doing another contract together and especially getting the opportunity to play opposite each other on stage. We are living in a woman's house who volunteers at the theatre. All of her children have moved out and she has a room available that has a full size bed, a little seating area in our room, two walk in closets, our own bathroom, a washer and dryer, a dishwasher, and a piano! We feel like we are at our own little bed and breakfast; it is so nice! The woman who lives here works an early shift so she is gone by the time we wake up and then retreats to her room around 8pm at night, so it feels like we have the house to ourselves. It definitely makes us feel at home to be able to buy groceries and cook our own meals everyday.
      We also are getting a complimentary pass to the beautiful Health Plex Gym here in town. It has everything you could need, including a jacuzzi, steam room, and sauna. We are definitely taking advantage of this perk! :) The theatre is in an adorable little downtown area that reminds me a little bit of Gatlinburg, TN. We are really enjoying our time so far and are excited for our friends and family to come and visit.

Before Nathan and I started this contract we came to the conclusion that it was time for us to get a car again. We haven't needed one for the past two years because we have been living in NYC and haven't had the need for one since we use the train for our transportation. Since we got this job together and would have to be living in a smaller city where we would have to have a car to get from one place to another, I started looking up Rental Car Options. We realized that it was going to cost us SO much to rent a car for 2-4 months, that it would make more sense to buy a used car....so thats what we did! :) We bought ourselves a beautiful 2003 Black Hyundai Elantra. We paid for it in cash, got it registered, got car insurance and inspected all in a matter of 2 days! We have drove it to and from Philly to NYC a couple of times now and this baby is running like a gem! We are SO blessed and are so happy to be car owners! :) We have also been loving just riding in a car with the windows down listening to our music. We haven't had this luxury of commuting since we have been living in New York City. We are also LOVING the huge grocery stores and putting our groceries in the car to bring home and not carrying them home. ;) It's the small things right?

My Best Friend's Wedding

This past weekend was Sam and Katherine's Wedding!
Sam is Nathan's best friend from Iowa and they grew up together from the age of 13. Recently, Sam moved to NYC and lived with us for a while after he graduated from college. He then met his beautiful wife, Katherine, here in New York at the church where Nathan and I brought him to. Katherine is from Connecticut and has lived, gone to school, and worked as an art teacher in New York City. They are just perfect for one another and we couldn't be happier for them! Their wedding was gorgeous and was held on 5th Avenue at a beautiful ballroom where actually Gweneth Paltrow was married. The ceremony was in the same space as the reception. They transformed the room after the ceremony when we had a cocktail hour and then revealed the gorgeous dinner set up around the dance floor.
      Nathan was one of the best men. (Sam's brother was the other best man) Our dear friend, Eric Percuoco  was also a groomsman in the wedding, and we were excited to see him as well. (Nathan, Sam, and Eric are like the three stooges....attached to the hip, and are really close friends from childhood) Sam was Nathan's best man at mine and Nathan's wedding and Eric was also a groomsman.
      On Friday, Nathan's parents and sister, Karen flew in and stayed at our apartment with us for the weekend. Nathan and I attended the Rehearsal Dinner on Friday night and then met up with other wedding guests who had flown in (included Nathan's parents and sister) at the Hilton Hotel Bar so we could chat with the happy couple the night before their wedding.
     On the Day of the wedding, Nathan spent all day with Sam and the groomsmen at the Hilton Hotel. I stayed with nathan's family at our apartment where we played card games, relaxed at the house and ordered in sushi. We then went to the wedding at 5:30pm and had an incredible night!
     Here are a few photos from the weekend:

Congratulations Sam and Katherine Reth! 

We Love You!

Whitney Turns 25!!

Whitney turned 25 this past Saturday and we took the whole day to celebrate! 25 is big deal as I'm sure most of you know... 1/4 of a century! I wanted to make this day jammed pack with fun adventures. We started at Alice's Tea Cup for brunch.

Afterwards we walked past this puppy shop and we of course had to play with this precious one. Whitney called him Butterscotch Fluffy.

We next went downtown to lower Manhattan to a Museum all dedicated to Anne Frank. Whitney has been pretty interested in Anne Frank ever since she found out that August 4th was the day that the Nazi's found her and her family hiding and took them to the concentration camps. When we visited my family in Iowa in May, my mom and Whitney tried to go to a museum about Anne Frank but the event changed so they didn't get to see it. I'm glad we got to learn more about her life.

We were right by the Financial District and since the weather was beautiful we rested underneath some shade and enjoyed the scenery. In the distance, you'll notice the Statue of Liberty.

And... the last activity besides dinner was ARCHERY! We both have never done this activity before and I found a groupon online for Archery and thought this would be so fun. Especially, since we are both reading Hunger Games and just saw the movie Brave.

It was pretty tough! It takes so much precision and a steady grip to allow it hit the target. What was really fun about this was they started all of us pretty close but after like 15 minutes they would pull our line further and further making it much more difficult.

We ended the night at Watawa - our favorite Sushi place with four of our great friends. A triple date:) It was an eventful day!!
Happy Birthday to the most important person in my life!

Hiking

Nathan and I had a surprise MINI-VACATION last Saturday. The city can get really exhausting after a while with walking everywhere in the heat, not having central air conditioning and auditioning, taking class, and working 3 different jobs! Our close friends Marissa and James invited us to go see The Dark Knight Rises on Friday night, and we had a blast. They then invited us to hiking with them the next day in upstate NY. They luckily have a car and we were so excited to go!
  They picked us up early Saturday morning and we headed to our destination that was 2.5 hours away in Minnewaska, NY. We were so happy to be in a car with the windows down listening to music and talking with our friends. That alone felt like a vacation from the city. :)
    We then go to the park around noon and immediately saw the beautiful lake surrounded by trees and these gorgeous cliffs that jut out from the trees.

     We then headed on our hike which ended up being about 7 miles of hiking - SHEESH! The weather was perfect...I mean, it felt like it was October...the perfect cool chill in the air, it was such a blessing!

 
    As we hiked we would tell stories and talk about everything under the sun. There were even times when we were laughing so hard no one could walk anymore because we couldn't breathe from laughing - those are the best times!
   When got to hike along the edge of this gorgeous mountainous cliff over looking a city and trees below us, which is where we decided to eat our packed lunches.

I realllllly thought we could push this over. Guess not...

   

Lunch Location

   After lunch we were hiking up a hill when we felt the temperature drop like 15 degrees. We were all talking about how we all felt it and it felt like air conditioning, next thing we knew there was this cave that jutted down almost like a big rocky hole in the ground. It went so deep, that the cold air was pouring out of the cave and created a feeling of air conditioning. We walked close to the opening and we could see our breath and the rocks felt like ice. This was one of the coolest things I had ever experienced in person. We sat down and took a nice rest there in our natural air conditioning. :)

   We then finished our hike after a few pretty tough spots that included rock climbing...we were SO out of breath! We had never been happier than to see the gorgeous LAKE when we returned. Once we got to the lake, Nathan quickly jumped into the cold water while the rest of us just sat on the pier and dipped our sore feet into the water. Nathan is the sweetest husband in the universe because he floated right below me and massaged my feet then gave me a 'natural foot scrub' with the rocks from the lake. He is the best! I almost cried because it felt sooo good.

   After changing out of our sweaty and wet clothes and into a fresh outfit, we walked to our car and were overjoyed to sit down! (we are getting old..haha) Then we saw a FOOD TRUCK where we got fresh cold waters and raspberry-lemon italian ice's. A few minutes down the road we saw a BBQ restaurant , that was not any bigger than 2 port-a-potty's side by side. It was kind of like a BBQ truck, but it looked like a log cabin. :) You know me and BBQ. I HAD to have it , and so did everyone else.
   We ordered up and sat under our rainbow colored umbrella in the parking lot and stuffed our starving faces. We felt like this was a prize after all of our hard work!

 

  We returned home around 8pm, and settled back into the loud noises of the city. The day was so refreshing and felt like an unexpected get-a-way. Couldn't have been a better Saturday!

Newsies for Nathan

These past few days have sure been a whirlwind! Last Monday July 9th I got seen at the Equity call for the Broadway Musical Newsies. [Telsey and Company] cast this show and I've auditioned for them numerous times! Justin Huff from Telsey was in the room and recognized me, which is only a good thing, and I left feeling good about my audition. That same week, on Thursday - I got a call from [Telsey and Company] telling me they wanted to bring me in for a callback for Newsies for the standby of the lead role - Jack Kelly. A standby means, someone who is ready to perform at any moment during the event that the lead actor hurts themselves and wouldn't be able to finish the performance. Or, if the lead actor calls out for any reason. In this case, the lead actor (Jeremy Jordan) is about to start shooting Season 2 of Smash so they needed an immediate standby so that they could have someone ready since his schedule is about to get pretty crazy.

Let's back track a little bit. I got the call on Thursday of last week and they told me my audition was Tuesday, July 17th. They emailed me the material. It was 5 scenes and one whole song. This is quite a lot of material. Especially when dealing with an accent. Newsies is about the true story of the newsboy strike in 1899. The broadway musical is based off of the Disney movie which premiered in 1992 with Christian Bale. I immediately began preparing for the material by memorizing it. I met with a dialect coach to go over the New York accent. I saw the Bway show for the second time. I met with an acting coach and I even asked some questions to one of the ensemble members understudying the role in the show. I wanted to cover all of my bases because I knew that this was huge opportunity. Whitney was a HUGE help in this whole process. She is such a great coach and really challenged and stretched my acting abilities. We're so lucky to be in the same profession. I had everything memorized by Sunday evening. I was feeling prepared confident and excited. My audition on Tuesday went really well. Later that afternoon I got a call for a final callback! They told me that it would be Wednesday (today) for the director and associate director of Newsies. THIS IS HUGE - Whit and I both started screaming. I mean, we were thinking by the end of this week, my life could drastically change!

I went to my final callback today and there were about 20 other actors auditioning as well. I'm thinking wow, so many guys are still being considered for this. (I thought going in that they had narrowed it down to a smaller number by this point - but that unfortunately was not the case). I went in to my audition and there was Jeff Calhoun the director, whom has done numerous other Bway productions. I was auditioning for the top dogs! They had me do the song first, and I felt really great about it. The Lord was giving me such favor through this whole experience. Then we did the first scene and I flubbed one of the lines but felt connected with the rest. And just like that... that was it!!! They just said, "nice work, thank you so much." And I was done. I knew at that moment that I was no longer being considered. I know this because later that afternoon they were having another callback for Thomas Schumacher and he is the TOP PRODUCER for Disney Theatrics. And they hadn't asked me to stay.

I left feeling completely defeated and confused. I just wanted to get to the very end. Is that too much to ask?! However, coming away from this - I couldn't be more thrilled to have gotten as far as I did. I had an amazing time preparing for this character and I'll never forget the experience. One day, I will play that role ... just not right now. 

This is a clip of them performing on The View. Performance starts at 0:25 - I was auditioning for the guy that sings the solo at the end after they all dance.

Her Last Taxi Ride

I came across this story today and thought it was so sweet.

A sweet lesson on patience. 

A NYC Taxi driver wrote:

I arrived at the address and honked the horn. After waiting a few minutes I honked again. Since this was going to be my last ride of my shift I thought about just driving away, but instead I put the car in park and walked up to the door and knocked.. 'Just a minute', answered a frail, elderly voice. I could hear something being dragged across the floor.

After a long pause, the door opened. A small woman in her 90's stood before me. She was wearing a print dress and a pillbox hat with a veil pinned on it, like somebody out of a 1940's movie.

By her side was a small nylon suitcase. The apartment looked as if no one had lived in it for years. All the furniture was covered with sheets.

There were no clocks on the walls, no knickknacks or utensils on the counters. In the corner was a cardboard
box filled with photos and glassware.

'Would you carry my bag out to the car?' she said. I took the suitcase to the cab, then returned to assist the woman.

She took my arm and we walked slowly toward the curb.

She kept thanking me for my kindness. 'It's nothing', I told her.. 'I just try to treat my passengers the way I would want my mother to be treated.'

'Oh, you're such a good boy, she said. When we got in the cab, she gave me an address and then asked, 'Could you drive
through downtown?'

'It's not the shortest way,' I answered quickly..

'Oh, I don't mind,' she said. 'I'm in no hurry. I'm on my way to a hospice.

I looked in the rear-view mirror. Her eyes were glistening. 'I don't have any family left,' she continued in a soft voice..'The doctor says I don't have very long.' I quietly reached over and shut off the meter.

'What route would you like me to take?' I asked.

For the next two hours, we drove through the city. She showed me the building where she had once worked as an elevator operator.

We drove through the neighborhood where she and her husband had lived when they were newlyweds She had me pull up in front of a furniture warehouse that had once been a ballroom where she had gone dancing as a girl.

Sometimes she'd ask me to slow in front of a particular building or corner and would sit staring into the darkness, saying nothing.

As the first hint of sun was creasing the horizon, she suddenly said, 'I'm tired.Let's go now'.
We drove in silence to the address she had given me. It was a low building, like a small convalescent home, with a driveway that passed under a portico.

Two orderlies came out to the cab as soon as we pulled up. They were solicitous and intent, watching her every move.
They must have been expecting her.

I opened the trunk and took the small suitcase to the door. The woman was already seated in a wheelchair.

'How much do I owe you?' She asked, reaching into her purse.

'Nothing,' I said

'You have to make a living,' she answered.

'There are other passengers,' I responded.

Almost without thinking, I bent and gave her a hug.She held onto me tightly.

'You gave an old woman a little moment of joy,' she said. 'Thank you.'

I squeezed her hand, and then walked into the dim morning light.. Behind me, a door shut.It was the sound of the closing of a life..

I didn't pick up any more passengers that shift. I drove aimlessly lost in thought. For the rest of that day,I could hardly talk.What if that woman had gotten an angry driver,or one who was impatient to end his shift? What if I had refused to take the run, or had honked once, then driven away?

On a quick review, I don't think that I have done anything more important in my life.

We're conditioned to think that our lives revolve around great moments.

But great moments often catch us unaware-beautifully wrapped in what others may consider a small one.

A little birdie told me...

Whitney's Post:

      Birds...hmm...I'm not sure if I've ever blogged about Birds before. :) However, I am now because they have really been entering mine and Nathan's day to day life lately. There are two instances from the past week that have involved birds, and it makes me wonder if God is trying to tell us something - what that is...I have NO idea.
      Here is the first bird instance: 
     It has been EXTREMELY hot here in New York and we don't have central air. We have a few AC window units but we try to keep them off as much as we can, because it can get so expensive. So- one evening when the sun was setting, I went into our guest bedroom and put my elbows inside the window sill so I could feel the breeze. This window is on the third floor of our building and the view is of our little backyard area that is fenced in. As I was looking outside, daydreaming about possibly having a cookout in our backyard sometime...I start noticing the pretty birds that are in the trees making themselves known by their little chirps. I start to really pay attention to them because my parents have tons of bird houses in their backyard in Tennessee and they get to see gorgeous birds up close all the time, so I wanted to see if this kind of bird life existed in our backyard as well. Then all of a sudden, a beautiful red bird landed on the tree limb near my window. Then I saw a beautiful butterscotch colored cat walk in the alley behind our apartment. I was so excited by the little animals that I yelled to Nathan to come see what I was seeing, and also to enjoy the glorious breeze that was giving me a nice break from the heat.
     Right as he walked into the guest bedroom, I noticed that the cat had gotten into our fenced in backyard and was walking towards the table in the grass. I was just about to point out the beautiful red bird to him when all of a sudden right when Nathan looked outside with me, the cat pounced on a bird that I hadn't even noticed was sitting on the table in the grass. The bird tried to fly away, but the cat kept swatting at it like it was a toy. Nathan started gasping and laughing, like this is what I was watching the whole time. I was so shocked by what was happening, I felt so bad for the bird that I asked Nathan if we should run downstairs and shoo the cat away, but Nathan wanted to see what was going to happen in the 'natural circle of life'. The bird was wounded and could only hop- hop -hop around in the grass like he was trying desperately to fly away but the cat had handicapped him. What was so miraculous was that all the other birds from the trees started chirping like crazy as if they were calling for help, then they would take turns swooping down in front of the cat like they were trying to distract him so the injured bird could hop to safety. Nathan and I were cheering from our third floor window as if it was some sort of basketball game! Nathan was yelling "C'mon bird!! You can do it!! Just hop through the little holes in the fence to the other side!" and I was yelling "Hey birds! just all attack the cat at once!!"
     Then we noticed something interesting...the cat wasn't trying to catch the bird at all so that he could eat him or kill him, he just wanted to play. The cat would swat at the bird and then sit back on its hind legs and watch the bird to see what it would do next. And that cat was not giving any grace to the bird. If the bird hopped at all,  the cat would chase it and swat it back down. The cat was like "haha, nice try. try again." (meanwhile the birds are still chirping so loud trying to save their friend)
     THEN..all of a sudden - enters a black and white cat into our backyard...out of nowhere! He pounces onto the grass, grabs the bird in his mouth, and trots off into the alley away from our house while the butterscotch cat just sits in our backyard confused at what just happened, and the birds slowly stop chirping.
    Didn't expect that. Not at all. Poor Bird.
    I guess our backyard even reflects New York and not glorious birdhouse Tennessee.
     It's a hard knock life.
   Second Bird Instance:
    Nathan goes to work at a fitness studio in manhattan where he works at the front desk. As he goes to open the front door to enter, he sees that there is a bird laying on the ground against the door, blocking where Nathan can enter. He slowly opens the door and the bird doesn't move. He can tell that the bird isn't dead, but definitely hurt. One of the trainers comes up to Nathan and says "Dude...that bird just totally smacked into the glass front door and I guess is dead on the ground now- did you see it?" and so then Nathan spends the next 30 minutes sitting at the front desk watching this poor bird experience what seems to be the last minutes of his little birdie life. Nathan said that the bird would open its mouth so wide and its eyes would get big like it was trying sooooo hard to gasp for air and then it would just fall on its face. (haha, the visual is kinda funny) Nathan said it was sooo pitiful.
     Then the trainer from the gym went outside to move it somewhere other than the front door and he goes to pick up the bird by putting his hand underneath him and all of a sudden the bird just flies away...
     Hmm.....so- was the bird... acting?  Playing dead??? Or did he just need a little nudge to get off the ground? Who knows...


So- in conclusion, it hasn't been a good week for the birds here in NYC.