A busy few weeks!

We've been keeping busy lately, which is a great thing!

Last weekend, we went to Chicago to see the Edward Hopper art exhibit. Cassie and I took the train in, and it was a pretty cool experience since I had never ridden the train into Chicago before. The terminal in Chicago was almost like an airport.
We couldn't help but spend the first couple of hours shopping around. All of the stores in Chicago are bigger and better than what we're used to.

The Hopper exhibit was great, and really surprised me how bright and vivid the artwork looks in person. One of the highlights was "Nighthawks" which looks amazing in person.
We then had some deep dish Chicago pizza at a restaurant that we later found out has a location only minutes from our house! Even so, the pizza was great, especially because it essentially has an entire block of cheese on each slice. It was a really fun trip, and it makes me want to go back soon!


This weekend, Shalom played its last show at the Cup of Joy in Green Bay, Wisconsin. We were all a little sad to see the band end, but we are all so busy in our own lives, that it is nearly impossible to keep things going. We had a great show, opening for a band called Air Five, and had an amazing live video made! I'll have it posted on YouTube soon.


It was great to visit Oshkosh and hang out with all the guys from the band again.

After working all weekend, I'm gearing up with Cassie to go back to classes tomorrow. It will definitely be a strange atmosphere following the tragedy, but we will try to make the best of it and keep going on.

A Surprise Tragedy on Campus

It's the morning after the tragic shooting at NIU that shocked all of us yesterday afternoon. Thankfully, both Cassie and I were at home when my dad called to tell us about the shooting. We had the news on for most of the afternoon and evening to ultimately find out that there were seven people killed, including the gunman.
It's still hard to believe, of all the universities that you could hear about this happening, and it actually happens here. The Kishwaukee hospital, where many of the victims are taken, is only several minutes from our apartment.
All I can really say is that my heart goes out to the victims and I'm sure that many people who were on campus or attend NIU were keeping their loved ones a little bit closer on Valentine's Day, thankful to be safe from such a senseless and unexplainable situation.
I'm not exactly sure how things will change on campus following all of this, but it certainly seems that everyone will be on edge for a while, knowing that something so innocent as a campus Geology class isn't enough to keep you safe from someone who has lost their mind.
I hope that the families and friends of these victims can somehow learn to eventually cope and somehow heal from all of this.

Still Cold!

It's still cold. And snowy. And winter!
It's getting a little tiring, but I have some new changes that I am looking forward to.
I'm hoping to make the jump from work at Steve & Barry's, to teaching private voice and piano lessons. Unfortunately, since things have been very slow at work, I haven't been getting many hours, but this also led me to realize how great it would be to teach on a regular basis.

I'm also participating in the February songwriting challenge with some friends from Wisconsin, which essentially entails writing one song every two days for the entire month of February. I'm running a little behind right now, but it has taught me a lot about my variety of songwriting styles, and I'm glad that I'm recording all of the new songs so that I don't forget them! Hopefully, I'll catch up before the end of the month when we are going to share all of our works.

Cassie has been really busy with school, and has been gone quite a bit. She has been working really hard lately, and I hope she gets through the rest of the semester without going crazy! I know she'll make it, though, because she's handled this kind of stress many times before.

Next week is going to be the last show by the band I am in from Oshkosh. We had a great run, and played some really exciting shows, including the Lifefest music festival, which was an amazing experience. It looks like we're all getting so busy, and I am living so far away, that this is probably the time to call it quits for the band. It is a little sad, but it's also exciting that we all have so many great things going on in our own individual lives.

Finally, we're planning a trip to Chicago this Saturday to visit the art museum and I'm really looking forward to seeing the Edward Hopper exhibit. We haven't been into Chicago in a while, and I think it will be great to get away for a day.

Well, I guess there's more going on than I thought, despite the cold winter! We'll see how everything turns out.

Snow Day!

It's great to know that you're never too old for a good ol' snow day!
That's right, classes were canceled today, and we're in a winter wonderland once again.
So the last few weeks have mostly been made up of class and work, but there has been some fun stuff going on.
Last Thursday was my performance at the House Cafe in Dekalb. Even though it was snowing pretty hard, we still had a pretty decent turnout of about 30 or so people. There was also some great music after us which made the night a great time. Even my work friend Mia came with one of her friends to watch. Check out one of the songs I performed:

Then on Sunday, we invited our friends from the art world, Tom and Shawna, over for the Super Bowl! I have to say, it was a great game and it was awesome to see the Giants take down the Patriots.
Cassie made us tacos, which were excellent!
So the rest of my week is made up of work, and I'm hoping to finish up my first project. More information on that to come!