Hangin’ Out in Donnybrook

Hangin’ Out in Donnybrook

I had the opportunity yesterday to go and watch a friend of mine perform at the Legion (Donnybrook Branch) in Dorchester. Those of you who know me personally, know that a couple of years ago I decided to take up guitar lessons. A fella that my husband worked with at the time, Cal Horner, played guitar and gave lessons. So I thought, what the heck, I’ll give it a go. Well….long story short….I think this dog is a little too old to learn that new trick. I can always dream that one day I will wake up and magically be able to play the guitar, but I’m not holding my breath.
The funny thing is though, that as the lessons progressed and Cal and I started to get to know each other a little better, we realized that we used to go to the same high school. We grew up in the same area but never met when we lived at home. How funny is it that all these years later, he would become friends with my husband and we would meet in Woodstock, and he would start to give me guitar lessons.
Cal has a long history of playing music. He is most definitely one of the most musically talented people I have ever met….maybe even on the planet! One of the things that blows me away is he plays by ear. He can listen to a song once and then sit there and start playing it. Man I would love to have a musical bone somewhere in my body. He started playing the fiddle when he was a kid, and he can play many other instruments as well. They include, but are not restricted to the dobro, the drums, lap steel, acoustic guitar, lead guitar, fiddle, piano, mandolin, and the banjo. He has played on a cruise ship and with many different groups over the years. I love country music, and I think my hubby likes it too, although he might just say he does cause he knows I love it so he goes along with me…..but since we like this kind of music, we make a point of going to watch Cal play whenever he is getting together with a group to perform.
Today he was playing at the Dorchester Legion with Brian and Peggy Storey and Bill Deller who have the band called Keeping It Country. I recently had the pleasure of meeting Brian and Peggy Storey and they are both so sweet. They are also very talented musicians. Peggy plays guitar and sings and Brian plays the drums, the banjo, the mandolin, the fiddle, and I’m sure other instruments as well, but those are all I have seen him play. Peggy’s family is very talented as well; her brother and sister both got up and sang a song with the band yesterday as well. As well as her family, they had a few friends get up and sing and a very special treat was Bill Irving playing the fiddle. Bill is a 7 maybe 8 now, Canadian International Fiddle Champion. Not only does he play the fiddle, but he also fixes fiddles and builds fiddles. He came up on stage and shared some fiddle tunes with us and told a few stories. He’s a robust man and his voice sounds like Burl Ives. I could have sat and listened to him all day. The very cool thing is Cal adores Bill and his fiddle talent, and when Bill was on stage playing with Cal, he continually talked about how great a guitar player Cal is and how we all were so lucky to have this amount of talent in our area. It was just nice to hear that they are mutually in awe of each other. And it was a special treat to hear them play together.
Anyhow, I could go on and on and on about these guys. We have so much fun travelling around listening to them play and they have so much fun playing together. It’s very enjoyable to watch people entertaining you, but it is even more fun when they are having a great time doing it.
Here are a couple of videos of the day. I apologize for the quality and for those people who kept walking in front of my camera….How Rude!!! I tried to lighten the videos up and resave them, but I'm not sure if it's going to be lighter when you watch them...oh well you should be able to hear them anyway!

In keeping with the Country theme, I whipped up this card today. It is a very simple quick card. But I needed to make a thank you card for a friend of my husband’s who helped us out with something. So it was a quick one, but hopefully he’ll like it.
The base is Kraft, which I inked up with Creamy Caramel. The designer paper was cut out with the top note die, and inked up with Creamy Caramel as well. The horse and rider from Bronc Buster were stamped on vanilla with basic brown ink and inked up with Creamy Caramel around the edges. The letters were cut out with the sissix die and a little bit of hemp was rolled up to look like a lasso.

Chow for now,
Jacqui