Natalie Perfume!!

Do you think it "smells like Natalie"? Or is it how "Natalie wants to smell"?

Happy Mother's Day from a GINORMOUS Lumber Jack

Blog search

ummmm.... you know how you can see what people are "searching for" to
get to your blog?

Well, you can....

Tonight someone got to my blog by searching... wait for it.... "dreams
with hippos"

That's awesome.

:)

Texas to "almost Canada" trip

We played at MSU in Wichita Falls, Texas on Saturday for their family day!!! They had a mechanical bull, games, face painting, all kinds of fun things to do!!!! It was so hot, my bow broke!!! That's never happened before. The hair on my bow loosened so much, I couldn't play with it! I was a little paniced the first song, cause I wasn't sure how in the WORLD I was gonna play the rest of the show..... I mean, I could have cut my own hair off and fashioned together some kind of bow.... but that would have taken at least an hour and a half and it was only an hour-long show. Luckily I had a spare that I completely forgot about in my case. Whew. Pat on the back for that one!



And I have to thank Tiffany for the pics! (I just stole them off facebook where she posted them!)



We left a scorching hot Texas on Sunday and our next show is 1,306 miles away in Marquette Michigan which is almost all the way to Canada! We are currently in a hotel room in Appleton, WI and my sunburn from Texas is quickly fading into windburn up here. It is COLD. I mean, not really - I'm a wuss... but it's all relative. :) I am looking forward to going back to Marquette, though. It is such a beautiful, quaint little downtown. We'll play at Upfront & Company on Wed and Thurs nights. They have GREAT food and a really fun stage and dance floor. Oh, we'll be doing the line dance :)

James' Aunt Deana noticed that we would be driving right through Iowa City on our way to Marquette and offered to provide a little room and board for us, which we GLADLY took her up on!!!!
We drove 16 1/2 hours the first day to get to Iowa City (took longer than normal because of the interstate traffic at 11pm... go figure) We definitely got some good footage for the next Tour Diary of our ridiculous attempts at guitar hero. I got booed off the stage trying to play "Devil Went Down to Geaorgia" but it's ok. I took out my aggression by boxing James on the Wii. :)

And wow. Home cooked food. MMMMMM. So good. Thanks for everything Aunt Deana!

Peace, Love, Fiddle Y'all.

My song REALLY IS in a movie!!!!

Autographing my first 4 copies of Bag Boy :)

Our Day off in Dallas

Can I just say that I love my band? Cause I do. Even though they made fun of me the whole way home in the Suburban.... I was laughing so hard I was crying though, so I really can't complain....

We had a really good day off today in Dallas, which was very nice after a bit of a rough evening last night.
We hung out with Randy Peterson - our friend from "Beach TV" in Panama City this evening. We filmed a couple little interview spots with him at a studio in Dallas today and then his friends threw a big BBQ for us tonight, and ummm yeah... it was pretty delicious. They gave me all the left over cookies and brownies at the end of the night so I pretty much think they will be my best friends for life. :)

Notice the glow around my hair.... you know it's big when there's a haze coming off of it....





PS Happy Birthday Boyd!!!!

Fate

My fate is that way. Apparently, it is a little under construction.

Don't Stop Believin

A little view from the drums of how awesome it is to play Spinnaker and have everyone singing along...

The only thing cooler is when they sing along like this to MY songs. But none of my songs start without the drums...
I should probably work on that.

SPINNAKER!!!!

There's usually quite a bit of military at our shows at Spinnaker. This time there were a whole bunch of Navy Divers. The first night they were all there celebrating Wally's Bachelor party. All the guys were dressed in Captain's hats, sports coats, shorts, and some had pipes :) They were quite a sight and you just knew there was a story behind it. At first I thought it was a fraternity rushing.... but no, it was "Walter's Bachelor Party" :) They had rules written on his shirt that he had to accomplish for the night. They were all dancing and partying in front of the stage, and on my set break, they asked if I would make up a rule for him. :)



Rule: pick up a fiddle player.



And check.

The next set, they kept putting this water bottle up on my monitor and then taking pictures of me with it.... I was pretty confused, but then they told me that it was the water bottle for their "Class". They are supposed to take pics of all the random places they take it and at the end of their training, they'll do a big montage of the places it's been.



Here's the whole crew, in all their glory - including the one really cute girl that is also a navy diver:




The next night they actually had an auction with all the guys and 1 gal to raise money for gear for dive school. It was hilarious. I don't know that I have ever seen men be auctioned off before, but as you can imagine.... the ladies were going crazy at the club. One of the bar tenders wanted to bid, but she couldn't since she was working... So she gave me money and I went and bid for her!!! :) 

I'm not gonna lie. It was pretty fun.

Goodness, it was such a fun weekend. This couple came that had seen us about a year ago at Spinnaker - Billy Ray aka "Biggun" and Tonya - came back and Billy Ray bought a XXL Peace Love Fiddle shirt. That boy immediately put it on and was showing off all night. He was really proud of it - and so was I!!!!!



Spinnaker is always a good time. How could it not be with all this craziness??? Funny thing is - this is about par for our shows there. It is ALWAYS wild. There were a few bachelorette parties, and even a wedding reception - the bride and groom got up on stage and danced while we played "Let's Get It On". 

But seriously? I just love any place where on my set break, I get to go get a breath of fresh air by letting the waves of the ocean wash over my toes. Yeah. That's awesome....

Tour Diary #1

James recently found this little camera he had bought a while back, so we took some video of one of the last road trips :)
We played Spinnaker Beach club in Panama City for 2 nights and then had to drive through the night to get to Elizabeth City NC to play for the Coast Guard. It was awesome. And after this one, we have decided to do a LOT more video blogging. :)

Hope you enjoy Tour Diary #1!!!!!

Naca.org

Whoa. This is crazy!!!! This is on the front page of NACA's website!
That was right after being in the ER and right before the infamous
"accident". Our trailer is still quite gimply, but as long as we
close her off with a big ole belt strap, we can get the door shut :)
She just needs a little help.... http://www.NACA.org

Hold me closer Tony Danza

Today James and I were meeting a friend for lunch in Green Hills. As
we were walking in our friend tapped me on the shoulder and said,
"Hey, isn't that Darryl Waltrip?" Sure enough there he was getting out
of his car... As we got closer our friend heard him saying something...

Was he on his cell phone?

Nope...

Was he talking to someone still in the car?

Nope...

He was definitely singing "Tiny Dancer" to himself...

That is awesome... Of course he would be. I wanted to jump up on the
hood of his car and join in for a big dramatic "Almost Famous"
moment... but he probably would have just called the cops.

Maybe next time...

The Suburban Chronicles: Mud-Wrestling Incident

We played a show at Amarillo College back in April and after the show, this girl came up to me and said "Hey, you should mud-wrestle me!" I told her I would love to but I really didn't want to get my performing clothes dirty and I didn't have anything else to wear. (All of our bags were already at the hotel so I thought I was off the hook!) Immediately this one guy said - "I've got basketball shorts you could wear!" And the college had just given each of us a t-shirt. So I had kinda committed without even meaning to!! But as soon as I realized that I was REALLY gonna mud wrestle this girl... I realized that she looked like she had already taken some people down..... and I was smaller.... and I was about to get killed....
But hey! I think I put up a pretty good fight. Notice how she says "She won't go down!" towards the end. I am really proud of that part - cause girlfriend just TACKLES me at first and I was NOT ready for that!!!

Boyd, Big Byrd, and Train Ridin'

So I am a little late on this.... but I have to go back to our show in Columbia, SC at Wild Wing Cafe.

1st of all.... one of my favorite people in the entire world showed up to surprise me! BOYD!!!!!!! He ad I met at NACA a little over a year ago, and we discovered we are both from Columbia, TN - Mule Town USA!!!! We grew up 2 streets away from each other and his Daddy was always the BEST host of the Liars Contest :) That is a tradition from Mule Day - one of the most fun events of the weekend.




The show was AWESOME. The "Ruth" party :) brought about 15 of the most fun people!
It was Big Byrd's birthday. :)
What is it with these unbelievably tall people at the shows lately? I mean, I know I am a shorty, but seriously?




The night ended with a conga line to "Come On Ride The Train" - I never noticed how LONG that song is!!!! I was one tired girl at the end of the night!