Final Day of Clown Training

This was the last weekend of clown training...what an amazing experience. Yesterday we made up skits, jokes, whatever by using props supplied by the experienced clowns..very fun! Then we did role playing by pretending we were going into someones room to do our shtick! Today we arrived in full costume and had our id pictures taken. Oh my! Then we did some actual visits to rooms with real patients in them! That was the very most fun. There were approx 10 rooms with people in them, out of that 10 8 invited us in for a friendly visit. The people loved us! We did a magic trick, sang songs and had a wonderful time. We also brought candy and stickers for the staff. Graduation is next Sunday, unfortunately I'll not be there. Hope they don't dock my pay!

Spring Has Arrived, I Hope

Well, its Memorial Day weekend and the rain has stopped for the moment! Today is the ideal day; the sky is blue with an occasional cloud floating by; the temperature is in the low 70's and the breeze is strong enough to move the chimes...that melodic sound is definitely Spring to me!!! Today was my first visit to the New Canaan Farmer's Market with my friend Diane. We met at a muffin shop and had coffee/tea and did not give in to the scrumptious aroma of the freshly made muffins (there was cinnamon wafting in the air). After much conversation, advice, laughs and camaraderie we left and went to the Farmer's Market. Not too much product this time of year, however, there was a table from a bakery in the Bronx that was giving samples of pesto with fresh made mozzarella on newly baked whole grain bread...to die for! Most of the vendors were selling plants; one had succulents in beautiful arrangements with white stones around each plant; very lovely. The other interesting thing they did was to take large planters and put cannas in the middle with flowing flowers around the edges; very beautiful! After buying plants I succumbed to the bakery table that was selling blueberry, cranberry, banana or chocolate chip muffins; I made sure not to buy the chocolate chip...that would have been my all time downfall! So, on to a lovely day and thoughts of what to buy at the Market next week!

Clown Pictures

So here are the pictures from the first day; more to come when they are available! I am happy to say the second day was better than the first! As you can see there were even some changes made the first day...got rid of the white around my mouth and now my cheeks are heavy blush rather than the paint shown here! Now I have to work on my costume!

Clown Training

This is the most well planned and thought out training program I have been a part of for a long time! The men and women involved with the HaHa Clown Program at Stamford Hospital are extremely professional and dedicated to the program. The first day there was lots of role playing; community building and overall bonding. At the end of the day we spent some time putting on make up. What a fun activity that was. Most of us did not have experience with the clown style of make up and listened intently while the experienced clowns told us what to do and how to do it. Before we left for the evening we were given homework to work on our costume, name and how we wanted our make up to look.

Today was day 2 of the program. We watched a make up demo and then went to work on our own make up. Interesting how the second day went faster than the first and the fine tuning started to take place! Still some internal pressure going on since I don't have a name and haven't decided what I want to look like.

Here's me in my make up first day with the bright red circles on my cheeks and second day with freckles! Which do you like best??? You can also see how on the first day I started with the white around my mouth and decided I didn't like it. So, the evaluation continues!

Some technical problems with the pictures. Perhaps tomorrow?

So how do you blog on a regular basis?

I find that I have all these good intentions and then life gets in the way! Here's a brief rundown on what I've been up to...David is very involved with the UJF bike ride so I've been posting email addresses so that we can get his dollars raised up...you'd be surprised how much $18 can help! Then we're involved with a Mission to Israel from October 24th to November 2nd...more letters to send out. Maybe I'm just not up on the latest technology; I know how to do a mail merge for Word but can't figure out how to do that for email...thoughts? Anyway, by cutting, pasting and copying I sent out 90 letter...talk about time consuming! Then I have thank you notes to finish up from the Federation Campaign. The good news is I'll be done with this responsibility very soon (next couple of weeks) the bad news is I should be through with the notes by the time I am replaced! Family wise, Mom and I were honored by the JCC at their annual Gala! What a lovely evening standing there with my mom...she is amazing and would you believe spoke and thanked everyone for coming without a note in her hand! My friend Candace would be proud! Any excuse to have the family come to town works for me! Tomorrow I start my training as a clown for Stamford Hospital. I am so totally psyched! Can't wait to see where this new adventure leads me. I'll keep you up on things via this site!