If you are looking for a Tax Deduction that can help children you might want to look at what Donna and Dondino is
doing to help children. It is a wonderful foundations so go and look at it. We always look at ways to not give
all our money to the government so go and check the web site out.
CLICK HERE and it will take you to the web site that will show you what Read To Me Foundation is all about. See what Donna
(Wall) Gummelt has been up to.
Click HERE and it will take you to the church web site.
Yes, this is our Rita and you can read about what she has been doing. Just click here (Rita Williams) and read what she has
done.
Donna is writing childrens book. If you are looking to buy a child in your life a book go and check out what she has written.
Click on (Donna) and go visit her web site.
Click on the picture and it will take you to their web site.
Click on (HERE) and it will take you to Dondino Show blog and you can read more about Donna's book. How fun to read about
our classmates.
Donna (Wall) Gummelt is Dondino's manager/business partner. You
will enjoy going and looking at their web site and listing to him singing. If you click on the picture it will enlarge it.
If you click on the link above ... it will take you to the web site.
Click on TOMMY WHITE and it will take you to the web page on his book.
Laurie
and I live in New Braunfels, Texas. We love the Hill Country. We have been married 38 years, have two children, Emily and
Andy that are both married and live in Dallas, Texas. I
retired in 2003 and have recently written a book about managing people through understanding human nature. The book is titled
The Wreckless Manager and is available on Amazon.com. It's a series of
72 tips followed by a real world story with each tip as an anecdote.
I know that Janene would enjoy you seeing her work so click here (Janene Close Pratt)and enjoy.
Enjoy Mike's work. Click here (M Mahon) and see his web site.
I know that Mike would enjoy you seeing his work so click here (Atkinson)and enjoy.
If you want to see where Joey is going to be next click here (JOEY)and take a look. You can also see some of his photos.
If you are in or around Albuquerque, NM and need a safe place for you furry family
member, call Kay and Jack and let them love him/her at "Kay's Critter Cleaners" while you are away. She can
make them smell wonderful too.
Kay (Copenhaver)
Woody
9920 Academy Knolls Dr. NE
Albuquerque, NM 87111
505-296-7220
You can go and visit her web site. Just click here (Kennel Kare) and see what she can do for you.
If you are in or around Dallas or Fort Worth, Texas and need a safe place for you furry
family member, call Sherry Gray and let her and her staff love him/her at "Kennel Kare" while
you are away .
Sherry Gray
2205 North Pearson Lane
Roanoke, Texas 76262
817-379-0710
Lubbock Avalanche Journal
News Paper
Curtain Up: Ray touches young lives on stage
By Joe Gulick | AVALANCHE-JOURNAL
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Story last updated at 2/17/2009 - 1:36 am
This time of year, Karen Ray is a steady
and calm island with a sea of chaos swirling around her.
The days are drawing near for the annual musical that is the
biggest event of the year for her theater arts department at O.L. Slaton Middle School. This year she is directing Cole Porter's
"Anything Goes" with a cast and chorus of 100 and a crew of 40 - all of them in the sixth, seventh and eighth grades.
She has painstakingly staged the scenes, and she appears laid-back and relaxed as she answers seemingly endless questions
from actors and crew members and solves problems that arise from every direction. Bit by bit, the acting, singing, dancing,
sets, props, costumes, lights, sound and music settle into place. By the time the curtain rises before a paying audience
- which will be at 7:30 p.m. on Friday and Saturday for "Anything Goes" - the professionalism of the cast, crew
and chorus will have reached such an impressive level it will be easy to forget they are middle-school students. "Kids
can achieve more talent and do more than most people believe they can do. The more responsibility we give them, the better
they do," Ray said.
She has learned a great deal over the years about students - and about directing musicals. "Anything
Goes" is her 17th production. "As a director, I used to worry about things all the time," Ray said. "I
have learned everything works out. I certainly want a professional appearance, but the kids are more important than the product.
I know that if I am stressed, they will be stressed." Choosing the annual play every year can be complicated. She
selects the musical to fit the talents of the students, and has to keep an ear on the boys' voices, which usually have
just changed and generally are not as strong as those of the girl singers. When she began directing musicals, they primarily
featured the ninth-grade class, but that switched to the eighth grade when freshmen were moved to high school.
And then there was spring of 2006, when both the ninth- and eighth-grade classes would be going to high school the next school
year. After the exhaustive effort of staging a musical, she started all over again and did another one.
"I
had the ninth-grade musical in February, the eighth-grade musical in April and my daughter's wedding in May that year,"
she laughed. "But I wouldn't have cheated (the eighth-graders) for anything. They were the best group I ever had."
The annual musical is the culmination of three years of theater training that begins in the sixth grade, she said.
"We
perform all year long. The students do monologues in class and prepare plays to perform, including the younger kids.
By the time we get to the two-hour musical, they are used to performing," she said. They have learned more than
just acting, however. They have studied costuming, make-up and all the technical parts of theater, Ray said.
"They
know how to run lights, work sound boards and build sets," she said. "They gain confidence they can use in every
part of their lives." Linda Gober, a Coronado High School teacher and academic decathlon coach who has known Ray
since the second grade, calls her "one of Lubbock's hidden treasures." "Her students are her second
family, and they know she cares about them. When they leave O.L. Slaton, they not only know theater arts, but they have
experienced the love and dedication of an excellent teacher," Gober said. Ray said rumors seem to get started every
year she is retiring. However, she said she intends to teach for many more years. More than 20 of Ray's students
have gotten full acting scholarships to universities, and at least five or six of them work as professional actors today,
Ray said. Many others are working as directors, screenwriters and in technical jobs in show business.
"A
lot of my kids have gone into law. They have gotten used to speaking in public. A theater background is good for
lawyers," said Ray, whose daughter, Lori, is one of those attorneys. Ray's dream for Lubbock is a true performing
arts high school for the acting, choir, band and orchestra students. "We have so much talent in Lubbock,"
she said. "If we could have one place where we could teach all of these kids together, it would be great."
In addition to her duties at O.L. Slaton, Ray wears other hats in theater arts involvement. "Karen serves as the
University Interscholastic League Region 1 3A and 5A one-act play contest manager as well as event director for the Master
Theatre Workshop, the One-Act Play Director's Workshop, and Student Activities Conference, all hosted by Texas Tech University,"
said Lynn Elms, director general for UIL Region 1 spring meet events. "The responsibilities of this assignment are huge.
To date, Karen manages the best regional one-act play contest in the state." Since Ray's involvement as the
event director for the Master Theatre Workshop, offered to area high school students, and the One-Act Play Director's
Workshop, offered to directors across the state, both events have tripled in attendance, Elms said. Ray enjoys managing
the contest and conducting the workshops, she said. In the Director's Workshop, she teaches, teachers how to select a
one-act play and stage it. Smaller high schools that participate in the UIL one-act play contest usually don't have a
theater arts class and may have a teacher directing the play who doesn't have a theater background, she said. One
of the favorite memories of Ray for many of her former students is the six-day theater trip to New York City she leads every
spring break. Students see four Broadway plays, get to meet someone from one of the plays and take in New York's tourist
sites. The trip next month will be the 15th one Ray has led, and she enjoys getting to experience vicariously a new
group of students' discovering The Big Apple each year.
Ray grew up around show business. Her father was an All-American
football player at Arkansas, who played professional football for the St. Louis Gunners, who later became the Cleveland Browns.
He was a sales manager for a Lubbock radio station, was a friend of Buddy Holly and other music artists and had other ties
to the movie business.