5/13/25

It was a short trip to Benjamin this time. We arrived together on Saturday morning in my car, so our resources were limited. The Benjamin group was performing Monday in Austin at the State UIL One Act Play competition, so rather than driving back to Lubbock, we drove to Austin Sunday morning from Benjamin. 

Saturday we installed 3 door frames/doors, re-sanded and vacuumed the floors, and put on another 1.5 coats of sealer, so the floors are now complete. The door installations were complicated by not having all doors at the house yet (and my Rav4 is too small to take them), having limited tools available, and needing to install doors on several very complicated doorways. 

Next weekend, we'll hopefully finish the door installations and not sure what's next. The baseboards will be installed soon, but they'll probably be painted here first, and that probably won't happen in the next few days.

The Austin trip was great. We left early Sunday morning, ate BBQ in Brady, and stopped by Luckenbach for some live music and beer before arriving in Austin. The play was Monday afternoon and Benjamin went 2nd in the first session (there were 8 total schools with 4 plays in each session). They really killed it! We hung out with Becky, Kemp, Devon, Blake, Tori, Brooke, Matt, Wyatt, Landreigh, mother, and Susan all day at a couple of restaurants, the auditorium, and the hotel lobby and bar. 

We finally got the results at almost midnight. Benjamin was first runner-up/2nd place! Kamryn won one of the two Best Performer awards, and was then awarded the top acting award--the Samuel French Outstanding Performer. We're really proud of her and the rest of the group!