Friday 20 April 2012

The ball has started to roll....

Unbelievably the time is rolling by so quickly and our June photo shoot is looming ever closer. Today was the day I sent out the email to all our ladies with final details of where/what and when. I'm hoping that receiving the email doesn't have them running for the hills, but I know our ladies very well and we're a stoical bunch.

I decided that I needed to give them plenty of time to prepare themselves, exfoliate, moisturise, lose 20lbs, tone up. Ok I am joking now, maybe moisturise will be enough, after all we are all just an ordinary group of women, most of us of "a certain age", what you see is what you get. I hope that in the coming weeks the anticipation and excitement of doing something as unusual and worthwhile  as this will spur them on and as long as they all bring their biggest smiles that's all we ask.

Tuesday 10 April 2012

Are these "buns" big enough?

I've been sourcing props that we need for our photo shoot and am so excited today that the postman just delivered something to my door. Ok so I lied about them being buns, but we are following a theatrical theme. Ok now to cover up the holes, a girl has to protect her modesty.


Saturday 7 April 2012

Let's get down to business

Now to organise the shooting and printing of the calendar. My very good friend Elaine, a fellow LTC member and freelance writer, approached our lovely friend Tilley Bancroft, an animator and photographer and asked if she'd be willing to do our photo shoot. Tilley is an amazingly talented lady and in true Tilley style was bubbling over with enthusiasm.

And so the three of us got together one evening to make plans. It goes without saying that there were copious amounts of tea and cake consumed.

We knew from the beginning that we wanted our theme to be a theatrical one so we talked through many poses, some inspired and some frankly too funny but we finally agreed on our 12 poses.

Elaine, being in the profession she is, had many brilliant ideas about publishing and promoting the calendar. Tilley and Elaine had already had chats with a local printing company and were to have further talks to determine the style of the calendar, how many to print and the finer details.

It was left to me to contact the Brewhouse to book the theatre auditorium for our shoot. No turning back now the date is set for Sunday 10th June 2012.

We'd decided that we wanted to be ready to launch our calendar in early September at the Little Theatre Company's bi-annual fund raising Playathon. And so, on cup of tea number three ( thanks to the expert tea brewer Ken, my other half) we had our initial plan of action. We were well on our way.

Wednesday 4 April 2012

A trip to see what we're in for.

Several months ago our director John gathered the Little Theatre Company ladies together. He asked us if we'd like to do the play Calendar Girls. The answer was a resounding "YES". The amateur rights for Calendar Girls have been released for 18 months in an attempt to get into the Guinness Book of World Records for the most productions of one play in a year.  Full of enthusiasm it was suggested that in true Calendar Girl style we produce our own calendar the proceeds to be donated to Leukaemia Research.

Having committed ourselves to both the play and the calendar we arranged for most of the LTC ladies to take a trip along with the director to a production of Calendar Girls. The touring company was performing at the Theatre Royal in Nottingham, so on the 6th July 2011 we went to see what we were letting ourselves in for.

It was a terrific production with an excellent cast and whilst most of us had seen the film, it reminded us all what a truly uplifting story this really is. I think what most of us had forgotten was how much comedy there was, proving that the best remedy in tragic times is often found in laughter. A wonderful, thought provoking evening which left all of us looking forward to being involved in this journey.