The Summerglen Files » Velvet the Summerglen cat

Sunday Shots – Summerglen’s New Assistant Mascot

summerglen — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 15:07:03 +0000

Welcome to another edition of Sunday Shots here on the Summerglen Blog. Today we introduce the newest member of the Summerglen family, Buster the Bunny! Buster joined us over the summer, and lives next door to Christina’s trombone studio. He loves music, and spends most of his time sitting in on practice sessions and making friends with our students and their families.

Here’s Buster!

Buster surveys the scene

Buster takes a bath!

Velvet doesn’t mind the bunny…but likes his time outside more.

Hope you enjoyed meeting our favorite animals. Please feel free to give them a shout in the comments, or say hello when you stop by Summerglen for your lesson!

A Post About Kitties :-)

summerglen — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 18:07:47 +0000

I was down last week with a nasty case of food poisoning, and the most activity I could handle was sitting around watching YouTube. Not the most enjoyable week in the world, but there was a silver lining–this video about the Cat House on Kings.

We love cats here at Summerglen, so we enjoyed seeing such a kindhearted person taking care of animals in need. Check out their video–I’ve never seen so many happy cats!

Insulating the Studio

summerglen — Tue, 20 May 2008 12:33:59 +0000

For a percussionist especially, soundproofing a home studio can be an ongoing saga–and Andrew’s drumset studio here at Summerglen is no exception. Generally, the sound quality in the studio is good, but the house in general doesn’t have much insulation, which leads to lots of sound bleeding outside when Andrew plays. (Our place was built in the 1970’s–maybe there wasn’t as much demand for energy efficiency back then?) So, over the past two years we’ve worked on soundproofing so that the entire neighborhood doesn’t have to hear Andrew’s latest recording job.

Our latest venture finds us fixing up some obvious insulation problems, and discovering some more! When we bought this place, the drum studio was but an unfinished room on the lower level, and the ceiling still remains open. Because of this, the worst sound bleed is in one of the bathrooms upstairs, which sits directly over the studio. See why?

So, this week we’re going to pack the ceiling with insulation, and then we’ll top it off with a layer of flexible sound barrier.

In the larger room outside the drum studio, we have an acoustical ceiling, which makes the room sound pretty nice. Unfortunately, when we popped several tiles out today, we found absolutely NO barrier between the inside of the house and the siding. You could see daylight! Ack! Once we insulated the area, though, the sound of the drumset outdoors on that side of the house was cut nearly in half. Very cool .

Andrew knows a lot more about the subject of soundproofing than I ever will, but I’ve had a great time experimenting with different soundproofing measures as we’ve done this project. We don’t have thousands of dollars to blow on top-of-the-line equipment, nor do we have space to build the ultimate in soundproofing, a room within a room. So we’ve had to try different approaches and see what works best, and it’s given us many opportunities to get creative with fluffy pink fiberglass. Even Velvet the Cat wants a piece of the action!

Hello, Velvet!

summerglen — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 01:01:45 +0000

After we lost our beloved Ella the Jazz Cat, we thought we wouldn’t get another kitty for some time. But when we stumbled upon a post on Craigslist that said a cat needed a nice home, we knew we could help. So, we introduce the newest addition to the Summerglen family…VELVET!

Velvet was very skittish and shy when we first brought him home, but he has quickly started to come out of his shell. He enjoys walking on the marimba, vibes, and keyboards to hear their sounds (and use them as stools to reach high-up stuff), and loves watching birds even more. He has a sweet personality and a loud, deep purr! Look for Velvet at your next Summerglen lesson or workshop, and on this blog!