Monday, August 31, 2015

BLOG SITE UPDATE

       We have added a new page to the site.  It is photos of Praising Hands members, both past and present.  Check it out and enjoy.

        Also, we have added our song offering from yesterday, Sunday, August 30, 2015, to the song page.  If you click the link after the song title, you can see Moe and Rae, me, signing "May it be."

Thank you for visiting.  May God Bless.

Saturday, August 29, 2015

COLORS

     Way back in the beginning we decided that we would wear black, ankle length black skirts with black tops or dresses for the women and black pants and shirt for men.  After our first time signing in service, someone mentioned that we looked as if we were in morning.  So we decided to were colorful, sparkly sashes.  We try to follow the colors of the liturgical year. however once in a while we depart from tradition.  An example is when we did "Just a Closer Walk with Thee", we chose to wear golden sashes.  

      Right now is Ordinary Times so tomorrow we will be wearing green.  However, when we next will be part of the service (October) we will not want to wear the same green sashes and pocket squares.  I do not know what color we will use.  That will be decided by the group at a later date.

Thank you for visiting.  May God bless.
    

Thursday, August 27, 2015

INTRODUCING RAE

      I thought it was about time you started meeting us one by one.  So it seemed I should be the first, as the blogger and director of Praising Hands.

      I first began learning sign language as a child when my friend, who is deaf, communicated mainly through sign language and gestures.  Later, while working on a Special Education Credential, I was required to take a course in ASL, American Sign Language.  

      All of my life I have been interested in music. Besides learning to play more than one instrument, I was in orchestra all through high school.  I also had dance lessons as a child and was involved in various folk dancing groups throughout my younger life.  During my first two years of college, I was a music major.  There fore I was in orchestra and choir.  

       When, after joining our church, someone talked to me about the desire to form a Signing Choir,  these two parts of my life came together.  And the rest of the story you know form a previous post.

Thank you for visiting and may God bless.


Sunday, August 23, 2015

MAY IT BE

      The song we are signing next Sunday, Aug. 30, is "May it Be".  As I said previously, it is an old Celtic prayer sung by Enya.  Here are the lyrics.

                   May it Be

May it be an evening star shines down upon you.
May it be when darkness falls your heart will be true.

You walk a lonely road
Oh! How far your are from home.

Mornie utulie          (darkness has come)
Believe and you will find your way.

Mornie alantie         (darkness has fallen)
A promise lives within you now.

May it be the shadows call will fly away.
May it be you journey on to light the day.

When the night is over come 
You may rise to find the sun.

Mornie utulie
Believe and you will find your way.

Mornie alantie
A promise lives within you now.
A promise lives within you now.




Thanks for visiting.  May God Bless.

Friday, August 21, 2015

A GLIMPS AT PRACTICE

     We work hard at practice but we do have a lot of fun.   

     I thought you might enjoy a peek at what practice looks like.  So I offer  you these pictures.

                          Moe and Rae                                                                          Moe




Moe 

                                                           "Stay together now"




                                                    Nancy, keeping us on point.








            



                                                                                            
   
            "look she can blow it also"              Yes even I, Rae, .make mistakes.

Monday, August 17, 2015

FLEXIBILITY

     One of the precepts that we decided on in the beginning was flexibility. 

      First when and where we meet is flexible. We chose a place and time to meet and that is where and when we met until we changed.  With the addition of another person who had limited transportation, we changed our meeting time and place.  She was at church on Friday mornings so our meeting place became church and our time changed to 1 p.m.

      The size of our choir is flexible.  We started with four members, grew over time to six, than fell back to three.  We are currently five with four performing.  One person has found performing too much but still wants to be part of our choir.  So she now ques each of us from the front pew.

      Flexibility became key in that some of our members have physical limitations.  So we adapt some signs to fit the signer's limitations.

Thank you for visiting again.    

Saturday, August 15, 2015

A LITTLE HISTORY

     I thought that you might like to know about our beginnings.  In 2012 some members of our church thought they would like to start a signing group.  We had our first meeting the beginning of September.  After a discussion of what direction our group would take and how we would go about it, we left to meet the following week.  The decision was, as you see, to be a signing choir.  We were all to do some research on resources, music, and other such groups.

     The following week when we reconvened, we each presented what we had found.  As I, Rae, was the only one that had any back ground in signing, the other members elected me leader/director. So, I became the reluctant leader of Praising Hands.

Thank you for visiting.  We look forward to your comments.

Thursday, August 13, 2015

AND ON WE GO

       Tomorrow we, Praising Hands, are back to practice.  Moe and Rae will be doing a duet on August 30, 2015.  The song we will be offering is an old Celtic prayer, "May it be".  The music we will be using is a video set to Enya sing the song.  

       As with most Celtic Christian songs or prayers there is an element of nature spirit in it.  However it is a beautiful, you might say haunting, song.  It speaks to both Moe and I, Rae, of many Christian thoughts and ideas.

         Thank you for visiting.  Please visit again soon.

Tuesday, August 11, 2015

MISSION STATEMENT

    We now have our Mission Statement up on the "mission" page.  I know it is slow but steady progress.  
  
      I will be posting the address to this blog on Face Book very soon.  

      We encourage visitors to leave comments.  We would really like to hear from you.  What do you think about the blog or our songs.  Also we would love to hear suggestions on how we might make this blog better, songs we have done that you would like to see, or songs that you think might be good for us to do.

      Thank you for visiting.

Monday, August 10, 2015

SONG PAGE

     Our blog site is developing.  We now have the Song page up and running.  If you check it out, you will see a list of all the songs we have done during worship services.  As some of you have already seen, we have uploaded some of our songs to youtube.  Those songs on the list that have been uploaded to youtube will have a link to that video after the title.  You need only click on that link and you will go to our video on youtube.   As time goes by we will be uploading more of our videos to youtube.

     We hope you enjoy watching as much as we enjoyed signing these songs.

Sunday, August 9, 2015

WELCOME

     Welcome to our blog.  The other pages are still under construction but will be ready soon. We would like to keep you informed of what we are doing and when we will be part of the service at Trinity United Methodist Church in Sequim, Washington.  As of this point that is our only venue.
  
       Please do visit us here again soon and see what is going on.