Clothed in dark blue pajamas dotted with stars and moons, they appear to be sound asleep. Bird chirps fill the gymnasium. One by one they stretch and rub their eyes and greet the audience with a bright, cheery “good morning.”

Both varsity and junior varsity winter guards competed in their final competition Saturday, March 31. Junior varsity placed fourth competing in Regional A, and varsity placed second in Scholastic A. The color guard’s winter guard season, a series of indoor performances, began in November.

“Our show theme this year is actually a dream a couple of us came up with midway through last year,” junior and varsity captain Erin Riley said. “Our uniforms were long dresses and hard to manage. We all wanted our uniforms to be PJs, so this year, we’re doing ‘Good Morning’ from Singing in the Rain.”

While the junior varsity is made up entirely of new guard members, the varsity is students who have done color guard and or winter guard.

“This is my first season of winter guard,” sophomore Kodi Hicks said. “I’ve only been to one competition so far, but it’s a really cool feeling. You run your show a ton of times in rehearsal and then in contest, it’s completely different.”

Riley has competed in winter guard since her freshman year.

“I got into winter guard after marching season my freshman year,” Riley said. “I prefer winter guard over marching guard, mainly because we’re self-reliant. Our rehearsals are just for us, and we have more input on what we need to fix and how.”

Winter guard competitions give guards a chance to perform and show off skills that can not be done in marching season.

“I like winter guard, especially how over the top it is,” Riley said. “It takes a page out of theater’s book and adds a story or message that’s mostly left up to interpretation.”

Winter guard begins right after marching season ends.

“I like marching in color guard because I’ve done it for two years,” Hicks said. “I haven’t gotten to experience all of winter guard yet. I’m on the flag and rifle line. We have different features, and I’m in the rifle feature.”

Riley helps teach the rifle line.

“We don’t have a permanent instructor that does rifle, so I teach and help them the most,” Riley said. “As a captain, it’s my job to help make sure everyone is ready and in full hair and makeup. I love helping my kiddos look and feel great.”

Freshman Marlee Ramirez performs on the varsity guard with Riley and Hicks.

“It’s stressful,” Ramirez said. “We have a harder show this year and you’re expected to know it all. You can’t use the excuse of you’re just a freshman. You have to be a senior and just do it.”

This was Ramirez’ first time competing in winter guard.

“I was really excited, but I was also nervous in the case that something went wrong,” Ramirez said. “We weren’t really expecting to do very good. We were expecting fourth and we were happy with that because we are really proud of our show. How we did really didn’t matter.”