27 June 2011

May and June in a Pretty Big Nutshell

A few last pictures from the quick trip to Houston. It was very gratifying that Kiera (age 2 1/2) is now old enough to remember us, and when she saw us at the airport she ran towards us shouting, "Grandpa!" and "Grandma!".
Kiera in the tutu and crown I gave her last year for her second birthday. She and I enjoyed some bonding time while her mom and dad spent a couple of days away. Kent's Mom and brothers Marty and Rob came to visit us the end of April. After church the first Sunday in May we went to the National Arboretum in Washington DC. They have an azalea trail, and the flowers were in bloom. Azaleas are one of my favorite flowers, and the pictures don't do justice to the many lovely colors of we saw. I hope Kent and I can go see the azaleas every year at the arboretum. Kent's mom has always loved flowers. I'm sure it's where Kent got his love of gardening. When we were first married if I wanted to know the name of a flower or plant, I would ask Kent's mom.



The columns below used to be around the US Capitol building, but were replaced in the 1950's.


We took a daytrip to Gettysburg, PA, which is less than a two-hour drive away with Kent's mom and brothers.

Unfortunately I didn't have Kent get into this picture with his family members.
This civil war re-enactor was available to answer questions.
I had my spring recital in May instead of June this year to accomodate a family who was going out of town. Below is one of the 15 invitations I made.
Kent and I played a duet of Billy Joel's "Piano Man", only we changed it to "Piano Teacher". I played the piano while Kent played the harmonica and sang words adapted to the names of my piano students.
We did a couple of cool things for Memorial Day. We went to the military cemetery in Fredericksburg, Virginia, to see the 15,000 luminaries again this year on the Saturday night of Memorial day weekend.


On Sunday after church we went to the Kennedy Center for a free Memorial Day concert being conducted by Craig Jessop, who formerly led the MoTab. The picture below is of the bridge between Arlington Cemetery and the Lincoln memorial. I took this picture as we walked across it because the bridge was blocked off so the "Rolling Thunder" motorcycle organization could have it's parade. We saw LOTS of motorcycles!
Inside the Kennedy Center with the US Army orchestra and a combined choir from across the country performing patriotic songs.


And now for the month of June, which started off with several Relief Society activities. I taught at class at our evening RS meeting on making organza flowers like those pictured below.
The theme of that activity was "Bloom Where You're Planted", so my counselor and I made 80 sugar cookie flowers with sticks in them. We made them into flower pots (ice cream cones filled with ice cream) and some Oreo crumb dirt. They were cute and yummy but didn't stand up very well.

I helped to prepare and serve a meal at a homeless shelter.
I hosted a "Welcome and Farewell" Garden party for the Relief Society sisters who were moving out and into our ward.
We bought a new light for the dining room, so I took the old one and spray painted it white. (With lots of help from Kent.) I added some bling and hung it below the deck during my garden party. Kent has the yard looking great.
I organized a Relief Society "Ladies Day Out" trip to the Library of Congress in DC.
Unfortunately only three of us went.
This is me with George Gershwin's piano.
The Library of Congress was built in the 1890's and is a beautiful building.
Our last outing of the month was to the overflow Smithsonian Air and Space Museum near Dulles airport. We were excited to see an authentic space shuttle, the "Enterprise."
The Enola Gay dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Can you see the reflection of me taking the picture?
It was hard to fit it into a picture, but that's a Concorde jet behind us.

4 comments:

Jason and Lissa said...

Keeping super-busy, as always! Glad you're having lots of fun experiences. Can't wait to see you guys soon!

Adri and Russ Lee said...

I love your piano recital invitations! So cute. You guys are always so busy! I'm glad you have dad to go do things with - he's probably a lot more of a willing participant than us kids, but when you die, you are going to know a LOT more about the world than any of the rest of us. (Not that I'm saying you might die soon....just thinking about the visiting teaching message this month)

PLANET HANSEN said...

Girlfriend...you ROCK! I'm very amazed at all you have accomplished in June! The pictures are awesome and the activities look like they went over really well!

The Mortensens said...

That is a big nutshell! There sure are a lot of neat things to see over there. I love your piano recital invitations. Very creative! It would have been fun to see a video of you and Kent doing your duet. It sounded like fun.