End of School Piano Recital

  

 The end of the school year means another piano recital.  This year's color scheme was black, white and aqua.

 It's always fun for me to get out my piano/music themed decorations to put up in the cultural hall.

 I borrowed all the black and white damask tablecloths and table runners from someone who had used them at a wedding reception.

As usual, I played lots of duets with the students, plus played a solo number. Gabe and I are playing a fun "Chopsticks" duet in the photo below.

In December 2013 I put up power poing slides with pictures representing the song the student was playing.  For this recital I took it one step further, and included not only the name of the song and a picture to represent it, but pictures of the students from previous recitals.

Through the years I've had many siblings or parent with siblings play trios, but for the first time I tried three brothers playing a trio. They stayed together for about the first three measures, and then they all just played their parts and made no attempt to listen to each other and stay together. It will probably be the LAST time I have three brothers play a trio!!

A neighbor gave me a cute wonky piano with piano key spreaders. I was excited to use it for the first time for the pepper jelly and cream cheese spread I put on my keyboard serving plate. I love it.

Here's my good-looking group of students. Another successful piano recital under my belt; that's always a good feeling!

Minneapolis and Minot in the Same Weekend

On May 1st Kent and I flew out together from Washington, DC to visit the kids. We had a layover in Minneapolis, which was my final destination. I got out to spend a day with Adri's family while Kent continued on to Minot to spend an extra day with Garrett's family.

While in Minneapolis, Adri, Russ and Sophia took me to some of the tourist spots in the city which they hadn't been to yet. One was the waterfall in the photo below. It was at a park right in the middle of the city. 

Next we went to a museum inside the old General Mills flour mills.

 This was the inside, and Sophia just looked so cute I had to take her picture.

 This was the view of Minneapolis from the top of the museum.

 This picture was taken outside on the roof of the museum, with the Gold Medal flour sign in the background.

 The next day we loaded up and drove the eight hours to Minot, North Dakota. Sophia and I sat in the backseat together and had some good grandma bonding time.

While we were in Minot, Kent celebrated his birthday. It's always more fun to celebrate birthdays with some family around!

 The following photos are candids taken while we were in Minot.

 Some good-looking fellas in their white shirts and ties.

 Trying to get Adam to smile at me.

The reason we had all gathered on this first weekend in May was for Adam's blessing.  Since it was stake conference weekend, we blessed him at home.

Krystal's parents and one brother were able to come too.

 Here's sweet baby Adam in the blessing outfit made by his mommy, Krystal, on the baby blanket made for him by great-grandma Christensen and grandma Carson.(me.)

 This is the best picture of the three siblings in their brother and sister shirts we were able to get.

 This winter wonderland is what it looked like on Sunday evening, May 4th. Gotta give that crazy Minot winter credit for it's last gasp. At least it didn't stay for long and we were able to leave the next day without any trouble.

Another successful, but whirlwind, family trip where we packed lots in to a few days!!