Thanksgiving week

What a great Thanksgiving week Steve and I had!  We left on Saturday, the 17^th, to fly to Syracuse, New York, to visit Elise.  Here is a run-down of our week: 

Saturday – arrived, checked in to hotel, ate dinner at Cracker Barre.  Not a very original choice but it gave us a chance to meet some of Elise's co-workers.  

Sunday – church with Elise.  She has a great ward.   

Here we are in the parking lot of the meetinghouse.

After lunch and a nap, we took a walking tour of Syracuse University campus.   Assorted photos below.....

 

 

 

 

After dinner, we watched “Family Man”( Steve’s November movie-to-watch)

Monday- Steve and I rented a car and drove to Cooperstown and visited the Baseball Hall of Fame.  Although it was Steve’s third visit, it was my first time to actually go INSIDE the hall of fame.  First visit, in 1999, we were on a tight budget so I opted to stay with kids who were not that excited to go inside (I think it was Kirsti, Sarah, and Emily).  Second visit, in 2010, we had two dogs that were not allowed so I offered to stay with them while the rest of the family went inside.  It was nice to finally go in.  While many of the displays had not the meaning for me that they did for Steve, I still found many things to enjoy and admire.   I loved the actual hall with all the inductees.

 

 

 Steve, a happy man (although blurry - oops)

Tuesday – Elise took the day off and we three spent the day at Niagara Falls and Palmyra.  Niagara Falls was simply breathtaking.  I just couldn’t stop taking photos.  

 

 

  In Palmrya, we visited sites where we had not previously not gone:  the E.B. Grandin print shop where the Book of Mormon was first published, 

 

 Here I am learning to fold a printed page as it would have looked before being bound. Pretty cool.

We toured inside the two homes that the Smith family lived, (below is the first one they built)

 

  and we saw the Martin Harris home.  We ended our visit with a session at the temple.

Wednesday – While Elise worked, Steve and I puttered around her apartment doing some small chores (shades of what my mom and dad did when they came to visit us).  We watched "Home Alone" that night. Elise has the cutest apartment on the second floor of this house.  Her door is the one on the right....

 

  It is just one of hundreds of similar-looking houses surrounding the Syracuse campus.  She has lots of windows, hardwood floors, a working fireplace (!), three bedrooms that she and her roommate, Alison, share, two balconies, and a modern kitchen with tons of storage cabinets. 

Thursday – Turkey Day!  Elise had to work – of course – so during her shift from 8:20 – 2:30 (which stretched out to 3:30), Steve and I watched the Macy’s Parade and the Purina Dog Show while baking a gluten-free pecan pie, the turkey, and making cranberry sauce and Waldorf salad.  Once Elise got off, we made the mashed potatoes and gravy.  Simple and delicious – probably the most relaxed Thanksgiving dinner I have had in recent memory!  

 

  We watched “White Christmas” that evening.

Friday – Elise worked again and Steve and I watched my Netflix selection “Mr. Blanding Builds His Dream House” (a classic featuring Cary Grant and Myrna Loy).  When we picked up Elise, there was just time to eat dinner (yummy leftovers) and visit an amazing mall near the Amtrak station and then it was 9:30 and time to board our overnight train to Chicago.  We did not choose to pay the ridiculous price for a sleeper car so we got to spend our night in a “cold, drafty club car” (see “White Christmas”) but, thankfully, it was not cold nor drafty – just not our bed so sleep was not the best.  But, we knew that coming in.  Overall, though, the train travel was great.  Leg room is soooo much better than on a plane.  We would do it again but, next time around, I will bring a sleep mask to block out the light.  And, I will have more pillows.  I was just grateful for my book, Ender's Shadow, to help me through my sleeplessness. 

Saturday – We got to Chicago around 9:30 a.m., 

 

 

 We hung around Union Station, mostly in the Great Hall, which was decorated beautifully for Christmas.  Above is Steve catching a quick nap.  At 1:45, we boarded the train to St. Louis and we were picked up by Joe and the grandkids at 8:00.  We finally pulled into our Columbia garage at 10:45 p.m. 

Sunday – I turned 57 today.  And had a great day:  relaxed morning, church from 1-4:00, dinner at 6:00, lots of great gifts and phone calls.  Here I am with my pumpkin cheesecake.  Mmmmmm.

 

Try, try again

It has been a trying week – literally!  On both Monday and Thursday nights, the annual Try-Me-Out night (only now they are called Instrument Exploration Night) occurred at Lange and Smithton Middle Schools.  I manned the string bass station and for over two hours at Lange and over three at Smithton, it was “What is your name?”  “Do you play an instrument now?” “Do you have a vehicle that can transport a bass?”  all the while keeping at least one hand on the scroll of the bass at all times since most of the kiddos at that age are quite small and the bass is HUGE in comparison.  My left arm is still sore! And I have one more to do tomorrow night at Gentry Middle School.......

Our patience was also tried this week on Wednesday when the truck had a flat tire – REALLY flat (no fix-a-flat, unfortunately, was going to work here).  Usually this is not a problem but the Volvo was in the shop for new brakes (front and rear – ugh) so I really needed the truck to get to all my schools.  And, when we took the spare tire off, it was too BIG!  Whaaat, you ask?  Well, the original tires way back in 2004 were all actually bigger.  When it came time to replace them, we were able to go with a slightly smaller tire for less money so that is what we did.  And, have done ever since.  And, I guess we have never needed to use the spare all these years!  That is pretty amazing, actually.  Anyway, thankfully, Sarah had just pulled up to go on a bike ride on the trails nearby so I was able to use her car to get to CIS.  And, she could drop me off and pick up me from Lange while shopping at Aldi in between for the YSA Regional conference held this weekend.   Steven was able to take me to pick up the Volvo later in the afternoon.  And, Steve was able to take the spare tire in the trunk of the Volvo to Wal-Mart that evening to get a smaller one put on.  So, 24 hours later, we had both vehicles up and running again.  Whew!

Tuesday, election day, the public school kids had a day off but the teachers did not – boo.  However, I spent a very productive couple of hours with the Performing Arts faculty planning for next school year (that is all we seem to be doing this year –plan for 2013-14 – reason being, we are opening up high school #3 and changing from 10-12 high school to the more normal 9-12 model.   So, there really IS lots of planning and preparing that needs to be done.  In fact, the Try-Me-Out  a.k.a. Instrument Exploration Night events usually happen in the early spring but they were bumped up to now so we can get an earlier picture of enrollment to know how many more music teachers will need to be hired.)  Well, after that LONG explanation, I have to post a hilarious photo we had taken during our faculty meeting.  I am not sure where it will ultimately end up but the goal was to depict our specific areas of expertise.  

 

It is hilarious that I have a violin! But the cellos were all locked up in lockers and no one had the master key.   The back row ( left to right)  is Mike -  choir, Mary Margaret - drama, Dee – theater tech.  Front Row is Katrina – music secretary, me, Steve – band.  The other band teacher is going to the new high school next year so they will have to hire a new assistant.  And, probably a second choir teacher, too.  I hope to have two orchestras – one open to everyone and one that is by audition only.

I had my fall studio recital Friday night.  Here are the participants (minus the six students who could not come).

 

Some brief updates:  I am not sure whether I reported that we can now park both vehicles in the garage for the first time in about two years.  Woo hoo.  We had stake conference all last weekend.  It was really good from beginning to end.  The YSA conference has been this weekend and we have put up guys to sleep the last two nights – seven on Friday and five last night.  Trissy continues to escape from the back yard.  We are now looking at having to tie her up every time she is let out.  I watched TWO DVDs last week – “Snow White and The Huntsman” and “Elizabeth the Golden Age”.  And, I got to work in the yard Saturday morning.  Wow, getting to live a bit of my “old” life for a brief bit.

Here is what our maple tree looked like two days ago.  

 

Here is what it looks like today after two days of wind.

  

Finally, look at this angel wing begonia that I have had for many years (at least seven).  It has bloomed for the first time!