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Holy smokes, the girls have music coming out of their ears.  Or at least out of every bag and folder and their instrument cases.  Did Mark have this much music?  I don't think so. With the upgrade to new divisions, and with the girls getting such high seating, there is a heck-of-a-lot of music to learn!  This morning, I had a few moments, so I headed over to the practice hut with Glo.  As an intermediate, she has a mandatory practice hour.  She had three movements of a string quartet to learn, four pieces for orchestra, a new solo piece given to her by her teacher here, and all the regular violin technique exercises to practice.  Just sitting there, I felt stress, wondering how she was going to learn it all. And when I say "learn", I mean "learn".  Most of the kids here have played one or two of the pieces back at home because they have good quality orchestras in their schools, or they are enrolled in a youth community orchestra.  The kid...

I make no apologies for my adoration of Interlochen and my life at the moment.  I only wish all of you were here with me! The girls had their first day of rehearsal today.  Since it's Monday (technically a day off for the kids), they only had rehearsal for 3 hours in the morning, and the rest of the day was ours. Hannah and Anna were champs, getting up at 7 a.m. to go running. Rehearsals were a success, although Hannah doesn't like having to count 90 measures of rest in a John Williams' piece :-) Anna practicing with Hannah Glo loves her orchestra and the music they are playing. Lunch. Anna then spent an hour with Johannah, helping her rehearse her next set of audition excerpts.  Johannah has no desire to be put in the lower orchestra anytime soon. Afterwards, we were off for the day.  Our destination?  Sleeping Bear Dunes, voted "The Most Beautiful Place in America".  Seriously. We've been here for five years now and never visited the dunes. ...

There is a magic here at Interlochen that is indescribable to anyone who hasn't visited this place.  I must admit that I sometimes wondered if it was a unique feeling for our family, but this week I discovered that it's not just us. Anna is here with us.  I've been trying to get her to visit Interlochen for the past two summers, but it was only this summer that she had some time.  She's only here for five days, but she felt the "magic" the moment she stepped out of the car. If I had to describe the feeling, I would use the word beauty.   Physical beauty with the camp nestled between two lakes and sitting among the pines.  Musical beauty with the sounds of every instrument coming from every corner of the camp.  Youthful beauty because all that music is created by children.  I think I would be hard pressed to find another place like this in the world.  My idea of heaven is pretty close to what I experience here at Interlochen. For us this year,...

As we enter Michigan from Ohio (on our way to Interlochen), the sign at the border says "Welcome to Pure Michigan".  I miss the oldie, but goodie "Welcome to the Great Lakes State". About three hours up the mitten, I looked to the side of the car and saw this: Anna piped up and said, "That's why it's called "pure" Michigan".  She said she'd never seen skies like we have here. She's right--pure beauty.

For us, the year doesn't revolve around the calendar year, nor the tax year.  For our family, the year revolves around the summer, and specifically Interlochen. As soon as we leave Interlochen in August, we begin the countdown to the next summer.  Unbelievably, Interlochen is here again.  In fact, we leave in just two days. While there is quite a bit of stress and trepidation leading up to Interlochen (auditions are always on the mind), I look forward to the relief and relaxation we will all feel.  There is nothing inherently stressful about playing music all day long, and my kids love it.  In fact, we wouldn't know how to spend our summers otherwise.  We've spent so much time there over the past few years that I can literally feel how it feels to be there while still sitting at my computer in PA.  I can hear the sounds of the music, and the birds, and the water.  I  anticipate shedding several tears through amazing performances. Thi...

Everyone thinks I host Kennedy Kousin Kamp for the kids.  As much as I wish that was true, it's not.  I host Kennedy Kousin Kamp for me. As I was driving back to Albuquerque yesterday and was left alone with my thoughts up in the front of the cab, the sadness of it all coming to an end hit me. I host it because it makes me indescribably happy. I love the kids, and I love the time I get to spend with them.  I'm the ruling adult, and yet I have no need to rule.  I'm the token aunt, but I feel like a kid.  I get to check things off my bucket list that I never thought I would do. I've been wanting to take an RV trip for years.  I'm not sure how the thought ever entered my mind, or why I thought it would be fun, but obviously I couldn't get it all together before this.  Kennedy Kousin Kamp gave me the opportunity to live that dream.  And live it, we did!! White-water rafting?  I've seen the flyers in hotels my entire life.  Never di...

Today was a day that we did nothing, and yet we did everything. We were determined to finish the hilarious movie "RV", so we took breakfast over to the dining hall where they had a big screen TV.  Oh my gosh, that goes down as one of my favorites. We left Carlsbad at the last possible moment (11 a.m.) and headed back to Albuquerque.  We had initially planned on stopping by White Sands Sand Dunes, but the road there was skinny, headed through the mountains, and it was over 100 degrees.  The kids didn't seem too disappointed. It took us about 5 hours to get back, and the kids had a ball in the back of the RV.  There were serious games of poker taking place, and other games that involved cards and laughter.  I never would have thought that we could fit 7 people around that tiny RV table, but they did! We checked in quickly at the RV camp and headed out shopping.  There was one last store I wanted to hit, and turns out we probably should have started th...

Such a wonderfully busy day!  I don't know how to write about it all, so I'm just going to highlight the day. Add caption We woke up in the morning to one gosh-awful stench in our RV.  I figured it was because we hadn't actually used the toilet, so I grabbed the disinfectant pouch and flushed the toilet.  Not much help.  Mark, using his dog-sniffing skills (inherited from his father), discovered the shower was filled with backed-up, stink-filled water from our "grey tank".  In other words, all the water that we had used for the past four days had filled the tank.  The RV must send the overflow into the shower.  No problem if we hadn't filled the shower with all our extra sheets and towels !  What a mess! Although we tried to avoid it, the tanks had to be emptied.  Both the black tank and the grey tank.  Mark and Glo were CHAMPS, not flinching once even though we used the word "sewage" several times in 15 minutes. Swimming...

After the hot-air balloon reschedule, we were all ready to really get camp started.  This morning, we had white water rafting on the docket.  When my phone rang early in the morning, Rachel said, "Don't answer it!" assuming that they would be canceling also.  Thankfully, it was just John :-) Okay, I know the trip isn't about my driving experiences, but for me personally, this trip is all about my driving experiences.  Driving a 30 foot RV is an experience like no other.  It absolutely terrifies me.  Not because I think I can't do it, but because there is a $1,000 deductible on the insurance if I wreck anything! So, I was worried to drive into the heart of Santa Fe.  It's a smaller, artsy kind of town, and the streets aren't particularly wide.  The GPS said that is was only 20 minutes away, but I allowed 45 minutes, and lucky I did. So, the GPS is now inoperable.  The cigarette lighters on the RV are broken, so all directions are being h...

I am overwhelmed when I feel love.  I think many people in this world take it for granted, but not me.  My cup runneth over when I feel loved. This week, the kids and I (minus Ethan and John) are in Albuquerque, NM.  It's time for the annual Kennedy Kousin Kamp, sponsored in part by me.  It's for all Kennedy cousins, age 12 years old and up.  The parents pay for all expenses for the kids, but I have the enviable job of playing host. The PA Kennedys (us) flew in a day early for one reason, and one reason only:  to see my grandparents, Grandad and Vannette.  Gosh, I love those people.  They are the epitome of kindness. They took us out to Mark's favorite restaurant, The Olive Garden, because it was Mark's birthday.  Then, because Vannette couldn't find a carrot cake that didn't include raisins or nuts (Mark's favorite), she baked one herself.  As I told John, it was the best carrot cake I've ever had.  She even hand-decorate...

1.  Take an already busy doctor and install an EMR (Electronic Medical Record) in his office.  Kiss him goodnight at midnight as he begins to "preload" charts for future visits. 2.  Host a general authority of the church for our stake conference this weekend.  Receive a long "to do" list of jobs just five days before the conference. 3.  Feel stress because John is stressed.  Try to do his jobs around the house so that he doesn't have to worry about them. 4.  Have 16 puppies. 5.  Decide to build outside area for puppies.  Borrow backhoe from neighbor.  Watch John work long past the setting sun, and wake up before anyone else to dig. 6.  Use our own tractor to move the dirt.  Watch bucket malfunction, cut the fuel line and destroy the fuel pump.  Try to catch the leaking diesel fuel in a bucket. 7.  Catch cold last weekend.  Dread colds like a hemophiliac dreads a small cut.  Nurse fever, congestio...

When I was six, I began staying with my grandparents in Florida for the summer.  Literally, the day school ended, they were there in Lubbock to pick me up, and I returned back to Texas only a day, or two before school started up again in the fall.  Buck and Sylvia Caruthers were the parents of my step-father, but they could have been blood relatives for all I knew.  They treated me more like one of their own children than a grandchild.  In fact, as the years progressed, my school pictures took a fourth section of the portrait wall in their home, next to their three children.  I could make a never-ending list of all the things they gave me and taught me over the next ten summers.    The greatest gift they gave me was a love of music, and I think of them when I see my children continuing that tradition. Because they were newly retired from the Air Force when I began staying with them, they were both home during the day.  I was a picky eater which ...

This year, Hannah single-handedly planned another "Marvelous Music Formal Mixer".  The Music Formal was initially conceived when the musicians at the high school were gone to a music festival on prom.  It was so popular that it continued.  My kids like it because it's really just 300 of their closest musical friends (!), and Hannah invites only those people who DON'T have boyfriends/girlfriends.  Just friends, getting together, and having fun.  Last year, about 12 kids came.  This year?  Around 25!  I took over 250 photos, but here are a few of the best: What would a trip to the Kennedys be without a picture with the tractor??? Mark and "his" girl, Rebecca Price.  At least, he hopes SHE sees it that way.... This was the kids' idea:  TRACTOR WARS!!! And of course, the old car.  We keep it for no other reason than it's good in pictures. One of my favorite pictures of the evening. The kids LOVED this!  Galo...