Tuesday, July 15, 2014

Bastille Day in NH with Lisa & Dan - Start to Finish!

Our Bastille Day began with Life Cereal and "friends" at breakfast.

Then, Storyhour at the New Boston Library.  Even Thomas attended!  He even lead the gang in "Freres Jacques"!

A little pause.

A little Nature Trail walk, with our friends the deerflies.

Back at the ranch, time to cool off and play in the pool!




Reading a book to Anna's old bear.

Next up:  18 holes of mini-golf!  I hadn't played in 25 years or so.  VERY fun!


Lots of strategy discussions!

How to teach a left-handed 5-yr-old how to swing a putter.  This was a constant challenge.

This hole was called "Mine Shaft".

The afternoon wrapped up with some Go-Karting.  I had never done this!

Thomas and Léna had a fast kart!


Meanwhile, the M & M "Dud" car tried it's best to catch up, to no avail.

We had fun none the less!



The evening ended with a nice concert, complete with a beautiful music stand courtesy of Dan's mom!  Thanks Elaine!
We may not have been singing "La Marseillaise" all day, but we certainly celebrated with a lot of fun!

Monday, July 14, 2014

Summer Saturday - July 12th - Craftsbury & Shadow



 Thomas arrived safely into America on Friday after Jeanne got him over the border.  Saturday we went to Craftsbury to the Antiques & Uniques show and had a great day!
 Estelle picked out a handmade hula hoop to keep in Glover as an early birthday present.   She has one down in Richmond, now she has one in Glover too.   It's the big blue one in this photo. 
 Estelle shows her hula hoop prowess.  This was good marketing for the lady selling them!
 The girls were delighted to see this face painting booth run by Donna Bousquet who used to work with Joanie years ago.  They remembered her from the Irasburg town fair from last year, and she remembered them!
 Estelle notes The Vermont Switchel Company on the list of vendors!
 We ran into family and friends.  Here we are with Tyler.
 A well-deserved creemee on our way out of town at the Craftsbury Store.

 Then, off to heaven on earth:  our dock on Shadow.



 This boat going by held a famous hockey player by the last name of "Mink" and Wesley recognized him so here they are having a boat-to-dock chat.
 Mary and Jacob kayaked over from their rental chalet at Danforth Cove.

 That night Mom, Cedric & I went to the Shadow Lake Association annual dinner & meeting in Glover.  Everyone sat at our table kept saying "Now, WHERE exactly do you all have a place on the lake?"  I thought, you can keep your big fancy camps, we've got the sweetest spot there is.

Friday, July 11, 2014

14 days of fun: First 2 weeks in Vermont

Léna and Baby Grant at Crystal Lake

Fun on the tractor



First morning in Vermont:  Lillian visits on her way out of the country




Fourth of July in Barton




Many great moments during Maura & Chris' visit!  We love our "big" cousins!


Story Hour @ the Glover Library

With 2nd cousin, Jayden


The New Porch!  Yes!

Sunday, June 22, 2014

Video of Chorale Concert

Click HERE to see/hear the video of Estelle singing June 14th.

Click HERE for a 2nd video of another song in this concert.

These songs were sung all strung together, and we didn't have a program to know the order of the songs - thus I had to scramble to get my video going each time, which is why the "start" of each song is missing!

Friday, June 20, 2014

Chorale Concert @ La Gaude

Saturday, Estelle had her big "concert coeur" in a village outside of Nice.  It was stupendous!
 In the photo above, the boy in front of Estelle is the son of her choir director.  He also happens to be an oboist.
 The whole thing was pretty impressive!  14 songs, all with a nautical/sailor theme. 

 That man on the violin is Estelle's "solfege" teacher - Music Theory.  He's a trombone teacher - but apparently also a violinist.  Who knew?
It was a delightful afternoon.  Some of the moms were teary-eyed listening to the kids!


Estelle with her buddies Anaïs and Charlotte, our carpool pal.  They were pretty happy that day.  It was fun to sing in that gorgeous church in a perched village.

Thursday, June 19, 2014

Thank you Mr. Richard

Estelle left her nice digital camera on a bus during a field trip last week.  The bus driver from the charter company turned it in and the company mailed it to the school.  Estelle made a thank you.

Saturday, June 07, 2014

Oboe

 On May 26th, Estelle had her first "real" oboe recital at the Conservatory.  She played a piece called "Banana Tango", which she practiced in her lessons with her professor, Charlotte (whom you see in the video). 
Estelle also practiced at home, almost every day.  2 days before the recital, she got to go to the Conservatory on a Saturday and play with the accompanist on the piano.  He gave me a photocopy of the music to play so I could help Estelle practice. It was a challenge for me - it was hard to play!  He makes it look easy!  :-)
We were VERY proud of Estelle because Charlotte says Banana Tango is not an easy piece to play for someone who just started the oboe 9 months ago.
Estelle says "J'ai raté", which means "I made a mistake", but we told her mistakes are o-kay!