A wonderful day of music!

We started the day out with the girls participating in a small musical/narrative program at church during the service. They all did really well, and people kept coming up to us and them after the service and Sunday School and telling us how well they thought they did. Our girls were the ones to sing the best and loudest and really helped carry the whole musical parts of the program. It's not terribly surprising since they are singing constantly at home.
And then, finally it was the big day for the Michael Card The Promise program we have been practicing several months for. It is a joy to not only listen to Michael Card sing his songs, but to hear things about the songs- the scripture they are based on and some of the other inspirations he used for the lyrics, etc.- it gives them even more meaning. It went well, and was very enjoyable. I played all but the last oboe solo and got through them without making a mistake :) I had a couple of minor flubs- missing an accidental or something like that, but they were all it places that I hope they weren't too noticeable since there was a microphone sitting right in between us oboe players. Monica, the first oboe/english horn player was very nice.

Kathleen and Skip were sitting with our kids during the concert, and I brought my camera (of course!!) and gave it to Kat to take pics with during the concert for me. Since she is a scrapbooker too she knows how to get good pics! She even went up to the balcony at the beginning of the concert to get a better angle on the pics since they couldn't see a lot where they were seated. thanks Kat! So, here is a picture of most of the stage during a song when Michael C is doing a song by himself. I've pointed out Mark, myself and my mom with the red arrows (arrow brushes by Jessica Bolton).

and since you can only see half of my mom's face in the picture above, here is a better one:

Michael C brings new singers along with him on his tours. This tour he was with Jason Gray. We very much enjoyed the three songs he performed, and picked up his new CD at the end of the show. Michael C introduced us to Wes King's music over 10 years ago when we saw him in concert in Pennsylvania.
and Kat took my picture with my oboe during the intermission of the performance. I came over to the side of the stage to wave hello to the kids.
and after the show was over we took the opportunity to go say hello to Michael C and tell him how much we have appreciated his music and teaching through it over the years. And of course I got my mom to take a picture for us. Michael said his wife is a scrapbooker, so I will have to send them a copy of whatever page I happen to get done!
and we had Kathleen also take photos of us all together. I have two shots with some minor small children problems- this one is a bit better than the other. One of the new features of PSE6 is a function to easily take photos like these and combine the best faces into one photo. I will have to give it a try after I get the new version at Christmas and see how well it really does ;)
and a couple more pics of Mark and I together. I don't think Mark has had a tux on since our wedding, so we figured we had better take advantage of the opportunity!


Well, that's it for tonight. The kids have 4 more days of school before break starts, so I have to get up in the morning. The fourth graders get to start building their gingerbread village tomorrow, and the twins are very excited about that.