Mom's Senior Recital

After my parents became empty-nesters, my mom decided to use the extra time to return to college and pursue a degree in organ performance.  She has practiced the organ 2-3 hours a day for the past 5 years, and she's finally ready to graduate (summa cum laude!).  I flew to Philly last weekend for my mom's senior organ recital.  (My 3 boys stayed at home for male bonding time-- more on that later.)

We kicked off the weekend with presents and cake for dad's birthday.

("Hey Quin, you made me a Lego space shuttle!  It's perfect!  Exactly what I wanted.")

That hat my dad is wearing was another birthday present.  Suh-weet!

A bunch of our Neuenswander cousins drove over from Ohio for the big weekend.  That's Tara (my big sis), Kira, and Heidi.  

Each of the 6 candles on my dad's cake represented 10.5 years of life. 

1 treadmill

5 cousins who need to work out at the same time

No problem

C'mon, synchronize boys!  Left! Right! Left! Right!

Those jokers also put state trooper signs all around the house.  They kept trying to give us speeding tickets!

I got triple-teamed in foozball.  (The sign that the boys made for the football table said "Spin Limit: 5")

 That's Zaya, Caleb, and Alistair pictured above.

My best bud Joy took a train up from Richmond for the occasion.  (That's Elise, Joy, me, and Tara.)  It was so great to catch up with Joy.  Phone calls and emails are nice, but real live person is much better.  

Here is some of the cheering squad a few minutes before my mom's organ concert started.  About 95 of my mom's friends and family came for the big show.  She could have gotten a lot more if she had advertised better, but we didn't feel like renting the Astrodome, and my mom didn't tell many people because she didn't want them to feel obligated to come.  (But still, it was a pretty large group for her minimal advertising.)  

There she is!  (Not Dianne Sawyer, my mom.)

This is a 2-minute clip of what she sounded like during the concert.   (This particular song is the Bach "St. Anne's" Fugue.) It was very impressive!  Her footwork around 1 minute into this video proves that you have to be an excellent multi-tasker to become an organist.  My mom had a very technically difficult program, but she did fabulous.  She played 6 pieces, and the concert lasted an hour.

My dad got up at the end of the performance to give my mom flowers (it's always 12 yellow roses + 1 red rose for some reason), and to make a little speech.   

My dad's speech was very funny, as usual.

Then all 95 guests drove to our house for dinner.

We actually hired caterers for the event.  They were ready to go as soon as we arrived home, with hot delicious food, and everyone wearing crisp tuxedos.  We felt like we were in Downton Abbey.  

Mmm boy.  I'm going to hire caterers more often.  The best part was the cleanup afterwards, which was non-existent (for us).  

I spent a lot of time staring at this table. 

You know the party is hosted by mormons when there's a hot chocolate bar.

My parents put up a big tent outside to accommodate everyone for dinner.  Here I am with my cousins Matthew, Kim, Heidi, me, and Kira

   

It was such a great weekend in Philly, and it was inspiring and exciting to be there for my mom's concert.  But I missed my 3 boys terribly!  They made some signs of their own for when I arrived home on Sunday night.  

Congratulations Mom!