Band Concert / String concert
So after a great deal of practice and preparation, Waterford presented their first band concert and strings concert of the new school year. We have a new band teacher this year — a young guy from BYU that seems to be doing much better with the students than the old teacher. The concert was great and both Elliot and Clark did a good job. One of the best parts of the concert was hearing Clark as the jazz pianist in the middle school jazz band.
Madeleine along with the upper school string orchestra was very excited to play some of the music from Pirates of the Carribean — World's End. Their conductor, Kathy Morris, asked Elliot to come and play percussion for them and it was a great opportunity for him — he played the major snare drum part that is the important part of the piece. The kids always love playing movie music!
Pneumonia
So this month it was my turn to have Pneumonia. Good grief, it takes a lot of out of you and takes a long time to recover from. At this time of Thanksgiving, I am grateful to live in the day of good doctors, antibiotics, and cough medicine with narcotics and I am equally grateful to have been cough syrup free for a whole week now!
This year it was the Morgan Family's turn to be together for Thanksgiving Day. Everyone came to our house and by everyone I mean 17 children and 15 adults. It was quite a crowd! We fed the kids first on paper plates in the kitchen and then they all went downstairs to watch a movie with treat bags. We have done this several times now and it seems to work well. With them all in the basement mesmerized by a new movie, the adults actually get about an hour to sit down and enjoy a nice Thanksgiving dinner together. Then we spent the rest of the afternoon visiting and letting the cousins play. It was actually warm enough outside that some of the kids went out to jump on the trampoline. Of course we missed my brother Matt and his cute family, but look forward to having them with us next time!
Elder Brown and the College Kids
Phillip our missionary is doing well and is looking forward to spending a Christmas in Spain. Apparently they do not really observe Thanksgiving there, but he and his companion did have a baptism that weekend which is always a day of Thanksgiving for any missionary!
Loren and Tess were able to come home from BYU for Thanksgiving weekend and it was great to have them here. We had fun watching movies, cooking and eating together, going to the temple together and putting Christmas up. It was hard to let them go again (and they really didn't want to go back and face finals), but if they can hang in there until the end of the semester, they will get to have a nice two week break knowing it is all behind them!