Moonrise

This picture doesn't do justice to the beautiful sight that I saw on my way home from church tonight. I left a little early, so it was still light outside, but it had also just started raining. As I was driving over the mountain, I was greeted by the most beautiful sky. It was a little like this picture with black stormclouds drifting by and white, puffy clouds lit up by the sun as it was going down. The sky was pink on the horizon and faded into blue as it went up - and peeking thru the stormclouds was a shadow of the moon as it was beginning to rise. It was just so pretty... then as I turned the corner, I looked up over the mountains near my house, and there were more storm clouds. But right in the middle of the clouds there was an opening that looked like the mouth of a cave and sunlight was shining out from the mouth of the 'cave' in these stunning rays of light. It was just breathtaking! Well, I hurried home because I thought I might be able to grab a camera and catch one of these sights before they were gone. I suppose you can guess that I just missed out on that opportunity! :( But I wanted to write about it anyway because I was just so impressed with God's handiwork tonight. :) I'm thinking that maybe He did all that tonight in celebration of Mackenzie's 17th Birthday. ;-) Or maybe He just wanted to make me smile. :)

Speaking of Mackenzie, please refer to my last post for all the bragging about how wonderful she is, but I just wanted to post this on her actual birthday...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my beautiful, way-too-grown-up daughter! :)

Mackenzie

The last week of school has finally arrived and I am close to becoming the parent of a senior in high school - wow, how did we get here so fast? It's hitting me today because, aside from exams, which Mackenzie is mostly done with already, today is her last 'full' day of school. She's very excited about that, and so am I... really, I'm so done with school for this year! ;-) ...but I'm also in that nostalgic, melancholy mood that doesn't want my baby to grow up yet. sigh.

So I just thought I'd spend a little time on her today and share one of the songs from Huntsville High's spring concert. (yes, I managed to get to the concert with a fully charged video camera this time! ha) She'll probably hate me for all the 'close-ups' of her, but what can I say? I'm her mother, it's what mothers do... ha. She also had her band awards banquet last Friday night and was one of only 3 students who made the Alabama All-State band from HHS this year, as well as making the UAH Honor Wind Ensemble this last fall. She's looking forward to being the Senior Section leader for the Flutes this next year in band. I enjoy seeing her use her talents and putting in the extra work to be a leader in the band. It brings back some good memories of my band days in high school, though she has far surpassed my abilities, that's for sure! ;-)

Hope you enjoy the song!

The Week in Review

It's been a busy week around here and I feel very behind in my blogging - so I'm going to do a quick catch-up (ketchup?) on things:

We started off last Tuesday with both the girls being inducted into the National Honor Society. I'm very proud of both of them. They work hard to stay on top of their schoolwork while at the same time keeping very busy schedules outside of school. And while this is an academic honor, the "CSLS" on the logo stands for Character, Scholarship, Leadership, and Service... and those elements are all a part of being inducted into the NHS as well.

You know, you would think that I would have remembered to bring a camera with me - especially to Mackenzie's ceremony Tuesday night, since I had just forgotten to bring it that morning to Anna's.... but noooooooo.... I forgot both times - so I'm sharing this lovely logo instead. :)

Wednesday night was the Hampton Cove Middle School Band Spring Concert. This was Anna's night to perform with the Symphonic Band and was a busy night for me since I was the Band Parents Association President this last year. It was the first time to perform our concert at Huntsville High School and it was great! So much better to be there than in the cafeteria at the middle school! But the bands all played great and everything went really well. This time, I actually remembered my video camera, but I got there only to realize that the camera was dead! :( Hopefully someone else out there did better than me and can share some pictures and videos with me!

Saturday we traveled up to Nashville for Courtney's graduation. It was wonderful to see her reach this milestone and to share that time with her family and friends. I can't wait to have her back here this summer as an intern! :)

Congratulations Courtney!!

I don't think it would be that much of a stretch to think Courtney really IS Anna and Mackenzie's older sister! :)

Last but not least, we had a really yummy Mother's Day dinner over at my mom and dad's yesterday after church. I got the new TobyMac CD from my girls (yay!) and a sweet card from Mackenzie and Anna made me a cake. :) I was much more aware yesterday of how fortunate I am to still have my mom here and to be able to share Mother's Day together with her - I'm grateful for that. And my mom and I had a nice moment yesterday where that realization kicked in that none of us is perfect, but the important thing is that we believe the best about each other and that's a blessing. :)

Although I'm still wondering how it is that none of us girls seemed to have gotten any of my mom's genes when it comes to how tall we are! (no fair) Well.... maybe Anna still has a chance.... we'll give her a couple more years before we lock in her height. ha

So this week we have another Band Concert still ahead - Mackenzie's is on Thursday night. Then a gymnastics banquet this Saturday. Lynn's coming to visit next week - and then all the high school graduations start. Good times - but I am about ready for the change-up that the summer schedule will bring. :)