w. I’m always amazed at how fast time goes by. I’ll try to catch up the last couple of weeks really quickly. Um……(trying to remember where I left off)…. Oh! So kendall didn’t make it back that night I had hoped he would. There was a big storm and he had to take a later flight. My parents did come to my college choir concert. They are amazing!!! I love them so much. We hung out at Al’s afterwards for a while and then they had to leave.:( I had to stay at school because we were supposed to sing with the Syracuse Symphony and have a rehearsal with them earlier in the day. We found out the next morning that it was canceled, due to the weather. So I ended up going with Michael to a ‘Mercy Seat’ get together to talk about worship. It was really interesting and good! We then went on another date which was wonderful and then headed back to our dorms. We ended up going up to my room and Sydney, Priscilla, and I worked on some Theory homework. After we finished that we played some games and watched a movie. It was pretty nice! That Sunday Mike and I got to read and pray together after lunch and then my parents picked us up to go to Buffalo to get Kendall! T’was a wonderful afternoon. It was so great to see Kendall!!!! We met up with Uncle Eddie and Aunt Carol and had dinner together, after taking Selah to Petland to hang out. We couldn’t stay for very long because I had a rehearsal I had to be back at for Rob’s recital. When we were almost back to school it hit me……I had been planning for a while to go skiing with Mike and Kendall (since he’d be home on break). Well…..it then clicked that I was also singing in Rob’s Composition recital at the same time!! *sigh* That was a major bummer. I felt really bad especially when I know my parents had been planning on me coming. It was awful that I totally forgot… The next day Kendall and Tim came to pick up Michael to go boarding with them. I was bummed but I knew they would all have a blast together. I was also happy for them. Rob’s recital went very well. He is an amazing composer and his beautiful melodies were stuck in my head for so long!! :P I got some work done while waiting for my family and mike to come back. They didn’t get back till after midnight. So I got to go say hi to them and then mike and I hung out by the fire for a little bit before going back to the dorm. On Tuesday evening we all came to Buffalo to see the Montery Jazz Festival. (They were playing at UB!) It was very awesome. Most of our jazz band came. Tristan drove one van and Michael, the other. It was also my uncle’s birthday! So I ran to get a few balloons really quick from the campus store and while James was filling the balloon up it popped! Hahahha…oh man it was so funny! All the weird gunk that you put in the balloon to make it last longer went into Elaine’s (the other employer’s) hair! Mannnnn……. Yeah, anyway….the concert was great! Nate D. came too! Whoo hoo! It was very good to see him! Kendall and I laughed a lot during the concert, which was very fun. The singer was great, but she did the funniest hand movements while she sang! :P After the concert, some of us were hungry. Most of the kids from the band went back to school. It ended up just being my family, Mike, Nate, Steve, Darius, and Walker that went out for some food. We arrived back at school pretty late, but Michael did a fantastic job driving back. J On Wednesday we had a “H.E.L.P” day where the students had meetings with advisors and could go to different seminars….etc that was happening. I got to pray during chapel, and then I had to rush off to a meeting with Prof. Ro. That went pretty well since I had a good idea of all I was taking next semester. I came back out through the chapel and as I was walking by, I realized that Mike left his computer on in the chapel. Sooooooooo….I went and changed his background on his computer. ;P The rest of the day was kinda rough. I had received an e-mail earlier that morning from my French Horn player for my brass quintet say that she couldn’t do our recital anymore. (It was happening the next day.) So I had to e-mail all the French Horn players (which there really aren’t that many) and see if I could find one that would come and rehearse and then play the next morning. Kristen agreed to do it! Soooo we finally set up a rehearsal time and I show up and you won’t believe this. I transcribed all their parts back wrong. L *sigh* That was frustrating. And then my computer wasn’t really working to fix it. It was rough. Tristan helped and we got through it. I was just really frustrated with myself for messing it all up. L Later on I went to Kirstie’s and Nicole’s recital and then met up with Michael. J What an incredible man…… The next morning was pretty busy. I had an Aural skills test right before our composition recital. I had 2 of my pieces being performed and neither of them felt really ready. L Right as I was walking down the stairs to the recital hall I saw my mom (who was playing my flute piece) and then I looked over and Mr. and Mrs. Humphrey walked right in the door, along with Michael—having a huge grin on his face with his wonderful surprise! I was shocked. I couldn’t believe they came!! J oh I love them! Kendall also made it to half of it. Right after the recital I had a few classes right in a row, so I couldn’t hang out with all those wonderful people that came. L That was sad. Later on we had Mercy Seat, which was wonderful. I have missed it for the past month I was sick or away. It was really good. Kendall spent the night with Mike, so he came to some of it as well! Friday was a pretty normal day…same classes. Mom and Dad came around 6:30 so we could rehearse a little with Jesse. We played at Java as a family again, so that was super fun. It had been a while since we last played all together since Kendall’s been down South. Mike was leading worship again that night, so he could only make the beginning of it. I missed leading worship with him. He came back though right after we finished and we hung out and had some pizza before mom, dad, and kendall had to leave. Again, I had to stay at school because of opera rehearsal the next morning. Opera rehearsal started at 9 and was supposed to go till 6pm. He let some of us go around one, but I had to be back a little after 5. At the last minute, Mr.Humphrey came and picked Michael and I up to take us to this pancake house in the middle of nowhere! I think it’s called the “Maple Tree Inn.” It’s been there since like, the 60’s and people come from all over the world to visit! Haha…I thought it was pretty amazing. Also, they are only open 3 months of the year! It was so good to get away from school and hang out with mike and his daddy. I love them. J So we got back to school right before my next rehearsal. I did something I totally didn’t want to do during that rehearsal. Haha…..it’s actually funny when I think about it, but I was so frustrated. After that was done my daddy came and picked me up so I could go home and hang out with Kendall for his last night home before going back to school. We had to do some errands with him and then had a late dinner. Jeremy came over and hung out for a while. And then we just all sat in the living room and talked and laughed. It was wonderful. I was pretty exhausted from the whole week. Kendall wanted me to watch this movie with him, and I tried so hard to wake up, but it didn’t work. I never did make it to bed that night. We had to leave before 6am the next morning to make it to Kendall’s flight. Haha…..well we um….were a little late for the check in, so he missed his flight, but the next one was at 11 am, so it wasn’t too bad of a wait. My uncle met up with us and we had breakfast together! J When I got back home I worked on my string quartet for the rest of the day and then we headed back to school later that evening. ….yeah talk about being on the “go” all the time!...:) I’m having a hard time remembering how last week went. Oh yeah….well on Monday I got to conduct the sym. Winds band on their Back chorale warm up. Haha. That wasn’t bad (it could’ve been better on some of my fermatas….but I’ll work on it.) um….oh yeah, I went to a few recitals. I went to Nathan’s and Celeste’s and then Mike was done teaching his Geology lab, so he came and we watched Maggie’s from the sound room. I can’t remember what happened last Tuesday. I think I got a lot of sleep that night so I had more energy that day, and opera rehearsal went better. I had all the normal classes: Aural skills, percussion, college choir, opera and jazz. OHH. Ha. Yeah. I remember Tuesday night. I had one of my many “embarrassing” moments that night. (except one of the coolest teachers was involved.) haha…oh man…..It was pretty funny. Wednesday morning consisted of doing a lot of math at 8am during our theory class. We’ve been doing things with the interval class vector..etc and it’s really fun, but took me a while at 8am. Oh I remember not sleep much that night. I think I got maybe 3 hrs of sleep. I was staying up writing a paper for my Inst. Conducting class and then I woke up early to go practice for my piano lesson. That was a long day. I was pretty exhausted the whole day. We went to Pete’s recital later that night, and then we had a meeting with Sean for “SPARK.” It was at his room up at Shen, and I was barely awake for any of it. Haha. I think I was out as soon as I hit my pillow that night. I was so out in dreamland that I missed my morning class. (woops!) I made it to college choir and then had percussion after lunch. Thennnnn I was freeee! Although I had to do a lot of errands around campus and get all my music listening cds for our exam after break. After dinner we packed and then I went to help Michael with his drums. He has LOTS of them and he’s going to sell all of them except for his very unique set that he’s keeping. Hahaha…..I’ll have to take a picture once all the parts come in. My parents came to pick us up around 11:30ish I think. Priscilla and Wislene came home with me. As we were packing up our car, Mike’s dad pulled up behind us and we went over to help them pack up. It was really hard to leave……...it’s amazing how hard it is to be apart from Michael. He called me around 2 or 3 that morning and we both really missed each other…. *sigh* Prisiclla and I watched a movie and I didn’t really get to bed till like 6. haha….I know…it’s so bad…. On Friday we left in the early afternoon to take Priscilla to the airport. Sooooo we made it on time….but get this----her flight was canceled. It’s actually pretty hilarious how many times we’ve had problems with flights. It was canceled due to a bad snow storm in Chicago. Ha. So her next flight was scheduled for like 5 in the morning. We decided to just hang out with her. We ended up going to the Art Museum. (My mom had found some special thing going on.) We got in for free and got to see these little Indian girls dance, along with another older group. It was so cool! Then we watched Bolywood film and I could not believe how intense it was. I cried a lot and was pretty shaken when I left. …….man………. Mom and Dad took us out to eat and then we went back to the airport and said goodbye. I drove home sometime after 2 am and then talked to mike sometime after 4am. :P Saturday was a pretty chill/hang out with my parents day. They took me out to dinner and bought me some new shoes—even when I told them it was not at all necessary. They are incredible parents. On Sunday we went to church and then went to Buffalo to have dinner with my relatives. (That’s a story in itself, but I’m running out of time, so I’ll go on.) I drove home late again, and then we watched “No Reservations” together. I love that movie. I went to the “Y” on Monday!! Hurray!!! Haha. I was very proud of myself. I ran for over 2 and a half miles and then worked out for a bit. I hadn’t done it since last Fall, so I was a bit sore. Dad and I did some errands and then we watched a movie I got….”August Rush.” I really loved it! On Tuesdayyyyyyyy I got to go to Michael’s house. We all came for dinner! It was so wonderful. Steve was there as well…and Kristi , Jef and Lexi came over later! J What a wonderful night. My parents left and I spent the night. I started looking at some of Mr. Humphrey’s pictures and then we all ended looking at them. I loved that. Mike and I watched “August Rush”—he hadn’t seen it and then we went to bed pretty late. We got up early the next morning because we were supposed to go see/meet Michael’s Grandma up in Rochester. She ended up calling saying she was sick and not to come. So that was a bummer. We spent the day relaxing and talking and reading more of the Josh Harris “Boy Meets Girl” book. It’s so good. We had to do some errands and since Mike’s mom also wasn’t feeling well, we decided to make her a surprise. J I’ll have to show a picture of that later. When we got back we made some lunch and watched “Little House on the Prairie” with Mrs. H. And then Tim came over. Mike and Tim went for a walk while I hung out with Mrs. H and then ended up falling asleep. J Then Mike took me back to meet up with my parents. We stopped at school first to one of his drum sets off. Then we worked on his mom’s present in the car. :P It was so fun! Today, I tried to get some work done and then I taught some piano lessons. Oh! Yeah…so we have internet again!! It’s pretty exciting! We haven’t had in a while. Annnnnnd we are leaving for NYC tomorrow morning!!!!!! I need to run! I love you all!!! May God’s sweet shalom surround you! -Lizzie | 
