Monday, August 17th. August 17, 2009

Well, we find ourselves away from home…again.  We have been staying in Midland for the past few days with my brother and his family while my dear husband is in Odessa helping my Uncle Billy Pat make some very necessary repairs to my step-mom’s rent house.  It’s been sooooo hot, as it has been everywhere, and the house they are working on does not have air conditioning.  And they’ve been working really hard.  Yeah.  But today we go home…again.  And this time I think we’ll stay awhile.

In the brief two weeks that we got to be home (before we came here and after arriving home from Nashville), there was a lot going on.  We cleaned, painted and are now in the middle of re-organizing and re-decorating two rooms, in addition to the cleaning and painting that had already gone on in Toni and Beth’s room…and there is still much to be done in there as well. There was and is also much to be done in a general organizational way in the whole house before the school year starts.  You know that ‘everything goes from order to chaos’ law thing?  I’m pretty sure a housewife was somehow responsible for that discovery.

We also celebrated Michael’s 9th birthday while we were home and are preparing to celebrate 3 more birthdays in the next few weeks.  (And of course you remember Toni’s birthday was just a few weeks ago.)  It feels like from July to early September we are either planning for a party, getting ready for a party, having a party, or cleaning up/recovering from a party after which we begin planning again.  For several years we tried to keep it simple and just do family parties, but even they have to be planned, executed and cleaned up after… so why not enjoy some fellowship while we’re at it!  Right?

And I must confess, this time every year I get a little melancholy.  Our kids are growing up.  When they were all fairly young it felt like we would NEVER be out of the diaper stage…or the napping stage….or the terrible toddler stage (My kids were never just a terrible two — they spread it out over several years!)  But now all that seems like just the blink of an eye.  I had lots of older moms say that to me back then, but it sure didn’t feel true…until now.

Don’t worry, though.  I’m not wallowing in self-pity over our kids getting older.  We still have several parenting years ahead of us and I am enjoying the stage that we are in.  Even with all their quirks and conflicts, we have great kids…REALLY great kids.  And because I know of my own shortcomings and many, MANY mistakes in parenting them, I can say in all honesty and absolutely no false modesty…God gets the glory.  He has been sooooo gracious and faithful.

So to wrap it all up, the Maisanos are coming home…to stay for a while!  There’s lots to be done; parties to plan, cabinets to organize, school to get structured, and so forth.  But God is good…all the time.

Sunday – Wednesday, the 26th – 29th July 29, 2009

Good bye Nashville,…hello Burnet,

I have to admit, now that it is time to pack up and, very soon, hit the road, I am a little sad to be leaving.  We’ve really enjoyed Wayne and Rebecca (and the Kuhns, Johnsons, Nances and Perrys) and I have been completely spoiled.  Ah, well,….back to reality.

As you’ve probably already heard, the final performance on Sunday was really great but you can read more about it on Toni and Beth’s blogs if you like.  Since then we have been taking it pretty easy, just visiting and sight seeing.  Today (Wednesday), we are just cleaning and packing and our plan is to head out before sunrise tomorrow morning.

So I guess that’s it from Nashville.  Life is going to pick up speed in when we get home so this may be the end of this blog as well.

God bless, and hope to see you soon!

Saturday, the 25th July 26, 2009

All I can say is…WOW!  The show was fantastic!  Unbelievable that they could have put together something so elaborate in just two weeks.  It was really fun to watch, and even though it was two hours long, the time just flew by there was so much energy.

Our friends the Johnsons are here with us, as well as the Kuhns and Whitworths, of course.  Tomorrow two more old SoCal families will be joining us as well.  It is loud, chaotic, messy…and a lot of fun.  We are so blessed with ‘dear old friends’.  But I have to admit, we sure are missing our ‘dear newer friends’ back in Texas.  It will be nice to be home…whenever that will be.

Well, that’s it for tonight.  Tomorrow is another big day.  Oh, and thanks to those of you who sent an encouraging word to Hannah.  I think she’s going to make it.

Grace and peace to you all.

Thursday and Friday, the 23rd and 24th July 24, 2009

Well, we have almost made it.  Big day today with all the final details and rehearsals.  The first show is tomorrow night.  Then one more show Sunday night and FASA 2009 will be done.  It looks like it is going to be a wonderful production.  I hope all of you will get to see it.  It is supposed to be aired on TBN in the coming months but we don’t know when it will be yet.  We’ll keep you informed.

Yesterday was a little intense, especially for our young friend Jamie, who is staying with us.  They released the orchestra at about 6:00 but Jamie had to stay till about 9:30.  She wasn’t real happy about that.  But it’s better than last year!  I believe there was at least one night that we were rehearsing until midnight?  Am I remembering correctly Josh?  Well, anyway, it seems that adding five days to the camp has helped that aspect quite a bit.

Dino and I took Michael and Patti to the Parthenon yesterday!  No, we didn’t go to Greece.  In 1897, the city of Nashville celebrated Tennesse’s 100th birthday by building a life size replica of the Parthenon.  It is quite impressive.  It is built to look as it may have looked in all of its ancient splendor…not the crumbling structure that you can see today in Athens…although even the real one looks pretty good for being a couple thousand years old!

We are excited about this weekend.  We have many old friends who are all converging on Nashville to see the show and for various reasons.  The Johnsons from South Carolina and the Kuhns and Nances from Alabama (Jamie’s family) will be joining the Whitworths and us for a grand total of 21 children and 13 adults!  All of us lived in Southern California together at one time so it’s a reunion of sorts!  Should be fun.

Today we are just ‘hangin’ at the Whitworths.  I’m going to go up and have lunch with the girls later and try to give Hannah and Jamie a little needed support.  The older girls seem to be doing fine and are excited about the finish line and the show and all.  But Hannah and Jamie are…well…they are struggling.  Maybe you can pray for them.  If you want to send any encouraging notes, I’ll make sure they get them.

Oh, and one more prayer request, if you don’t mind.  I found out yesterday that my mom (Brenda Gulley) had a bad fall yesterday and broke her left shoulder.  She had to go into surgery to have some pins placed in it to set it and will be in the hospital for another day or so.  We’d all appreciate your prayers that her pain would subside and she will heal quickly.  Thanks so much.

That’s all for now.  Missing you all.  God bless.

Wednesday, the 22nd July 23, 2009

Happy day!  Fresh recruits are here!  Daddy has arrived.

We picked up Dino this morning during a very light rain…temperature 69 degrees.   He was very happy…and so were we.

Patti and Michael thought they should introduce Daddy to the science museum ASAP so we spent a couple of hours running around the solar system and the human body and such places.  Daddy was impressed.  I’ll have to post some pictures of all that soon.

All of us went up to the campus to have lunch with the campers and everyone was so happy to see Daddy.  We got to hear a little of their rehearsal also and it is quite impressive.

Back at the Whitworth’s house, Dino desparately needed a nap.  Then it was time to pick up the campers again.

I got the kids some supper before Toni and Katy and I went back up to the campus to hear the songwriters recital.  There were a dozen or so students who had composed pieces that they performed.  It was…well…interesting.  OK, so I know that I am just a mom, but I like the pieces that my girls have written much better.  But like I said, I am just a mom and probably slightly biased. :-/ (And Josh — your pieces would have blown them all out of the water!)

The day ended with Rebecca and I taking off for another mom’s night out.  Wow, am I getting spoiled or what?

So we are wrapping things up here at FASA 2009.  Just a few more days left.  That’s all for tonight.  Good night.

Tuesday, the 21st July 22, 2009

This is going to be short.  Sorry but I’m tired.

Today was similar to yesterday except that the library was open so we spent the morning there and then joined the girls on campus for lunch (instead of going to Cheesecake factory.  Bummer.)

Of course, the musicians are working hard — very hard — and coming home with  sore fingers and bleary eyes.  They are enjoying the challenge though.  I am looking forward to hearing the result of all their hard work.

We are all very excited about Dino joining us in the morning.  It will certainly be an encouragement to all of us and give us a needed lift to get through the rest of this week.

That’s all for tonight.  Blessings to you all.

Monday, the 20th. July 21, 2009

Well, Monday is fairly well over…or it will be by the time you read this.  We have just six days of camp left.  And it sounds like they are going to be quite intense.  The orchestra got the rest of their music today, and they have just three days to ‘get it down’ before the on stage rehearsals begin.   Like I said…’quite intense’.  But the music sounds really fun and I think the girls are excited about it.

Patti and Michael and I had a fun day also.  After getting the girls all settled in and attending the re-orientation meeting to cover the weeks agenda, my dear friend Rebecca met us up at the campus and drove us to downtown Nashville where we had hoped to go to the library again.  But, alas, one should always check on business hours before making plans.  It was closed.  But we did end up taking a nice walk through downtown Nashville to the Cumberland river where we got to walk through on old fort (Fort Nashborough) from the late 1700’s.  It was really neat!

By this time it was about lunch so Rebecca said she was going to take us out to a really great Mexican Restaurant that she and Wayne enjoy.  But alas, it had gone out of business!  Strike two.  I had no complaints, though, because we decided to go to The Cheesecake Factory instead!  Yummy!  And  yes, we got cheesecake.  Double yummy!

After lunch, Rebecca dropped Michael and I off at the van and we took off for…you guessed it…the science museum!  Patti decided she’d like to hang out with Rebecca for the afternoon and sweet Rebecca was very agreeable to the idea.  (They went home and made cookies together.)   So Michael and I had a couple of hours to ourselves to learn about physics, and blast germs, and moon walk and such.  Then it was back to the campus to pick up all the girls.  I came into the rehearsal just in time to hear the last piece they were working on…a piece by Bartok…very fast, very hard and I’m sure it will be very fun…if they can get it down. 

Back home at the Whitworth’s, we enjoyed a delicious dinner that Rebecca made for us.  And then she and I took off for a 3 mile walk, at least half of which was up hill!  I think I worked off that cheesecake from earlier in the day!

The kids are still enjoying playing outdoors with Henry every evening when they get home.  Henry is such an interesting child.  He almost deserves an entire post devoted just to him.  I don’t know if I’ll get around to it but if I don’t you should ask me more about him some time.  Yes, …very interesting.

So another day is done.  Another day closer to home.  I don’t want to sound ungrateful for this experience or like I don’t enjoy being with our dear friends…but home is sounding very nice.  Of course, it will be wonderful having Dino here with us in a couple of days so we will probably be a little less homesick when he arrives.

Good night.

Sunday, the 19th July 20, 2009

Our second sunday with the Wolaver family.   We’ve really enjoyed our worship time together.   Even though the place is full of talented musicians, we’ve sung acapella…and I have to confess…I like it that way.  We’ve also taken communion together both weeks…and I like that too.

The lesson was quite intriguing/challenging/disturbing.  Ask me about it sometime, if you like.

Then we went to Jamie’s piano recital at 2:30 and her choir recital at 7:00.  She did a great job and the programs were very entertaining…especially the choir recital.  They played and sang a medley of old TV show themes…like The Archie Bunker theme (what was the name of that show?), Rawhide, Gulligan’s Island, The Brady Bunch, Mission Impossible, Hawaii 5-0, Green Acres…and probably a dozen more.  It was very cute and took me back…….waaaaaaaay back!

So now we are ‘home’ and every one is in bed.  It was a big week and we have even a bigger one ahead.  We are all looking forward to daddy joining us on Wednesday.

Better get to sleep.  Good night.

Toni’s birthday! (the 18th) July 19, 2009

Wow!  What happened to Friday?  I totally forgot to post last night.  So sorry…but you didn’t miss much really.  We didn’t even make it to the science museum!  To tell you the truth, I can hardly remember what we did yesterday soooo…. how about we skip to today…Saturday…which I didn’t even mention in my header.

Well, as most of you know, today was Toni’s birthday.  You also probably know about the website that a dear friend (thanks dear friend ) set up at my request so that we could give her a ‘virtual’ birthday party.  (Thanks to all of you other dear friends who took time out to write sweet notes and make really cool videos to make her birthday special.  It was a wonderful success!  Thank you all so much!)

What some of you may not know is how all the details worked out.  Here’s how it went.  When Toni woke up this morning, after a nice breakfast, I asked Wayne, another dear friend in whose home we are staying, if we could borrow ‘his’ computer which was set up on the dining room table, so that we could show her her cool website and all the wonderful messages that you all had left for her.  (I think that would be called a run-on sentence, but oh-well.)

There was one more message, however, that did not make it onto the website and that was from my dear husband/Toni’s Daddy who sent a separate message to my email to make sure Toni didn’t stumble across it too soon.  After a lot of sentimental sweet stuff, here’s how it ended:

Quote:

Oh yes…birthday suprises…let’s see…okay, here’s one –

I am painting your room…ta-da!  Some weird purple color.  I hope you like it!

Oh…here’s another one — in keeping with tradition, we thought it would be good to bestow on you the Toshiba Notebook computer you have borrowed from Mr. Whitworth.  It is yours.  Hope it will better meet your ever expanding computer needs!  Should be a nice upgrade from the trusty old Gateway!!!

End quote.  (That was for all of you TP debaters.  Did I do it right?)

So you see, the computer we had asked to ‘borrow’ from Wayne was really the computer that her daddy had bought her for a graduation/birthday present.  Pretty sneaky, huh?  It was fun…and yes — she was totally surprised!

As if that wasn’t enough, all of us ‘big’ girls took Toni out for a special lunch and left the guys home to watch the younger kids.  (Thanks guys!)  We went to a cool, trendy, coffee/sandwich shop — very fun.

Then it was back ‘home’ to get ready for the orchestra recital but first, a little cake to wrap up the celebration.

The recital went well and the music was really fun.

Our young friend Rose Kuhn (age eight) expressed it well…”That music really woke my legs up!”  It was a lot of celtic/ blue grass/ fiddle style and it did make you want to get up and dance a jig in the aisle…but no, in case you’re wondering…I refrained. 

And that brings you up to speed.  Tomorrow is a rather easy day so the kids have a chance to regroup and re-energize before hitting it hard for one more week.  We’re half way there!

Blessings to all and good night!

Thursday the 16th July 17, 2009

Sorry Dino.  My creative juices just work soooo sloooooowly when I’m tired and I’d rather write the post than think of a cute heading.

So…today was…another day…kind of like the last few days with just a few exceptions.

Exception #1:  Patti and Michael and I went to the science museum in the morning instead of the afternoon.  We intended to go home for lunch and to get a little school work done except that exception #2 happened.

Exception #2:  We had a last minute change of plans and decided to go up to the campus to have lunch with the campers.  ( Hannah looked a little blue this morning….as in sad, …not literally blue, of course.)  After lunch we accompanied her to class only to find out that it had been canceled and she had a free hour and a half!  Hannah had been hoping for a little break — and this news made her happy!  So we decided to zoom over to the science museum…again… to share a little of the fun with her for an hour or so then…zoom…back to orchestra rehearsal.

That didn’t leave much of the afternoon for anything but a short rest at the Whitworth’s before heading back to pick up the campers.

Exception #3:  The younger ones opted to film a movie with Henry’s flip camera instead of the usual game of ‘toilet tag’ in the evening before dinner.  I thought it was a fine choice and perhaps we’ll have a little footage to show you all?  Well…maybe.  I’m not sure how Henry’s flip camera works.

So that brings us to tonight…which is Thursday…as I told you in my boring header.  Tomorrow brings us to the weekend and almost the halfway point.  I think we are going to make it.

All of the girls are being challenged, stretched and inspired…hopefully…to be a little more and do a lot more for the Glory of the Lord.  At least that is my prayer for them.   The Wolaver family (the family who started this camp and also perform as the Annie Moses Band) have been leading some devotional time every morning in which they have been teaching/exhorting all the students to be wary of the pitfalls of being involved in the arts while at the same time making the very most of the talents God has given you.  It has been very good.  They seem to be very humble and servanthearted folks.

So that about sums it all up for tonight.  Good night all.