Happy 17th Jessica!!!

True, I am not a very good sister because the other day I asked Jess how old she was because I thought she was 19!!!
Much to my relief she told me that she was only 16 about to be 17(if she were 19 I would be 17).
But to day is her 17th birthday so I will tell you how great she is.


First of all she is always the brave older sister even when we get roped into doing crazy things like play that song at the bluegrass festival that none of us knew.



And then the time at that wedding that we played at where she had to play harmony all by herself because I got SOOO lost and couldn't find my place again.



And she does fun things like order tons of wheat berries by the truck load.



And she lets me play my friends instruments even when I shouldn't.
Sometimes she even joins the fun.



And she hosts Film Festivals that are SOOO much FUN even when she has to speak in front of 200+ people.

Happy birthday Jess.

New Background

I have a new background for my blog.
Isn't it cute???
I decided to go with something cute and perky for a change.
So I tried to choose something that my sister Rachel would choose.
She always puts something like fluffy baby chicks on her blog so that's what I did.
It was either the paw prints or the coffee-bean imprint.
Well and there was the option of barbed wire or the fish skeleton silhouette.
Oh, and I could either have the Wine and Cheese photo or the Spices~At~Market one.
So many options!!!
What will I choose!?!?!?!

It will be the paw prints!!!

Just kidding I didn't really want ANY of those!
Just the paw prints!

The Long, Green, And Winding Road

My Favorite Website EVER!!!

I LOVE sheetmusic!!!
Of course I do. Who doesn't???
It tells you how to play all of your favorite pieces.
That if you can find it.
And that is why I love IMSLP.org!!!
For about a year and half I sat in my room with my violin; confined to hymns, Christmas songs and bluegrass fiddle tunes.
There's nothing wrong with those pieces but if you love Classical music as much as I do you get kind of bored and playing the violin isn't as much fun as all your friends at church and biblestudy(who play The Great Classics)make it out to be .


Until one day...

The International Music Score Library Project walks into your life.
The free public domain music library.
Online since February 16, 2006 · 29,567 works · 73,532 scores · 1,135 recordings · 4,223 composers · 37 performers

It was "love at first pageview"!!!
That is where I get almost all my classical sheetmusic now!!!
Everything from Canon in D to Polonaise de Concert!!!

Before you know it you are playing fun pieces you never even knew existed!!!

Stradivari's Genius

I found this book the other day at the library.
When I first picked it up I thought that it looked kind of boring but I got it anyway(no clue why).
Well on the way home I started looking at it and read a little bit of the introduction;
I LOVED it!!!
It is a book about Antonio Stradivari and 6 of the instruments that he made.
Of course I didn't get to read the whole thing because we had to return it to the library(one of the many, many bad things about being a slow reader) but have no doubt, I will get it again!!!

Sunset On Seagrass

No, it's not really seagrass but this photo reminded me of being at the beach with the sun setting over the dunes so that's why I titled this post what I did.
And I took about a billion of these photos (okay, maybe not a billion but a lot) so I might post some more later.

I Have A New Favorite Composer!!!

Aaron Copland is fun!!!
I've always been a little prejudice about him because he was slightly more recent (1944)and I have never really liked music from that time period because it always seemed to sound well... "messy" I guess could describe it.
You know, odd harmony at times, different sections of the orchestra seem to be almost fighting against each other to be heard, things like that.

Yes I know that that is what the composer wanted but I have always liked how Vivaldi, Bach and all the other composers like them kept all their instruments together, playing happily.
And don't even get me started on how unpredictable Brahms' music is!

But I will be prejudice no more!
It all started when I would play violin with my friend Ren.
She would always ask me if I had ever heard "Rodeo".
Well I hadn't but then the other day my mom found THIS website.
THIS is "Rodeo". You have to listen to it!
And another pretty one that he wrote is Appalachian Spring.
After I heard those songs I got a Aaron Copland CD at the library and I am enjoying listening to it.
I am also enjoying not having to blog everyday but I will try to get so more of the camping photos up soon!