~Thursday~
The girls van on the way to Holdrege for the night
Ritz crackers are a must on a trip!
We had supper with Smith's that night, then we all drove back to Axtell where Uncle Jeff and Aunt Annette have an empty house. They let us stay there over night. Wow! That was interesting... 15 people in a three bedroom two bathroom house! :)
The boys crashed in the living room and one bedroom. We girls had a room and Mom and Dad had a room. It worked out great! Thank you so much, Uncle Jeff, Aunt Annette, Caleb, Ataley and the Smith family!
High jinks in the girls room... :)
~Friday~
On the way back to Axtell the night before, Ben hit a skunk with his car. Just about everything they had smelled skunky. I found somebody's white shirt airing on the tree. :)
The iPad is very handy on a long trip.
The backseat buddies
Yummy Subway sandwiches for lunch.
We passed this truck and trailer, oh, I don't know how many times!
The boys in Ben's car liked to wave at us from the sun roof.
Sleepy Sam
A CAM billboard
We arrived at the church slightly early, so we visited and relaxed awhile.
The lone director chair.
As an optional part of the weekend, Earl taught us all breathing techniques, pronunciation, etc of singing.
The cutest baby there!
Supper wasn't provided that night, so everyone went to their host families. Teresa Kauffman brought ours up to us. We ended up having supper with the Fantons since they'd stayed also.
The girls met back at 5 or so to practice the ladies song.
Some guys came too...
Trying to get the girl basses to go way down. :)
Uho, he's pointing right at us sopranos!
Earl called out names for a special singing group. These are just some of those called.
Ben must've been hiding... :)
For the Easter Hallelujah, Earl had the two groups face each other across the room. That's group two (I was in there).
This is just the tail end of group one. Abi, Irene and Lois Ann were in that one.
~Saturday~
The children practicing their song.
Poor T.J. was wore out...
The special group practicing. Abi was suppose to be in this picture, but she missed the call for practice.
Gracie Strong
Earl had each part stand around a mike so that they could hear each other.
Later that afternoon, he organized us by parts, and also by part one and two of the Easter Hallellujah, with part one on the left and two on the right.
Earl had us walk down the aisle, part 1 left, and part 2 right, then we'd separate and go to our seats. The same went for when we walked back to the bleachers.
The stragglers
We all sat in the dining hall.
Ataley and I were the last two on our side. :)
An ugly picture of your's truly...
We went to visit Strongs that night as the Kauffmans had to go get Katie Jo from the airport. There had been some pretty good storms moving through, some of them with hail.
~Sunday~
Poor Sweetie caught a cold and fever on Sunday. She was so miserable!
Ah, a field of Holsteins... Oops, I mean SOP Chorale!
We had a program in the morning for the local church, then one in the afternoon for the community.
Ben and Marsha were in charge of a pile of cameras!
Good job, Josh!
And Justin! :)
This is the only picture of the men's group that Sam got.
After the children's song in the afternoon, Mike gave a short message.
Then back at it! Sorry Abba... :)
Visiting at Kauffmans that night. We decided that Irene could come over to stay there just to simplify our early morning take off.
~Monday~
We all met at a gas station down the road from Kauffmans, then caravanned out.
Willard and Seth had to haul some pipe to a place near Sidney, NE, so Willard asked Sam if he'd like to ride along. Of course, Sam said yes. We'd missed the exit, so the rest of us waited at a rest area while Dad went to get Sam. Some of the boys and Irene and I walked up this trail.
It was beautiful in a rugged and barren sort of way.
Uh, another ugly picture of me!
Hello... down there!
The boys
Shawn found this thing stuck on a rock. Any guesses as to what it is?
Abi and I were splitting this blueberry muffin, but before we ate it, we set it up on the hot dash to warm up. Speaking of hot, the only vehicle in our whole caravan that had good AC was the Chupps! Our blue van and Gram's van had none to speak of. Whew, that was a hot ride!
After a long day, we all arrived home safe and sound about 6 that evening. Now, just to catch up on sleep!
Stay tuned for next week's busy schedule- Katlyn's 1st birthday, Homeschool picnic, recordings and more, I'm sure! :)
