MCO, MTC, Fishing and Bike Riding

My mom is the principal flutist for the Orange County Mormon Choral Organization and they came on tour this week to Salt Lake City along with a similar group from Arizona.  Together they are called MCO (Mormon Choral Organization) of America.  We didn't get to see much of her because of the demanding schedule the group had. Most days they were in recording sessions from 8 am to 9 or 10 pm.  They were recording an Oratorio, Messiah in America, written by their conductor, Brett Stewart.  After spending all week doing recording they were planning on performing a concert in the tabernacle on Friday night.  I was devastated when the tickets sold out in less than half an hour and I didn't get any!  Fortunately, they decided to schedule a second concert in Abravanel Hall on Saturday afternoon.  It was such an amazing concert!  The composition of the music was incredible and the choir and orchestra, made almost entirely of volunteers, gave an outstanding performance.  The soloists were so good I could have listened to them all day!  The recording is scheduled to be released in the fall and I highly recommend it.  Since I wasn't allowed to take photographs here's a picture I found on KSL of Saturday's performance.  

My uncle is president of the MTC (missionary training center) for our church in Provo.  This is where new missionaries go to learn the lessons they are going to teach as well as languages if they are going to a foreign speaking missions.  My uncle said their are about 2,200 missionaries there now learning 52 different languages!  He asked my mom to perform a musical number at the Sunday night fireside for the missionaries and invited our family to come.  We dropped Kaitlyn off with my mother-in-law since we thought she was too young to sit quietly in a meeting full of adults.  Andrew and Jared have been so excited about going to the MTC.  We ate dinner with Uncle Gordy and Aunt Pat in the cafeteria with the missionaries.  Andrew and Jared loved the all you can eat ice cream bar! Then we had a little free time to wander around the grounds.  It was a beautiful summer day!  All the missionaries we ran into loved to stop and talk to Andrew and Jared, the future missionaries!  Obviously they don't get kids there to talk to often.  Here's a picture of Andrew, Jared and my mom.

The highlight of the evening was the fireside.  Words really can't describe what it felt like to walk into the room with over 2000 missionaries.  There was such an amazing spirit there!  For the opening song we sang Called to Serve and it brought such a wonderful feeling into the room to hear all those missionaries singing behind us.  It was quite the crowd for Mom to have to play in front of but she did a great job!  The speaker was Elder Wayne Petersen, an emeritus seventy.  I expected a talk on missionary work but he was just released as the temple president for the Nauvoo temple and chose to speak about that.  The Nauvoo temple is one of my favorite places in the world since it was our temple for five years and I loved his comments!  It was a perfect ending to the evening!  It was such a great experience and I hope something Andrew and Jared will always remember and make a goal to go on a mission.  It's hard to believe in just over 7 years Andrew will be old enough to go!

While Mom was in Salt Lake all week, I had to find things to entertain my dad.  We decided to tackle the flower bed under our front porch that is completely overgrown with weeds.  In the end we decided to rip everything out and start over.  Dad was a huge help but I always end up feeling a little guilty when he comes to visit and spends the whole time working.  We did go fishing one afternoon.  Jason has sworn me to secrecy about where we went but at least everyone caught a fish and we brought some home to eat.  Here are a few pictures.

We finally got to spend a day with my mom yesterday.  The kids wanted to take a picnic and their bikes to Beus Pond so that's what we did.  Jared finally decided last week when school got out that he wanted to learn to ride a bike.  As soon as he tried and I let go he was off like he's always been riding!