It's been awhile!

Well, Spring is finally here, and it is well over-due to update our blog!

December through March has been so action packed, it all seems a blur.

First and foremost, Scott completed his Masters of Arts in Counseling! He finished his thesis with flying colors, and as of two weeks ago was offered a job as a Personal Advocate at an insurance company! He just finished his first week of training and is ready to take on his role to help people.

As for me, life has pretty much been one giant rehearsal between work and side-gigs! From December until now, we've had eight orchestra or chamber performances, 4 field trips, 2 guest conductors, 1 string festival, and a Solo/Ensemble competition. Of all those, the String Fest pretty much took over my life for three months...and involved more planning than our wedding last July did. We had almost 700 people attend!! I never imagined I would be responsible for that many people when I finished my music degree! The string fest made it into 3 local newspapers, and we were extremely honored to have our assistant superintendent as a guest speaker. We also were joined by the Bloomington Symphony Orchestra, and both high schools attended a professional rehearsal the weekend before, and then performed a combined piece together! The logistics were definitely a feat of their own: trying to fit 110 people on one stage and feeding 100 elementary/middle school students pizza in a timely fashion without injuring any instruments was quite impressive, thanks to my fabulous students and parents. I was so proud to see my students in action as they took ownership and responsibility...it made my job easier to just be in charge of knowing who had to be where in the building and when.

Now that both the String Festival and the Disney Pops Concert are over, I actually had a moment to sit down with Scott today and plan our anniversary weekend this July! I've been working hard doing extra violin gigs on the side to pay for a weekend getaway (amongst other things!), which will make our weekend that much sweeter. Since we started dating, we've always wanted to take a weekend and stay in a Bed and Breakfast. We've also been meaning to hit up Duluth for awhile.

After a surprising short search for the perfect B&B, we discovered and fell in love with the Cotton Mansion:

(sorry, picture is so small!)

Its a *beautiful* Italian Renaissance mansion (we both adore classic vintage!) that was built in 1908 that has been converted into a bed and breakfast. We decided to go all out, and after having a hard time deciding in which room to stay in (they are all so beautiful and romantic!), we went with the room that has a private terrace overlooking Lake Supperior. We debated whether or not to stay in the Carriage house, but we thought for our first stay, we should stay in the main mansion. It will be so nice to take time out of our crazy schedules for a romantic weekend to relax on focus on each other. Although months away, it is something exciting to look forward too!

Here's a picture of the room:

While we're there, we're hoping to also spend some time on the shores of Lake Superior, and perhaps even take a drive up the North Shore to Grand Marais. It should be a beautiful weekend!

Well, lots of love to all! I hope spring is treating everyone well!