Random Pics from their stay....

Emily and Hannah (twins cousins) playing a game together.. Elizabeth and Jonathan sharing secrets...

Back seat passengers...

Jonathan and Evangeline playing music together....

One loaded couch!

Company!!!!

Many of you may be wondering why we have not put anything on our blog for quite some time... Well, the reason is that we have some awesomely fun company visiting us - our cousins Jonathan and Hannah Kline! They have been here for a week, and get to stay until Friday of next week! How awesome is that?! We planned it as a surprise for Emily's 15th birthday -she had no idea we were doing this, although we almost let it slip half a million times! Our excuse for going out without her was that we were going to do her birthday shopping and didn't want her around. We picked them up at the airport and brought them back - and had them walk through the front door. You should have seen the look on Em's face when she saw them. We got a video of it so if I can upload it you can see how ecstatic she was! It was so cute!

Needless to say we were very excited ourselves! I must admit that we made quite the scene at the terminal when we picked them up. Picture this: Twin girls, wearing the exact same clothes, grinning gleefully from ear to ear, and grasping each other's hand practically flying from one end of the airport to the other, trying to find the correct pickup gate. We must have looked hilarious! In fact, people did stare at us like we were a two-headed cow of some sort, and didn't in the least try to hide their stares! People would turn and stare at us and smile, security guards would poke each other and point at us like "take a look at that!".......One man passed us and asked if we were twins (duh) and when we replied in the affirmative, he went on down the terminal going "No way!"......Another man going up the escalator saw us and said "Oh my...." and stopped what he was going to say. It was so funny!

We've been having a blast - we'll be posting pictures of things we've done together......

Election Time.....Hobe Sound.........1980

Two weeks from today is election day. Ever since we were todlers, mommy and daddy would take us with them when they voted and would let us pull the levers. Next year we will finally be able to vote ourselves!

Daddy says that elections here in NY are boring compared to FL. Is is a given that NY will go to the DemocRATS (as Aunt Lily would say) so neither side bothers campaigning here. Daddy has all these neat stories of the campaigns in FL when he was teaching 7th grade at Hobe Sound. There were all kinds of rallies and he would love to take his class on field trips, and even some after school rallys. One time he took a few high school guys to a Mondale rally in a heavily Jewish community in the Palm Beach area. Another time his class showed up to a very formal press club meeting with national candidates on both sides speaking. They were the only "children" there and were creating quite a stir.

The above picture is from a Paula Hawkins rally that they were headed to in West Palm Beach. She was running for the US Senate Seat in Florida and one of the girls mother in the class had a special connection with her and arranged for our class to have a special meeting with her after. You may notice some familiar faces here. Kenny Hobbs is the one with buttons all up and down his tie and shirt......and of course, there is Mary Ellen.

We hope that daddy's interest in politics was passed down to his students and they are active voters today.

Richland Camp.....(2 months late)

Yes, this is about 2 months old, but we've been rather busy.
L-R: Bro. & Sis. Sams, Bro. & Sis. Hutchinson-preachers , Bro. & Sister Miller-singers

Mrs. Blowers and the twins


One night the evangelist/singers volunteered to work in the dinning hall for us.

Life does go on!

As the saying goes, "Life moves on..." - that's especially true with

our performing schedule! Things have been very busy here with

all the piano events! Evangeline and I are performing the four

Chopin Ballades with our piano professor and one other college

student (above photo). We have been (and will be) taking the

Ballades on a "mini tour". Last Thursday we performed at the

University, this Monday we'll be playing in Watertown, NY

(about and hr. and a half from our place), next Thursday at the

college again, and then Oct. 29th for a concert series in Syracuse.

Doesn't that sound exhausting? Well, it should - personal

experience affirms it! Fun yes, but tiring! We also found out last

night that we'll be recording with and oboist this Friday! Our

poor Dad has about had it with our practicing! (But don't worry,

we do let him get an occasional nap -ha!!!!!)

In the photo (L-R)

- Evangeline (Chopin Ballade No. 1)

- Elizabeth (Chopin Ballde No. 2)

- Timothy Lanigan (Chopin Ballade No. 3)

- Dr. Robert Auler ( Chopin Ballade No. 4)

Sketches from our camping trip....

While our parents were at Johns Hopkins our aunt and uncle (and cousins) took us with them camping. It was a lot of fun! We didn't have a camera with us, so we drew pictures instead.... One of our favorite happenings while on the trip was when we got chipmunks to eat right out of our hands! That was fun! We also got to go kayaking, which was a first! A tree stump.......... by Evangeline

"The Campfire" by Elizabeth

After 1 Week being Home.

Just an update on Daddy. Here he is with all the cards that he has received so far. THANKS!

To answer some of your questions. The kind of pancreatic cancer he has is called Islet cell, which only makes up 5% of all pancreatic cancers, and thankfully is the slow growing one. It does not respond to cemo or radiation so thankfully Daddy won't have to go through any of that.

The Whipple surgery he had, removed the tumor and 27 surrounding lymph nodes. Since the cancer was found in 3 of the lymph nodes, there is concern that it could come back in liver, so Daddy has to have regular CT scans every 6 months.

Things should soon be getting back to normal around here and we will share some of our other family happenings. We feel so blessed to have so many wonderful friends who have shown their love in so many ways!!