Piano Contest/Eagle's Nest/Sledding

My head started hurting from trying to come up with a blog post title that captured the weekend, so I decided to give up because our activities were just too eclectic.

Yesterday, Laura had piano contest at Bethel College. This is the second year she's done it, and now that she's at the primary level, the stakes are highter. This was just the first round (unlike last year, when she played once and was done). She played a piece called "Snagglefritz" for a judge, and if she's a "winner," she'll go on to the next round, and if she "wins" that, she gets to play in an honors concert. I listened outside the door while she was playing, and I have to say, she certainly knows how to turn it on when she has to. Laura's feeling good about her performance too, but you never know how the other participants did (there can only be so many winners), so we'll just have to wait and see. Laura hopes she wins, because "the certificate you get makes for a very fine decoration on the piano."

Laura was her usual cool self before it was time to go in with the judge. She was actually quite excited!

After piano contest, we met Pam and Fred at the Eagle's Nest play area nearby. Aly and Emily stayed with them this weekend, so it was a big cousins' party. The kids played hard for a while and then had to take an ice cream break.

Today we visited Jennifer and Brian's new place in Chisago City, and went sledding at a great hilly park nearby. It was nice and icy so the sleds went super fast. Laura had a few dramatic moments in which she 1. headed right for a tree and didn't bail out quite quickly enough so she banged her foot 2. veered too far to the left and careened off a landscaping terrace and did a complete face plant into the snow and 3. veered off too far to the left farther down the hill and did a jump off another terrace, which caused her to tumble off her sled in a heap of tears. Some of these things also happened to Karl and Damon, but for some reason they thought those were fun accidents to have.

Laura, Matt, Karl, Damon

Karl heads down the hill.

Karl's methods got crazier the longer we were there.

This picture was taken while Laura was still in a good mood...