The Hills Are Alive With The Sound of Music...

This used to be my favorite time of year when I was younger. I participated in the Rotary Carol Festival every year starting when I was 5 years old. I remember carefully choosing the songs I wanted to learn, whether it was singing, piano, or flute (and I even did a speech number or two in my days)! I loved when the books would come out that showed who had all entered and when everyone would be performing. I would scan every page over and over again till I basically had the whole thing memorized and had stars beside certain people that I wanted to watch. My mom was always so good to me because I would practically take the whole 2 weeks off of school!

Sometimes it scares me when I think about Kaden. He is turning out to be a little mini-me! I love that kid though! He played the piano and sang a vocal solo in the festival this year and did amazing! I was so proud of him! He got asked to sing his song at the Grand Concert this year and received an award for both piano and vocal.

These Olsen twins sang this song at the Grand Concert as well, and they were fantabulous! For the first time, I wanted little boys of my own so that I could teach them to sing in harmony just like this. Yes, the video is sideways but you can't see anything anyways and it is the sound that is coming out of their beautiful mouths that matters!

The festival seems to be getting smaller and smaller each year, which makes me kinda sad. It caused me to think a lot about the way music has influenced my life and I really do wish I was doing more with it.

I grew a love for music at an early age! I loved loved loved to sing!! (I still love to though!)

I found this picture that I drew in grade 6 or so. Ya, definitely not an artist in the slightest!! I must have been obsessed with voluptuous lips at the time....

(Well that, and the dress is a little provocative too...)

And I even did my fair share of piano too. Everyone ALWAYS says, "I wish I would have practiced more when I was younger." Sadly I am no exception to that, but it is something I am still working on!

I was so blessed to grow up always surrounded by good music. Some of my earliest memories are waking up to the sound of my Mom's flute students warming up with a scale. I don't remember feeling so grateful at the time though!! But my mom is amazing!

Her favorite thing is having the whole family gathered together around the piano and singing together. I feel the same way!

This is one of my favorite memories of my Grandpa Cahoon! Well, this and when he would always take his teeth out and talk with his gums. Oh, and always play this game about dishes on a bush or something to that effect! Sadly, the accordion is a dying art!

I was pretty lucky to grow up in Cardston! There is such great talent, and so many opportunities to take part in. I was pretty blessed to do choir under the direction of Linda Burwell and Leslie Dittmann! Words can't even express how much I learned from those 2 great ladies!

I loved choir! These were my Junior Choir pals! Monica Prince (Bell) and Candace Olsen (Kipp).

And I was pretty dang lucky to have Katelyn with me through it all! Here is us in Edmonton at Honor Choir when we were little.

As you can tell, I went searching through some of my mom's old photos. It is so easy to see what an influence music has had in my life. That was who I was; it was a part of my identity!

I will never live this one down! I got asked to sing 'A Part of Your World' from The Little Mermaid at a Community event. I got there to do a quick dress rehearsal and realized that they had a costume for me to wear! Yup! A costume for the Little Mermaid!! I was slightly mortified. Little did I know that several of my guy friends were also in the concert as the 7 dwarves. To this very day they still call me 'cockle-shells'!!

But since my 'cockle-shell' days, I have expanded my talents to other musical areas as well. I am quite the accomplished iPhone player. Oh yes, it is a real musical instrument! Here we are performing a trio at the Family Christmas Party.

I am so grateful for the joy that music has brought into my life! It played such an integral role into helping me become the person I am today.