Gettin' Ready

I was going to blog about the phenomenon of Christmas cantatas in the evangelical world since we just finished performing one of the less cheesy ones we have sung in during the last many years. We have a cracker-jack little spitfire of a college music performance major senior (on tippy-toe she can't be more than 4-10) who can really get music out of this mottly choir which has never had a director with musical training (which isn't to say that our previous directors have not had musical ability). She invited a year-long exchange student from Holland to accompany us (both of them are part of the enthusiastic student contingent who add so much to our church). He has professional training but no experience as an accompanist. He stands a good 6-3 or so, so when they together received their accolades, they made a cute pair! Anyhow, it went as well as can be expected, given that part of the purpose of a church choir is to welcome in any and all who want to serve and we have an ancient man who used to direct the choir at the high school in his long-ago heyday who is nearly deaf....:) The people loved it, especially the Amy Grant "Breath of Heaven" solo by the mother of the Halloween kitty who visits our house each week.
All that to say, I'm not going to blog about cantatas (are they valuable? is their cheesiness too much of a negative? etc). I am going to say that Chuck surprised me this morning by annoucing that we were going to go out and buy the rest of the new appliances we need to update our kitchen. We did and they might be in place by Christmas--or they might not. We're that much closer to being able to sell the house and retire to climates north of here.