a day in the life

my job title at greenwood is officially "babysitter". when i agreed to go, it was based primarily off the knowledge that i would be studying with a teacher who i admire. i also figured that i had babysat plenty of times before and it would be a cinch... turns out it's lot more challenging than i thought. six kids is quite a handful especially when you have four three-year olds, one four-and-a-half year old, and one seven-year old. it makes for a crazy time. (especially when the weather is in the 90's and there's no relief anywhere from the heat, like this week for instance) but there are also some really great moments. moments where i myself wish i had little ones....but maybe not six of them. here's one of those. (i'll introduce you to each of the kids soon!)

 

music camp.


this summer, i've been blessed to be able to come to this magical place called greenwood. it is a peaceful place where kids 13-18 can focus on creating some beautiful chamber music, outside of their regular routines. (for those of you unacquainted with classical music, chamber music is essentially small ensembles like trios and quartets) greenwood sits on an 80 acre estate surrounded by forrest. it is such a quaint place with a main house and plenty of little cabins surrounding the area; equipped with a pool, tennis courts, and a tree swing. i'm so jealous of all the kids who have been able to come here the past 70+ years. a place where music, and maybe finding a summer fling, is the center of the world. it really is amazing. despite their ages, the music that comes out of the new barn on saturday nights is at a level far greater than i've heard at collegiate levels. welcome to greenwood!

new york city, part iv

DAY 3

DAY 4

on our third day in new york, meredith and i took her two cousins out to manhattan. despite living in new york, they rarely go to manhattan. we ate at the famous madison park shake shack, which is delicious, and hung around fifth avenue for the greater part of the day. that evening we ventured to brooklyn where i got to meet some more of meredith's family members. what a treat it was to be able to meet them! they seriously had me laughing consistently...even if they did say that i looked like a guidance counselor (what?!).

our fourth and final day was by far the longest. we ate brunch at landmarc which is right across from central park. the food was amazing and the view was even better. (thank you stefanie for the recommendation!) we moseyed around soho where i got an incredible amount of blisters and had to buy mocassins to soothe my feet. stopped at the strand bookstore where we had a little bit of fun taking pictures. what an incredible bookstore! i could have spent hours there.

for dinner we ate at a restaurant called amaranth with one of my dad's friends named lucia. it was such a pleasure to be able to meet someone who i've always heard so much about. the food was also some of the best i've ever had. so delicious. if you're not on a budget, go there. afterwards, meredith and i managed somehow to get to little italy where she stopped into a little dessert bar to pick up a brownie. after getting her dose of sweets, we decided it was time to go home, it was about 11pm. getting back to long island turned out to be a difficult task this final night. we boarded the f train and were harassed for 10 stops by 5 columbian men. on the 11th stop things got a little crazy. the train was set to go but stopped abruptly. we were stationed for 10-15 minutes before people started to get off the train and start questioning what had happened. apparently someone had fallen onto the tracks. we were informed to go back one stop and the trains should be set to go. well that person was wrong.... we ended up having to take a bus somewhere and then walking 5+ blocks to get to another train station. at this point i was just ducking underneath the turnstiles because my metrocard was empty. i felt pretty rebellious. ;) we did all of this with the help of ronnie (last picture, guy with the peace sign). so thankful that we had him because we walked through some sketchy parts of town. we finally made it back to hillside ave. and took a taxi home. it was quite a last night. i loved my time in nyc and i plan on going back, hopefully next time i'll see the highline at sunset, go to the many art museums, see more hot spots! i love that there was always something going on, the polar opposite of nebraska.

lots of reading today, sorry! :)
next stop greenwood.

hannah

new york city, part iii

 

our second day we spent another long day in manhattan, re-exploring areas that we had seen the day before. stopped into grand central station, which is not only an amazing piece of architecture but is still quite functional and used for its intended purpose. ate in k-town at a place called gahm mi oak and ordered their speciality: sul lang tang. yum. walked around avoiding the downpour. for dinner that night we ate at this place called five napkin burger. meredith and i were obsessed with the lightbulbs....except they definitely did not turn out in the photos! only two days of nyc left to share which will be in one post then i can finally catch you all up to where i am right now! thanks for reading, everyone. :)

hannah

new york city, part ii


our first full day in nyc.
i loved it.
we ate noodles at a place called momofuku in some part of manhattan. i'm not sure what part we were in half of the time. i knew we took the F train then the green 4, 5, 6, train most days. honestly, we spent a majority of time on foot, which explains the ridiculous amount of blisters on my feet, all of which i painfully acquired on our final day day in nyc. we got tricked in to riding rickshaws and ended up having to pay $30, even though we were promised a free ride. clearly, we're not from this city. we needed a break, actually several, after a long day of walking so we stopped into some parks. madison square park, which was the center of a large rally taking place (lots of people and plenty of nypd. i secretly hoped to see some of the cast from law and order svu), and bryant park. we walked until we ended up in times square. never have i been in an outdoor place so brightly lit. you would think it was daytime even though it was 10pm. this was our last stop for the day. the train and bus ride back to aunt pat's on long island took 2 hours that first night. one of the shorter trips as we would soon find out. 

hannah

new york city, part i


the trip to NYC was quite lengthy. a typical 5 hour airplane ride turned to an all-day affair. meredith, her mom lisa, and i, left lincoln at 8 AM and did a three hour road trip to kansas city. our plane was supposed to leave at 1:30 PM. the plane was 15 minutes late and we were quite terrified with our short 30 minute connection. then, of course, a suitcase falls on an elderly gentleman's head. though he was ok and did not want any treatment, the paramedics had to come.... which took an extra 30 minutes. obviously, we missed our flight but were generously rebooked on another flight an hour later. which eventually turned into two hours later. we got into nyc at around midnight. poor aunt pat stayed up extra late to pick us up from the airport. so thankful to her and her daughters for allowing me to temporarily invade their home. hopefully we'll be able to meet again! more adventure stories to come...

hannah

unexcused absence


hello everyone! i didn't realize how limited internet would be here at Greenwood Music Camp! my sincere apologies as i won't be able to blog nearly as much as a did for the next 4-ish weeks. i'll try and do a post every week at least. there are some posts lined up for this week, however, so stay tuned! all about our trip to new york coming up!