I have actually been on a trip for the last ten days…first to Ohio to visit some Amish contacts face-to-face, meet my agent in Pittsburgh, and then to Aix-en-Provence in France to see my niece and her husband!

I did something new…I learned the technology (very low-tech and I’m mad at myself for not figuring it out before) to “blog drip.” I wasn’t sure I’d have much internet access overseas, so I set up blog posts before I left, as if I were right at home!

Anyway…I returned last night after sitting scrunched up like a pretzel on a United flight for what seemed like days and I’m so jet legged that the keyboard is blurry.

Yet it was all worth it! The main reason I went was to see my niece conduct a Christmas concert in a medieval cathedral. She was in charge of three choirs and over 1,000 people were in the audience! I can’t even begin to describe what an amazing experience it was.

This you tube clip gives a taste of the grandeur of the cathedral and the huge amount of people, especially at the very end when they sing Silent Night, by candlelight. My niece Hilary is in the first pix and is the soloist on O Happy Days…and she’s wearing a maroon scarf, conducting, in most of the clip:

Hilary and her husband Dom are missionaries to an international church in Provence. She also teaches music to children and has started a tourist business called Wine in Provence.

It was so much fun to see her life in Aix…to see where she was married and how fluent in French she’s become, and to get to know her wonderful new husband, Dom.

I’ll post more about the trip in the next couple of days…right now I feel as if I’m on a ship and everything is moving except for me.

Jet lag.