Irish Music Weekend!

 We had another busy Irish music weekend. We had to wake up really early on Saturday morning to drive Newt to the NJ State team wrestling practice in North Jersey (about 5 min from NY so really, really north). From there, I took Haley to her fiddle lesson then we went back and watched the rest of Newt's practice. When his practice was finished, we drove back to her fiddle teacher's house then to a session.

 Haley had fun at the session. Her friend, Alex, was there. We know him from the kids' Irish session in Philadelphia and he and Haley both compete in NY and Ireland. She enjoyed seeing him. It was the first we've seen him and his family since the Fleadh in Parsippany on April 1st.

After the session, we had a late night drive home which was pretty neat because in a number of places we drove past, there were cool fireworks. There were even fireworks going off as we crossed the Tappan Zee Bridge.

Sunday started out with thunderstorms and rain. It dried out and we headed to the South Jersey Irish Society picnic. We had a nice time. Haley swam, played mini golf, joined the ceili band with her fiddle, and did the water balloon toss.

Whacking the pinata! Boy! Was that hard to break!

Water balloon toss.

The ceili band.

Haley reading off the 50/50 winning number.

After the picnic, we decided to check out a session about 5 miles away. A number of people had recommended the session but it is a far drive for us normally. The place was half of a duplex and inside it felt like we were stepping into a pub in Cavan Ireland...really neat with lots of character.

There was only a piper and a bodhran player playing when we arrived and they welcomed Haley immediately. Soon after a guitarist joined them and 9yo twin girls with fiddles who also were good little dancers. So, it ended up being a nice session with a great crowd. Not sure if we'll make it back there anytime soon but if we are ever in the area again we'd stop in.