Ahhh, quiet.

It has been such a full weekend. It is now 10:13pm, and while I really need to go to bed, there are also a lot of other things that need to be done, including a need for quiet alone time. We seem to have little spurts where life is crazy busy. The past 4 days or so have been like that.

Here's a link to some cookies that I've made a couple of times in the past year or so - Strawberry-Shortcake Cookies. They are a nice change from chocolate chip, which seems to be a standard around here.

And a few more snapshots from the past week.

We did quite a bit of art...Starting over on a canvas she worked on a year or so ago and wasn't happy with:Learning about money:Poor pansies!!!

Helping a silly girl practice:Little G's favorite cold cereal of recent months has been Honey Bunches of Oats:A salt crystal garden - day 2 I believe.

Fa la la la la!

Yesterday was a day full of MUSIC! And a fun visit with friends, too.

The kids each performed with their Suzuki group classes at a recital that was very nice.

(All the other pictures I took included other children and therefore are not "postable.")

Then we came home for a dinner of soup and bread with another family and all decided to go back for the dress rehearsal of the Nutcracker. We have seen bits of it each year at the local Lollipop concert, but the children were mesmerized throughout the whole thing last night! I feared they would be wound up being there with their friends, but all eyes were glued, and mouths were mostly silent. Peanut fell asleep in her chair at the very end for about 5-10 minutes, right after telling me that the scene they were on (flowers? dew drops? somewhere in the midst of the sugar plum fairy section) was her favorite.

Last first violin lesson

Finally started the last little one on violin. (She started a year older than the other two for many reasons.) After watching her brother and sister every day for almost 4 years, it's her turn now!

All set to go!How to hold the bow properlyLearning something new!

Last recital of the season

There are some "technical issues" with these videos, but the general idea is still there...

Little America lighting festivities

Each year, the Suzuki students are invited to play at the annual lighting ceremony at a local hotel. The size of the group seems to vary from year to year, based on who is in town and available to come participate. Whenever we are here, the kids enjoy taking part.

Afterward, there are cookies and cider for all and then we walk around outside looking at the lights, depending on how cold it is that night. Geoff's mom and grandma came with us this year.

It's always very crowded, but a fun way to kick off the Christmas season!

Happy Thanksgiving

There hasn't been much time to post here lately.
I've been mending this... attending this... making this (Oatmeal Pumpkin Bread from the oft-mentioned Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day book)...

and so much more, all while trying to cram in as much school as possible (which has been a challenge).

We are having the usual feast tomorrow, which I attempted to get a head start on today (plus some extra things like the bread) and am already feeling "bushed." Looking forward to some low-key (hopefully) family time the next few days.

Hope that you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving and are able to be thankful in all things!

School delays, violin, and soccer-related craftiness

Perhaps this is why school takes so long on any given day:

Or this could be another reason...maybe we'll call it PE and then it IS school:

That was the three-legged version, and here is the four:Friday night was their first violin recital of the fall. B played Musette. This was an "after" shot. I fear distracting them taking pictures during their performances. Here is G playing Lully Gavotte:

I finally had a reason to make these:

These aren't nearly as cute as the ones on the link, but I had to make 23. One child had to take snacks and I talked her into these instead of Gatorade, which was going to involve a trip to the store. The other two saw them and insisted that they had to take some for their teams as well.

Another garage sale, tortoise, and violin

Today we loaded up everything from our previous garage sale and hauled it all in to Geoff's work, set it up again, and gave it another try. It went a little better this time, but there was still tons left over. We gave much of it to his coworkers' and students' families. Here the kids are playing with some of the children of one of Geoff's students at the Indian Bible College. They have a fascinating heritage - they are from Supai, which is in the bottom of part of the Grand Canyon. You can read about it in this very interesting book (which I checked out at the library): Here we are picking up and checking out a tortoise. Interesting pet!Last night the kids had a little, informal, outdoor, group, violin recital.

Burma (Myanmar) and books

It is interesting that we just recently read the book I recommended here about Burma. Since we don't really receive any television stations, we haven't been able to follow the tragedy with the kids via that medium at all.



I'm a little behind on blogging due to the recent visit of my family and a couple of full days since they left. I'm about to let go of my inhibitions about posting pictures of the kids. I figured I eventually would. Not as for pictures of myself...I'm NOT over the inhibition of even having them taken, let alone posting them!!!



The kids' recital went well. There was a last minute change of location which was a bit of a disappointment (from the usual stage/auditorium to a classroom), but my parents and Geoff's mom were all here for the event which was festive. I felt bad for B (though it didn't seem to bother her much) because they have had two practice sessions with the pianist and she played her song flawlessly at the practice session, but at the recital got stuck a few times. She still did well for a 6yo.
Here's a brief portion of G's song:



B finally got her teeth pulled (the four lower front ones) Tuesday. For one who is often quite dramatic, she sure does well with situations like that. The dentist said she didn't move while he was working on her and she never cried or whined about it.



Other miscellaneous tidbits...

Last week (which seems more like a month ago) I went out for dinner with a friend to belatedly celebrate my birthday. (Roughly two weeks after the fact we found a time that we were both available.) The night before we went she sent me an email, "Where should we go, the nut house?" Little G, who is becoming increasingly certain that anything that is our (Geoff's and my) business should also be his business (i.e. nosy), was reading over my shoulder and said, "What's the nut house?"