It's late

So, its way past my bedtime. I usually go to bed around 10 or 10:30. I am a little wired from the ladies game night I attended tonight. So instead of sleeping, I have been wasting precious sleep time blog hopping. Interesting, I found some people I haven't seen for a while, and I also discovered I have been tagged from Shawna , or at least I think I was, she did spell my name a bit funkier than it already is spelled.

Here are her questions. ( I think I am getting off easy on these)

1. What is one thing your husband doesn't know about you?
well I am not so sure I want to answer that, he does read this blog you know.
But I don't think he actually knows about the trouble we used to get into at Ricks. I seem to remember something about the Dean' s office?

2. Have you ever peed your pants because of laughter?
Probably.  But when I was pregnant with Luke I thought my water broke when it really didn't.

3. What's the most fun thing you have done with your kids?
Well I only have one kid. And today we had a pretty good time at Coney Island. (official post later). Especially on the never ending train ride.

4. Who is better looking Matt Damon or Mark Wahlberg?
I choose Leonardo DiCaprio, he does a pretty convincing Boston accent, and he pulls off a pretty nice physique as well.

5. When was the last time you did something for yourself and what was it?
Um, I do something for myself everyday. I am kinda selfish. Today it was a run around Prospect Park. Yesterday I sewed myself a wrap around skirt from a vintage pattern I bought off Ebay.

What's so great about quadrouple 7's?

....it is the day my mom turned 30, and had me.

I really don't remember ever wishing I didn't share my birthday with my mom. For me, it was something I had that no other sibling did. I was special.

I planned to carry the 30 year number out with another generation. But, Luke came a little earlier than planned, and having another right away, just wasn't an option. Maybe I'm selfish, I just want the day to just be mine and my mom's, and I feel ok about that.

"Thank you" mom for having surgery on your birthday, not to mention recovering from it. "Thank you" for baking me a boston creme pie cake every year, even though your favorite was German Chocolate. "Thank you" for throwing me birthday parties that didn't include any of your friends. "Thank you" for making my favorite breakfast, German Pancakes and letting me eat off of the "it is your special day" plate, even though it was yours too. "Thank you" for giving me gifts, even when you should have been receiving. "Thank you" for teaching me, spending time with me, worrying about me, sacrificing for me, and loving me. You have  helped shape my first 30 years, and made the "number" not so hard to accept.

Mom, I hope we have another 30 years together, and on 07.07.37, I can be closer to becoming more like you.

I love you, and Happy Birthday!

I am ready...

to teach Suzuki book 1.

It has been almost 25 years since I learned book one at the ripe age of five. Turns out, age five seems to be a bit on the older side to start violin lessons. Shinichi Suzuki, the founder of the Suzuki method really was a brilliant man. After teaching violin for a few years he concluded that ALL children posess the ability to play the violin, and play it well. In traditional study, children usually do not begin playing until they are eight or nine, because reading music is challenging and they typicaly cannot grasp it until they have learned to read words. If the child is exposed to learning the violin through the ear, they can begin playing much earlier and then later develop the skill of reading music. By this time they already have the musicality to play the instrument.

Suzuki began teaching this method to hundreds of children well before it got to America. It wasn't until much later that out of disbelief, a professor of music traveled to Japan to hear these children play. It brought him to tears when he heard a auditorium of children play the Bach Double Duet beautifully. Now there are over 20 different institutes across America offering the same courses that I took when I was young and the course I took this week to young children and hopeful teachers. My first Suzuki institute was in Logan, Utah over 20 years ago, and included all instruments. Today, the strings have formed their own institute with over 700 participants, just playing the violin.

Today was my last day of training. I am exhausted. We had class every day from 9-5pm. It did have a good variety of activities. My favorite, being the observations. I watched 15 different lessons and wrote at least 1-2 page paper on each including ideas and techniques I thought would be beneficial, and things I know I would do differently. The youngest student I watched, Hannah, was 2 1/2. She was so tiny and precious holding and playing her little violin. It was very exciting to watch the teachers interact with the kids, some with success, and others with some barriers. What I have learned is the parent involvement is one of the most critical pieces in the Suzuki method, without that, the child will have a very hard time progressing. It was obvious which kids had the the parent involvment and which ones didn't.

I am excited for Luke start lessons. It seems hard to believe that he could begin in as little as a year from now. He already has a love for music. He sings along to the hymns in church, and has a dance routine that he breaks out everytime he hears something with a beat. It is the constant need to run around, I am worried about. Hopefully with the Suzuki method, it will teach him how to hold still and bow, give him a regular structured activity with accountability, and win him a scholarship later down the road.

It's official

My second favorite show in TV history, next to of course Arrested Development, has indeed been cancelled. It really hit me yesterday as I was driving and heard the song "Had a bad day". Not because I was having a bad day, or because the song really makes me think, but because Veronica sings just a few lines from it in one of her brilliantly sarcastic banters with her dad. I teared up as I was listening and even a few times over the course of the next hour.  Even more sadly, they didn't even wrap it up. So many questions left unanswered. Does Veronica get back together with Logan? Does Keith become Sherriff? How will I ever know? They say, the good news is it might get picked up for a comic book. What? That is supposed to make me feel better?