Magical Advice

M is trying to learn "Pat a Pan" on piano for the choir.

Tonight lP told her "Don't just run through it, actually practice

the parts you don't know."  M yelled back "I've been taking

piano for 5 years, I don't need your magical advice!"

Tonight we went to a friends house because the mother of this friend is having a class over the next 4 weeks about peer relations and emotional health.  There are 13 girls ages 10-14 and they talked about Fitting in vs. Belonging.  It was pretty great.

Classes

 M is in an astronomy class at the homeschool co-op and got to create this model of a star with a giant rice crispy treat and lots of candy.  Then she ate it.  She did share a lot of the candy with her siblings.

 M loves going to band.  I'm so glad that is working out well.  It's wonderful for her to go off and have these adventures of independence.  This is a mural in the hall at her school.  So fun.

happening

M has started playing the french horn!  This picture was just documenting the dings on the school horn she is borrowing. 

It's so cute!

Competent

Today as we were having the primary program practice M did some good work.  She figured out how to fix the soap dispenser in the women's rest room which had been just giving a tiny amount of soap.  She found a spare soap holder in the supply closet, and figured out how to open the case.  Then she figured out how to line up the bag of soap so that the push bar actually pumped out soap.

She's also going to be playing 3 songs for the program, and singing a duet with her friend H.

I love this girl her competence.

Musician

Watching M in a piano lesson is a thing of beauty.  Mrs. B pushes her hard.  When M is focusing in her lesson her face takes on the expression of eyes wide and jaw relaxed.  It makes me so proud to see her amaze the teacher.  Last week she practiced diatonic 5 note scales.  Then in the lesson Mrs. asked her to do Chromatic ascending, which is hard, then she said eventually she should do descending.  Then M did it!  Mrs. B and I looked at each other like "woah."

Mrs. B runs the lesson so efficiently jumping from theory to technique to technology to real world application and the hour flies by.  M is learning so many great things musically but also for when she has her own piano studio.  I'm so glad she has this amazing ability to put things together in her head and put it into practice.  Mrs. B talks about how M is one of the kids who is going to be able an accompanist for a choir.  I love it.

I'm with the band

M started taking band at the local Jr. High on Friday.  So far she's very excited and loves her teacher.  I'm so grateful the school district makes this easy for us.  We're so excited for M to start her band life.  She said there's a girl at the school who plays french horn in the concert band and piano in the Jazz band.  Sweet!

party in the rain

We had  a party for M at the park Friday night.  The forecast was ominous.  I'd invited so many families that I didn't really feel like we could hold it at our house, and our activity was making slime...
Friends came, it rained like crazy, kids had fun and nobody was hurt thank goodness.  It's fun having a big party.  I'm grateful for fun friends.

 M riding in a single kayak on a trip in the moultrie creek.

 M playing in the giant piece of Lycra that recently joined our family as a swing, hammock, climbing thing.

 

M asked me to try the Hello Fresh which was 50% off for your first order.  It was fun and an ok value at 50% off.  It came with an instructions card and M made the chipotle pulled chicken and slaw herself.  It's fun letting her have all these experiences. 

M is learning hymns and playing for primary.  I'm grateful for her.  To compensate her having a great attitude about sharing her talents, I'm letting her earn money toward her choir trip next year.  It's stressful to me when she has too much money available.  She wants to buy robot cats.  But having large goals is a good thing.