piano for little mozarts

The girls started taking "piano" lessons last week. I had been looking for a fun music class for them to take for awhile, but most of what I could find were mommy and me classes and I just thought we were sort of passed that. Then the community ed brochure offered a partner music class in which students would learn basics of music and the beginnings of piano.

I had assumed it would be a group of partners, but when we showed up last Monday, we found it would be a private lesson for our two girls. The instructor is amazing and the girls fell in love right away. She was also impressed that they were such good listeners and cooperated so well. (But if you think about it, they don't know any better than to cooperate with one another!). 

We will be receiving Nana and Papa's piano on Wednesday (hello room rearranging!), but in the meantime the girls have been "practicing" on their little keyboard, singing the little tunes Miss Julie sings with them to help them learn the different aspects of the piano.

Miss Julie has them doing some amazing things already and it's unbelievable how quickly they pick things up. I'm looking forward to seeing all that they get out of this experience!

keeping busy

Rob left for another 12 day work trip on New Years Eve. It was really hard to say goodbye and all of us ended up crying. Leaving for 12 days is one thing, but the fact that he left on a holiday was worse. Fortunately this is the last long trip for a while (fingers crossed).

We've been trying to stay busy so as to make the time go by faster. It was nice when school resumed on Thursday and we could get back to our 'normal' schedule. The girls were anxious to get back to school and I was anxious to get my 2.5 hours back. 

Because the weekends tend to be the hardest when Rob is away, I tried to think of something that would be extra fun to do today. I gave the girls the option of going swimming or sledding. Little Bird chose sledding and Little Pie chose swimming so I had to be the tie breaker. While both are not necessarily easy activities to do, I tried to chose the one that would be less of a hassle. I decided against swimming today because I was sure the whole crowded locker room, constantly getting out of the pool to pee, and the mess of getting two whiny, cranky and cold girls showered and dressed afterwards (all the while freezing myself) would be just too much. 

So instead I thought spending 30 minutes getting us all dressed in 17 layers, loaded into the car and unloaded 4 minutes later at the sledding hill was going to be easier.

It ended up being super hilarious!

We started with each girl taking a turn with me down the hill. They quickly let me know that they wanted to go on their own and before I knew it, the were both zooming down the hill screeching all the way.

I got some video even though it was hard to get them situated on the sled and get my camera going. Little Pie's sled took off without her a couple of times because she couldn't quite get on it by herself. They both did great hiking back up the hill after each turn, but after about 45 minutes of sledding they were ready to call it a day.