Last Orchestra Recital!

A Scurvy Group of Mateys!

Relaxing!

Mozart: Theme

A while ago, I mentioned that Hannah had convinced her piano teacher to let her work on Mozart's "Ah, Vous Dirai-Je, Maman", commonly known as the "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" tune. She has been working on it for many months now and has learned all twelve variations. Now she is working on perfecting the speed (fast!) and perfecting the trills. I recorded the whole song but thought that 23 minutes of piano playing might be too much for one blog post so now we are recording them as variations. I am so proud of how much hard work Hannah has put into this and my new advice for parents whose kids may not want to practice is to let them choose the song. Fortunately, we have an incredible piano teacher who let her choose this difficult piece and had faith in Hannah that she could accomplish it!

Mozart: Variation 1

Mozart: Variation 2

At the Playground!

Dress Rehearsal!

Old Friends!

Our friends who moved to Pittsburgh after Mason finished preschool are moving back! It was so fun to watch the girls play as though they had not missed any time at all! Dylan took to his new friend immediately as well! We are so happy that they are moving back!

Summer is Back!

Goofball!

Swimming!

This guy's swimming lessons have really paid off. For the first time, he swam all over the pool with no life jacket, deep end included!

Play Rehearsal!

This sort of reminds me of when Mason was in Kindergarten. Some time during the middle of Kindergarten year, I started getting calls from parents to let me know that they would love for their child to participate in our after school book club (at my house). Since I had never heard of such a thing, I started looking into it and it turns out that Mason had made invitations at school and passed them out to friends. The invitations were for a book club at her house. Of course, I had to go along with it and we had a nice little bookish afternoon.

This time, she has written a long and actually quite entertaining play, so entertaining that lots of friends want to participate. I had no idea how to go about putting on a play with so many characters right here at our house. So, Mason put the whole thing together, organized a read through after school and showed up with nine girls, who, surprisingly enough, were able to curtail the giggling and actually read through the play (for the most part). I guess we'll see where it goes from here. One of the amazing parts of watching your kid grow up is seeing them put things like this together. I am very proud of her!

Magic Show at Zoe's Party!

A New Book!

Our little guy wants to write stories all the time these days! The process changed a bit between this book and the last. This time, when the drawings were finished and it was time to write, he got out his sight word cards (which we have hardly ever used for lack of interest) and his ball that has all of the planets and their names. Then, when he needed a word, he would try to find it in his cards or look at his planet ball. The others he sounded out, this time with less help. Here is the latest:

1. A space ship was leaving Earth.
2. The robot made an explosion on Uranus.

3. The planets changed and now the Earth is by the sun. Now everybody died. (tragic and dark, I know, but if the sun was right next to the Earth, it is a logical conclusion...)

4. Another robot exploded on Jupiter.


5. The robot walked to the man who made him.
6. Now they are friends and he is sad that he exploded his new friend. (Really, a lesson can be learned here. Don't randomly explode anyone-- they might become your closest friend and you will feel real bad!)


7. The robot met his friend on the moon.

8. The space ship shined its lights on Jupiter.

9. On Jupiter, suddenly there was a big fire.

10. They had to leave. (The larger robots are their mommies. One had to go home to Earth and the other's home is Mars. Dylan says that they really don't have to be too sad because they can visit each other with one jump since they are robots.)

Cousins!

You really can't get these hooligans to pose for a decent picture anymore. I mean, really, how hard is it to sit and smile? Must we make faces??? Must we complain the minute we see the camera? Don't they know me at all???

At least these two below can pull it together sometimes...

Easter!

Hannah decorated the cake!