Chopin, I haven't forgotten you

I realized something so incredibly sad today. I was playing Christmas music on the piano today and thought to myself, “Well, here I am again, the one time of the year I play the piano for FUN.”

What a horrible realization.

I started piano lessons at age 6 or 7. It was something at which I always excelled. I remember getting up early before school so that I could practice for an HOUR. An HOUR! And I was in grade school! I loved my piano teacher, and I loved to play the piano.

I miss that so much!

I miss working so hard on a difficult classical piece and getting so drawn into the music, feeling its power and emotion and playing it how it was meant to be played. Chopin is probably my favorite: Nocturne Op.9 No.2, Revolutionary Etude, Fantasie Impromptu, seriously the best. I would work on runs and scales, one note at a time. My piano teacher would always tell me, “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.” He was so awesome. He was so laid back and just pushed my strengths. He would sit and play for me, and listening to him was so inspiring.

Of course I was a typical kid and didn’t always love going to lessons and practicing, and I remember my mom would MAKE me play for relatives and I hated that. I was shy, and I did NOT like playing in front of people. Every Wednesday we’d visit my oma and opa and oma would ask me if I brought my books so I could play for her. I used to dread that. I always felt very close to oma, and yet I was so selfish that I’d get annoyed at her for wanting me to play the piano when I really just wanted to watch TV.

Then she got sicker and sicker. And soon I found myself wanting to play for her because I knew it made her happy. The sicker she got, the softer she spoke and it was SO hard to understand her sometimes with her thick German accent. I felt so frustrated because she would try and talk to me and I just could not understand her. Communicating with her became so hard. But when I played the piano for her, it was like we were both on the same page. I remember sometimes she would start sobbing during the middle of a song. Aah I can’t even write about it. I remember specifically she would cry when I played “Traumerei” by Robert Schumann. “Traumerei” means “dreaming” in German. That beautiful song still chokes me up.

You know, it was those times playing for oma that changed the way I looked at piano. I mean, I always enjoyed playing, but I didn’t realize how music really affected somebody. Oma was dying, and she wanted me to play. That was what she wanted from me in that last little bit of time she had on earth. She once told me, “When I die, I hope they let me come down and listen to you.” She died right after I turned 16.

And now I hardly play for enjoyment anymore... and she must be so sad.

I don’t know how it happened... oh yes, I do, its called kids, and life. But as soon as Christmas season rolls around you can bet I will be playing the piano and pulling out old stuff.

And when I do play it stirs something inside me. It uses a whole different part of my brain that's been saying, "Help me!" And I feel like I need to be developing my talent again. I mean, everyone knows I play, I’m the ward choir accompanist... but even that is sort of robotic. I have not challenged myself to a classical piece of music in so long. The stuff I used to play so well I struggle with now. My mind knows how to play it but my fingers are out of practice. I mean, what happened to me?

I think I should work on one song a day or something, actually play with my heart. For me, but also for my kids, I want them to grow up in a musical home, I mean we sing lots but I want them to play the piano someday, too. And also, for oma.

Turkey turkey turkey turkey turkey and other stuff.

I LOVE TURKEY!!!!!

I know Thanksgiving is about being thankful, blah blah blah, but really when it all comes down to it turkey is really the most important thing about the day for me. Pumpkin pie is a close second.

Don't worry, I'm kidding. Sort of.

Anyway here's a lot of pictures from that great day. At my parent's:







My brother Kenny leaves next week for 2 years. I don't know what my kids will do without Uncle Kenny.

And now for our second meal of the day. What can I say, we are pigs. Thank you to both our families for feeding us, it was DELISH! And a special thanks to Bryant for screwing up the pecan pie this year just like I did last year! See! I'm not the only one!! hee hee. I should have taken a picture... just imagine pure liquid. Fortunately I managed to bring fully edible items this year.





So these pictures are from last week. My mom-in-law and 2 of my sister-in-laws made gingerbread houses again this year!!! It is a lot of work but SO FUN. I mean, who wouldn't want to spend hours and hours on something that looks like THIS!





My poor kids stare at it longingly every day. How mean of me to display such a temptation, sigh.

Hope you had a good Thanksgiving! If you don't want your leftover turkey... I'm just sayin...

I don't like it! Then again...

I don’t like snot.

But I can’t help smiling when Logan’s snot-smeared face slobbers me with kisses... so gross, but sooooo sweet.

I don’t like fingerprints all over my walls.

But I can’t help smiling when I notice the cluster of smudges in the same spot on every door because that is where their little hands reach. They will only be so little for so long.

I don’t like getting woken up in the middle of the night.

But I can’t help smiling when that little body snuggles up next to me cause mommy makes bad dreams all better.

I don’t like marker scribbles all over the table.

But I can’t help smiling when I see the pictures they drew for me!

I don’t like when the kids throw every cushion and pillow and blanket down the stairs.

But I can’t help smiling when I see how much fun they have jumping into them.

I don’t like when the kids won’t nap.

But I can’t help smiling when I hear them singing with each other from separate rooms.

I don't like when the kids spill water all over the coffee table.

But I can't help but smile when they invite me over for the "tea" and "soup" they made for me.

I don’t like when the kids find my camera and play with it and get fingerprints all over the lens, agh!

But I can’t help smiling when I see some of the pictures they take. These are from the last couple months. (Logan is their favorite subject.)












And last but not least!!! I don’t like when wet cereal gets encrusted to the floor.

And yet... watching Logan try to eat it is pretty darn funny.




Yucky!

CALLING ALL PATIENT MOTHERS.

Today the kids were driving me crazy. I yelled, I mean, YELLED, at them a lot.

Then I felt really bad for losing my patience and getting so angry. Then I thought: how else do I let them know I am S.E.R.I.O.U.S.? How do other moms do it? Cause these time-out things aren’t working out for me anymore.

Sigh.

Then I read all the scriptures under “patience” in the Bible dictionary (I needed divine help, trust me.) And I wondered... are there really moms out there who handle little stinkers “patiently”? And if so, WHAT’S YOUR SECRET? I would love to be a mom that kindly and sweetly explains to my children that what they did is wrong and hear them say, “Yes, mommy, we understand, and we will never do it again cause we actually listen sometimes and we love each other so much we will never fight again and guess what mom, we won’t ever whine cause we looooooove you!” and then we’d give each other hugs and kisses and talk about making good choices.

Yeah. Not happening.

The thing that makes me the most crazy is when I'm so mad at Carter and he is struggling to keep a straight face, like my "mad face" is just so comical he cannot contain his amusement. Come on! I told Nate about that, and he told me, "Wow. There is no way I would ever think your mad face is funny. It's terrifying, actually."

Or something to that effect.

I would just like to point out that it has just been a bad day. Meaning, I do have patience most of the time. Okay, some of the time. Okay, maybe I should ask my kids if they think their momma has “patience.” (The other day I heard Carter telling someone, "You're makin' me crazy!" Hmm, who did he get that from.)

Love being a mom...

But just in case, why don’t you tell me all your secrets.

Nate and Miracle Max

Have you ever spent your whole life thinking one thing and finding out you were WAY OFF?

So this is probably a “you had to be there” moment, but it's so fun to tease. Nate and I had a funny conversation. We thought it’d be fun to show Jenna the movie “The Princess Bride” (fast-forwarding through the stuff like torture and oh, giant rats attacking people, things like that...) and we were watching the scene at Miracle Max’s. Then I hear Nate say, “See, Jenna, they’re giving him a miracle bell.”

I was like, “A miracle BELL?”

Nate says, “Yeah, a miracle bell.”

I really thought he was joking. I say, “You mean a miracle PILL.”

He looks at me like I’m the dumb one and says, “No, a miracle BELL!”

I am still not understanding... a miracle BELL, that doesn’t make any sense. I'm thinking, is there something offensive about the word "pill" he doesn't want Jenna to hear? I ask, “What the heck is a miracle bell? Are you serious?”

He explains, “A Miracle BELL, like, DING DING.”

I say, “I KNOW what a BELL is, but you realize he is saying PILL, right?”

He says, “They didn’t have pills back then!”

Then I am laughing, because at that moment I realize he is serious and now I get to mock him mercilessly. As I am gasping for air I exclaim, “WHAT are you TALKING about!?”

I mean, surely Nate has not actually believed for the last 20 years that something called a Miracle BELL saved Westley’s life.

Then he looked it up and he felt pretty stupid, but we laughed hard.

Sometimes it’s so fun to laugh at, I mean, with, your spouse.

Love you Nate! You owe me a massage!!!

The Halloween Post

Happy Halloween!! We had a beautiful Cinderella, a valiant knight, and a reluctant cow.







My super kind friend Amber let me borrow the Cinderella and knight costumes (and a big thanks to my friend Michelle for the cow!) and when Amber dropped them off she says, "AND here is a Snow White costume for you if you want to wear it!" and while I did hesitate, after all, everyone knows Snow White is the ugly one, I decided to GO FOR IT.



And I was so excited because we had a red cape and a semi-puffy shirt so Nate could be my Prince!!!!! Then he tried it on, and said he felt stupid, because, and I quote, "Nobody will know who I am." And so, he decided to go for the apparently less-stupid look, and my 27-year-old husband dressed up as Harry Potter.


Hey, I'm just glad he dressed up with me!

So, in years past we've had a couple of close calls where we ran out of candy. In fact, when we were first married, we did, so we were going through our drawers handing out Little Debbie cakes, granola bars, and money. This year, I was like, I am not going to stress out that i'm gonna run out so I grabbed a bunch of candy at the store. And when I counted later, that "bunch" turned out to be enough to feed exactly 542 trick-or-treaters.

Needless to say I'm going to be eating candy until next Halloween. What was I thinkin!

Oh well, Happy Halloween!!! Time to break out the Christmas music (yes I am one of those people.)