Ahoy - it's a cauliflower

I might have mentioned that I have been growing two cauliflower and two broccoli plants in my raised garden.  Fred Olver, our neighbor, gave them to me because he only wanted four plants and he had to buy them in packs of six. So, I accepted them and planted them and watched them grow but I didn't think they were producing anything but large leaves. Well, having never grown cauliflower before, I didn't know that the inner leaves cradle and cover the head so this past week, I was just about to pull them up when I peeked closer and lookie what I found!  A cauliflower head ready to be picked and another one that will be ready next week.  The broccoli is not doing so hot - I see one teeny tiny head the size of an hors d'oeuvres.  Hmmmmm

How has my first full week of freedom been? Marvelous!!!  I feel more relaxed. I have started doing 10-15 minute yoga via YouTube each morning. I have slept better. And, I have had fun getting things done: yard, planting the rest of the vegetable garden, sewing, family history. I watched the 3rd Guardians of the Galaxy on my own.  Even though it was sad, I loved how the characters were fleshed out in this film and it was fun to see Nathan Fillion's cameo role. Steve and I watched Titan AE (on loan from Elise). Steve started Forever Strong (another Elise loan) and I finished watching it with him. Both good movies. We watched a Picard episode on Friday and last night, we watched Mr Peabody and Sherman that I checked out from the library and it was so fun to watch and reminisce about the original cartoon episodes we watched as kids.   

I ended up NOT teaching driving on Monday morning (whew) but helped ladies sew pillows instead. The Thursday evening English classes had to be cancelled due to extensive repair work to the tall accordion doors in the cultural hall. It was nice to have the night off.  Steve and I got to the temple Friday afternoon and we worked in the baptistry Saturday morning. I gave piano lessons to Quinn and Larkin afterwards - it had been two months since their last lesson!  AND we wished happy birthday to both Steven on Friday and Julina on Saturday. 

It has been a great week!

I'M FINISHED....I'M FREE!

As of Tuesday evening's all district strings concert, I am officially through with teaching strings at Mehlville schools. I am SO relieved. I submitted my resignation on Wednesday. Here is a photo of my students as they wait for the concert to start...

The concert was only an hour long. It started with the beginning orchestra (my group) and then we heard the advanced elementary school orchestra followed by the combined middle school ensemble and the combined high school orchestra. The grand finale was an arrangement of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star that involved all the groups.  It went pretty well. The Mehlville strings program overall is rather weak compared to surrounding school districts like Parkway and Rockwood but sadly, it won't ever get stronger until they reconfigure their beginning strings program to more than two thirty-minute lessons every week and lump it in with programs like learning magic or jewelry making classes. Playing a violin is a whole lot more difficult than doing a card trick, in my opinion. Plus, the students and their parents don't seem to grasp the importance of regular practice. Oh, well, not my problem any more.  YAY!!!!  Just to add a nice finish, as I pulled into the driveway after the concert, our neighbor Sergio was grilling his thin-cut steaks that he always makes and he shared two with me and Steve. A delicious way to end my night. 

I spent my mornings starting on Wednesday doing much needed and much enjoyed yardwork. (usually, my mornings have been driving to teach). I have planted all the bedding plants we bought last Saturday, I found some ever-bear strawberries to put in the half barrel on the deck.  I picked a large mess of lettuce again. I put in my elephant ears and I have started pulling weeds that are trying to take over the back forty.  Saturday morning, Steve and I hauled an Element full of mulch to put down on our turn-around that had become a mud hole from all the rain we have had. And, we have had gorgeous weather to do all of this in.  

A neighbor was getting rid of a small dining table early this week and Steve and I drove the Element over and picked it up. I thought I might use it as a sewing table but it is just too large so it is now my project table downstairs. It is VERY heavy so moving it around was kind of a challenge. I cleaned it up with some wood soap and polished it with Old English and it looks great!  I love free things 😁

Fred has taken Star with him and Stacey on morning walks the last few days. I snapped this photo on Thursday....

                                                                             

I started my week at the church with the Afghanistan refugee women's group. The director asked if I would be willing to help Latifa learn to drive so I agreed. I drove her car from her house to the church and back and that is what we practiced in.  With the aid of Google translate, because she speaks practically no English, I learned that she had never been behind a wheel before. So, we just drove around the church parking lot and even that was rather scary!  First of all, I had to teach her that she only used her right foot for everything.  And, to press the brake pedal gently.  She seems pretty weak in spatial perception as we had several near misses with the parking lot islands and she definitely had a hard time keeping the car in a straight line! I honestly don't remember it being so challenging when teaching my own children to drive. I was very relieved when our session ended!  This is the women's group that I have been doing embroidery with in past months. Remember I had a bunch of pre-printed quilt squares donated to me and I suggested that the refugee women and teen girls might like to work on them to be pillow tops. It was a nice project for a few weeks but very little progress was being made so interest waned. Winona, the director, thought that maybe if they could see a finished product, it might spur them to want to resume so I have been working on my own square for the last few weeks. Tomorrow is when I need to have it finished so I have been more dedicated in my embroidering this past week and I finally completed it today! It has been an all out push to the finish line. I had to make a trip to JoAnn yesterday to find appropriate fabric for the backing. I am turning it into a pillow slip cover for our family room couch pillows.  Here it is with the sample of the backing in front of the pillow. 

Speaking of pillows, if the ladies do not want to finish their embroidery, Winona sent me home with some fabric pieces that I cut into squares for an easier pillow project - no hand work needed, just a sewing machine. So, tomorrow morning will be pillows and I just got a text that there will be more driving instruction for me and Latifa (shudder).

 In addition to going to a fabric store (and hauling mulch) on Saturday, Steve and I also attended a baptism, I had a short rehearsal for a musical number for next Sunday, and I also had a tiny recital for Jaxson, my piano student, who couldn't come to last week's recital so just he and his parents and two little brothers came to watch him play his four short piano pieces. Then we had cookies and milk to celebrate.  

Steve and I watched the Sound of Music yesterday and today (while I embroidered), and two episodes each of Bull and Picard. As I was cutting out the fabric for simple pillows, I watched on YouTube the film Lt. Kije.  For our December concert, the Civic Orchestra played the score that Prokofiev wrote for the film. It was made in the thirties and it is quite a silly movie - as it was intended to be....to poke fun at the Russian aristocracy prior to the revolution. 

We also made two temple trips this week - one on Tuesday morning to make up for missing last week and our usual Friday afternoon one.  So, while it seems like this week was a busy as ever, it sure seemed to be a lighter load but that was because much of what we did were things I wanted and liked to do. And, it all culminated in Mother's Day today. Steve fixed pancakes and sausage for my breakfast. He gave me a three-rose corsage. I sang God Is Love in a women's trio in Sacrament meeting. We took a very long afternoon nap and enjoyed BBQ ribs, potato salad, coleslaw, corn on the cob and strawberry shortcake for dinner. It has been a great day and a great week.

 

May Time

First of all, a garden report:  I finally got out to buy bedding plants but it looks like my snapdragons from last year re-seeded themselves.  I compared the leaves with the snapdragons I just bought and they look the same. They are in the pot with some of the assorted items I find on my morning walks .

My iris are just gorgeous. I photographed two views because the orange iris were not visible in one of the pictures.  Peonies and dianthus and SO MUCH LETTUCE! What a nice problem. The ziploc bag is full of the spinach also growing in the lettuce.

I bought some squirrel-specific food this past week just to keep the little buggers happy but they still dump my bird seed feeders. Happily, the birds are content to eat from the ground as well as the feeder. And, a very pretty pigeon has discovered our feeder. He is part of a huge flock that hangs around the alley but none have ventured up to our driveway until this fat guy.

On Wednesday, Fred adopted a puppy to be a baby sister to Stacy. Her name is Stardust and he calls her Star. She is a Boston terrior / pit bull mix and is six months old. I love the freckles on her nose and her eye patches! Steve was part of the two-day process as he was Fred's driver to and from the Humane Society.

Wednesday night, Steve and I drove to Ballwin to attend Noah's orchestra concert. They have a new conductor this year and he is someone with whom I played in the Columbia Civic Orchestra cello section pre-mission. He is doing a terrific job.  We returned home to a catastrophe, though. I had prepared certificates for my Mehlville strings students and I stapled a little bag of Hershey hugs and kisses (two of each) to each document and I loaded the ones to give out to my Thursday students in my teaching bag before we left for the concert.  Well, Sally found them and consumed all of the candy! She made a horrific chocolate mess on the sheet covering the front couch and, by the time we got home, she was showing all the classic symptoms of chocolate poisoning (thanks internet) - excessive thirst, panting, agitation.  But, because of the over abundance of information on the internet, I was overwhelmed as to what to do. Finally, I called the after-hours number for Open Door Animal Rescue and was advised to make her vomit with hydrogen peroxide.  So, we did and she did - four times on our bedroom floor - and, she was all better almost immediately.  Whew!!!!!

Friday night was the Yo Yo Ma concert!  We decided to postpone our usual temple appointment Friday afternoon so Sally wouldn't be alone for too long and that was a good decision. It allowed us to have a calm Friday afternoon and to leave in plenty of time for the concert because there was a Luke Brian concert at the Enterprise Center right next door to the Stifel Theater so downtown was a mass of humanity in their vehicles. But, we found a decent parking spot not too far away. Yay! The concert was SO marvelous. The first piece was Debussy's La Mer - gorgeous. Then, it was the Elgar cello concerto and Yo Yo Ma was just flawless. What an amazing night!

Saturday morning we worked at the temple baptistry. Afterwards, we hung out at Emily's to eat lunch and take a nap before returning to the temple at 2:00 to help plant flowers. Our stake was assigned the 2-4:00 time slot for the service. Many families showed up so there were plenty of helping hands.  Because of that, Steve and I stayed about thirty minutes and then we headed home to give the children the opportunity to participate more actively. 

Saturday night, in honor of May the Fourth, we watched The Force Awakens.  

This afternoon was my spring recital featuring my four home school orchestra students and my only in-person cello students.  I will have another smaller recital this coming Saturday for my in-person piano student, Jaxson, who couldn't attend today. Larkin and Quinn also had a conflict today so it was a short recital. But a good one!