Last Two Weeks of May

May is just about over.  Wow.  The last two weeks of this month have been fairly routine which is one reason I did not blog last Sunday.  Another reason is that we had stake conference and my usual morning blog time was taken up in church meetings.  We had two visiting General Authorities – Elders Arnold and Carpenter. 

Speaking of visits, we had a nice surprise Wednesday, the 18^th when a high school buddy of Steve’s contacted us to say he and his wife were driving through Columbia in the evening and would we be home to stop and visit.  Happily, we WERE home and we had a great hour and a half chat.  They have  lived these past fifteen years in Lincoln, Nebraska and this is the first time we have connected.  Hopefully, it won’t be another fifteen years before we visit again.

Some milestones in the past two weeks:  Steven turned 34 on the 17^th and Julina turned 40 (!!!!) on the 18^th.  And, we celebrated twenty years in this house on Parker Street on the 18^th.  

 

 Netflix report – I have not had a lot of time to watch movies but I did see “White Fang” with a very young Ethan Hawke.  And, Elise and I watched "The Lovely Bones".  It was good but kind of strange and Elise wondered how it compared to the book. 

I have been trying to take care of some projects that have been hanging over my head.  For example, I needed to take care of some of our walls – cleaning baseboards and touching up scuffs and dings with some paint.  I could never see how the “magic eraser” could help me since I no longer have kids to mark up walls but I am here to testify that they are amazing.  The scuffs came right off!  Another project was to deep clean the little grooves in our bathroom floor.  The truck needed to have tax and license paid by the end of the month. 

Steve and I took a little outing on Wednesday, the 25^th to Apple Wagon Antiques located about 30 miles from Columbia.  

 

 

  So fun! 

I bought a front basket for my bike so I can take Sadie on rides.  She was somewhat nervous the first couple of times but now she rides like a pro.  I just make sure she is strapped in so she won’t jump out.  

 

 More “Christmas” amaryllis blooms. 

 

Yard work never ends.  I finally planted the Mother’s Day azaleas.  I finally weeded the fancy iris bed.  The pie-cherry tree is starting to get ripe so out came the net to keep birds from feasting.  I am picking strawberries and the blackberries and raspberries are almost ripe.  The vegetable garden is looking mighty fine  

 

but, sadly, a large branch from our old peach tree broke off the other day. 

I am involved in a photo project for the Refugee office for International Refugee Day in June.  I picked two families to feature.  One family -  a mother, and her son, three daughters and two grandchildren is from Somalia and the other family is from Eretrea.

 

Sharing Day was yesterday.  LOTS of stuff to give away.  I was able to collect items to go to the refugees.  Do you spy Steve in this photo?

 
Melanie moved to a one-level apartment on Friday. 

 

Melanie drove the HUGE moving truck all by herself!

I will close with a shot of Steve and Trissy on one of our morning walks...

Russian feast - Mid-Missouri style

 Steven decided that his 34th birthday celebration should be a Russian feast - in memory of his two- year mission in Russia.   And, in order not to put his poor mother in an early grave by asking her fix every dish, he divided up the cooking duties among the guests and we all go to try our hand at Russian cooking.  Wonderful idea and wonderful results!  Steven made borscht,

 Melanie made shashliki (skewered and grilled meat), Emily fixed pierogi,

I did pelmeni (meat-filled dumplings), Sarah fixed golubtsi (stuffed cabbage rolls).  The Taylor family (Steve Taylor also served a mission in Russia) brought plov (seasoned rice with chicken), and black bread (dark rye) topped with sguschonka (sweetened condensed milk cooked to a caramel-like flavor and color). To finish it off - Elise fixed a tort Napolyon, a layered pastry and custard cake. 

The weather was gorgeous and Steve had just mowed the back lawn (and picked up dog poo) so we set up tables outside. 

 
 
 
 Tamara, Elise, Noah, and the birthday boy...


 Joe, Emily, Quinn, and Lucy

Alicia, Sarah, Steve, Cameron, and Will Taylor.

After gorging ourselves on delicious food...

 we started a fire in the pit.  The kids had a blast finding sticks to feed the fire and, thankfully, I had a handful of marshmallows for roasting.

Here is the birthday boy blowing out his candles

 Earlier in the day, Emily, Steven, Sarah, and the Southerland clan visited Rock Bridge State Park.

I love this photo Emily took of Lucy in our front yard enjoying my daisies.  As they were preparing to leave Sunday morning, Emily made each kid a daisy chain.

Aside from our exciting Saturday, the rest of the week was pretty average stuff.  I did get to visit a miracle woman, though, on Wednesday.  Sarah Everett is a lovely woman I visit teach.  She joined the church about 9 years ago but was never very active - mostly because she really couldn't lick her smoking or drinking habits.  March 16th, she went to the hospital and was intubated the next day and put into the MICU.  Because of her smoker lungs, she was difficult to extubate, even after getting a tracheotomy.  A month into her ordeal and her kidneys started to fail.  Eventually, she was put on "comfort care" and we all just waited for her to die.  But, she didn't.  Her kidneys started to get better.  She was finally extubated.  And, when I saw her on Wednesday, she was out of the MICU and alert and talking and her old self again.  She was waiting to be discharged to a rehabilitation center for physical therapy to regain her strength.   Wow!

A week of firsts

 Tuesday, it was my first time volunteering at the Refugee and Immigration Services office (RIS).  I will do an assortment of jobs.  For my first day, I worked at trying to remember names, I did some research on the four major countries where our refugees come from (Eritrea, Somalia, Republic of Congo, and Arab states), I sat at the reception desk, and I drove a Somali client and her son to a doctor appointment in one of the agency vehicles.  It looks like I will help with a photo/writing task to highlight some our clients in a refugee awareness effort – similar to the Humans of New York project. 

Saturday was Steve’s and my first day as workers in the St. Louis Temple.  We will work 1^st and 3^rd Saturdays from 11- 8.  As can be imagined, we were really tired afterwards but it is going to be great. 

It was my first piano lesson with Noah.  Every time we come to the temple, I will give Noah a lesson.  We might try Face-Time lessons on the alternate weeks.  I am so excited to be doing this. 

Friday was NOT my first time to play music at Candlelight Lodge.  This time it was the Mother’s Day Tea.  It WAS my first time to play Broadway and Movie hits with Suzanne and Tamara Kitchen.  We had a fun time with this music. It will likely be my LAST time playing with Tamara as she gets married in a month and will not be in Columbia much after that.  I guess unless her husband finds a job here.  That would be nice.

 

On our bike ride to the pharmacy one foggy morning last week, look at what we saw in this evergreen shrub – highlighted by the moisture in the air…. (bugs, BEWARE!!!)

  

 I got this pitcher and glasses from my cousin, Jan Winfield.  She inherited them from our Grandma Fraedrich (notice the etched initials in the pitcher - MHF: Mabel Harris Fraedrich.  The glasses are also etched).  She no longer wanted them and her son didn't either so she asked if I wanted them.  SURE THING!  I helped her with the shipping costs (I have NEVER seen so much packing peanuts and bubble wrap!) and they arrive on Thursday.  What a treasure

 

 Remember the amaryllis in the dark closet story?  Well, here is one of them today.  It is just stunning!

 

 This beautiful plant was a gift.  

 A week ago, I snapped this photo of the lone hybred yellow iris among the more common purple iris.  There is a life lesson here....

 

 The purple iris lining my walk way are all gone now but the daisies have just outdone themselves this year...

 

 Finally, Happy Mother's Day!  Steve didn't have any traveling assignments today so he made me waffles and bacon and fried eggs for breakfast.  When we saw Emily yesterday, she gave me this azalea 

 And Steve's gift to me is this little water fountain that I wanted for the lovely sound of running water and to provide water for the birds I feed on my back deck.

Music at the end of April

State music festival was on Thursday and my one student, Ethan, played his Haydn concerto and got a “one”.  Here I am with him and his voice teacher, Michael Straw, and his accompanist, Judy Shaw. 

 

 He will have a senior recital in cello and voice sometime this summer so I will continue to teach him a couple more months before he heads off to college.     I don't usually get to teach "advanced" students so it has really been a joy to teach him this past year.

I had my studio recital on Saturday and I forgot to get a group shot.  Here are a couple of photos with individual students, though. 

 This is Erica.  She is becoming "advanced" (she is in Suzuki 5) but she is also a pianist and, when she started with me, her mother made it very clear that piano was her primary instrument so pushing her on cello is not an option.  In spite of this restriction, she is still a very good cellist.

 

 This is Nathan.  And this is a sad photo for me because he is now going to study with another cello teacher.  Someone who is more "impressive" but, in my opinion, in name only.  I have first hand knowledge of how he teaches and it is pretty pathetic.  I will be surprised if he can help Nathan much.   He has just blossomed this past year on his cello - starting to take it seriously.  He has an amazingly mature sound and a very nice cello.  And, now he is leaving.  Sigh. 

 On my way to and from the recital, I got to take care of Sarah’s dogs (yes, plural) since she was in St. Louis all day celebrating her birthday with friends.  Sarah is considering adopting this puppy. 

  shown here visit with Bacon in our back yard.  

 Her name is Lilly and she is a blue heeler / Australian shepherd mix.  One of my piano students, Kiersten, needed a ride to the recital and it was a good thing she was with me because Bones and Lilly were a handful  - just ask Steven who also helped with their care yesterday. 

Steve helped me pit some thawed-out frozen cherries on Friday night while we watched Sherlock so I could make two batches of cherry jam and one batch of cherry jelly (thawed out cherries are REALLY juicy) on Saturday morning.  Mmmm. 

Steve and I enjoyed dinner and wonderful conversation with friends twice this week:  Monday it was with Jean Pry.  Friday it was with the missionaries and Marilou Bellamy (I visit teach her) and her husband, George. 

Steve and I had a fun outing Friday during the day.  We loaded up our bikes in the truck bed and first went to visit teach Jenna Herron up in Hallsville.  Then, we drove down to the Grindstone Wal-Mart for an oil change and while it was being done, we rode our bikes the short distance to Jo-Ann’s fabrics, Hy-Vee, and then lunch at Wendy’s.  The weather was just perfect.   

I substituted in the junior/senior class in seminary this past week.  I loved it.  It also took three hours out of each day – teaching and preparing lessons. 

And, now it is May.