Music stuff...... what else?

Just a quick update from this past week.  It was one full of music - BIG surprise there. But, this was more than usual.  Monday night was an RTO rehearsal.  Tuesday night was my first high school orchestra concert and I was a little nervous.  But, we were well prepared in our music and I am please to say it showed in our performance. We did Folk Tune and Fiddle Dance, Waltz of the Wicked, Adagio (the famous one by Albinoni), and Blue Rhythmico.   In between  the four large ensemble numbers, a few students performed solos or duets.  Those numbers also turned out wonderfully - even my senior boy who is autistic and kept messing up in rehearsal with his memorization of Moonlight Sonata.  He remembered to bring his music that night and he played with only a couple of glitches.  Another senior played a brilliant violin solo and she also performed an original piano composition.  I was so happy with how the concert went that afterward, I bought myself a frozen custard!  Thursday night I had tickets to hear a "world class" cellist. Two other cellists from CCO and I went together and I was really looking forward to the performance.  But, I left at intermission because, while he was clearly a brilliant musician and his cello was a masterpiece, I just couldn't justify sitting through the 20th and 21st century noise he played.  If I wanted to listen to all the crazy and bizarre sounds a cello can make, I can do that myself!  I had spent the entire afternoon trying NOT to fall asleep during my students lessons at CMU and do you think I could doze off in the concert - heck no!  So, I left and made very good use of my time here at home doing lesson plans.  Friday night, the Rock Bridge high school quartet was enlisted to play background music at a banquet for a school office workers conference.  We don't have a strong violist so we had to recruit across town at Hickman for one.  None of quartet had ever rehearsed together (we were too busy preparing for our concert!) and most had not really even looked at the gig books - but, thankfully, they were all solid enough musicians that they performed with very few mishaps.  I was required to be there so I sat between the second violin and viola and tapped an unobtrusive beat pattern for them to follow.  Saturday, Prairie Strings had their own banquet to play for at the elegant Tiger Hotel.  It was nice to put away the Pachelbel Canon and Bridal Chorus and break out the Mozart Divertimenti and some Bach Brandenburgs as well as his Double Violin Concerto for a change.  The hour and a half went by really quickly as a result.  Saturday morning began very early as we left at 5:30 to make the 7:30 session at the temple.  We then attended Noah's preschool's Fall Festival and enjoyed ourselves very much.  I forgot my camera - Emily's photos won't be ready to show for awhile - and I took a few pictures on my phone.  If I can figure out how to transfer them to the computer, you may get to see how cute Lucy and Noah were.  Stay tuned....

Signs of the times

Renaissance Festival – Prairie Days – leaf raking – corn maze……yep, it is definitely autumn time. 

 Emily, Joe, Noah and Lucy were here Friday and Saturday 

 

and Noah and grandpa got to have some time in the back yard with the leaves.

 

 

 

 

 Before Noah got to jump into leaf piles, he went camping with his dad, grandpa, and uncle Steve the night before at ward father-son campout.  The weekend forecast was not a dry one and the guys did have about 45 minutes of rain during the night, but our new tent kept everyone dry.  We had a bit of a reprieve Saturday morning for the corn maze......

Not surprisingly, Noah and Lucy were quite fascinated with the kernels of corn

but by the afternoon, the skies opened up again and just dumped!  Poor Sarah had rain at the Renaissance Festival and Nellie and I (she is a fiddle player) drove in rain all the way to and from Prairie Days down at Cole Camp (1 ½ hour drive one-way).  Thankfully, the event was held under a huge tent so we stayed dry, although our bows suffered a bit from the humidity and it got pretty dark toward the end of our playing time.  This was our third year to play for Prairie Days – the second year for just Nellie and me.  I was so excited to play my bass this year but it doesn’t fit in the Volvo and the truck has just the open bed so I had to bring the cello instead.  Darn!  Maybe next year?

I tweeted how beautiful Central Methodist University is in the fall and Beckie asked me to take some photos.  Coincidentally, I needed to be in Fayette today for the Fayette branch conference.  I packed my camera in the car and Steve and I walked around campus afterwards and took pictures. 

 

 

 

 

 Pretty, huh? The drive to and from Fayette was also quite beautiful. 

Oh, I have a doggie story to tell.  While driving home Wednesday afternoon, I had just turned on to Blueridge Road when I saw a little dauchund in the middle of the road looking very lost.  No humans were around so, since there was no one behind me, I stopped the car and opened the door to see if he would come to me and, what do you know – he did.  (most dogs cannot RESIST a car ride, right?)  He let me pick him up (I can’t believe I never even thought of the possibility of him biting me!)  and I put him on my lap, made a U-turn, and took him straight to the Humane Society.  I need to call tomorrow to see if he was claimed because he had a collar and a tag (from Fayette, interestingly enough). 

Only other “news” to report is that I had my annual mammogram Tuesday afternoon (ouch!) and then a doctor appointment to get a flu shot and to find out why my knee hurts.  It is only painful when I kneel and, besides kneeling to pray, it is surprising how much I kneel down.  I am supposed to be putting ice on it, doing some exercises, and taking naproxen twice a day.  Then we will see what that does.

October 7th and all is well

I need to accept my new busy life and move on….but, oh, it was so hard to do that on Wednesday.  I was such a grumpy wimp as I drove all over town (I went to CIS THREE times!) and taught all day.  I really love what I do – what better way to earn money than to teach music? – and right now, I just get to do it a whole bunch.  I DID get to sit down at my sewing machine Thursday evening after a long day and it was grand.  I watched a documentary called “Please Vote For Me”  about a third grade class in China that decided to elect (rather than appoint) their classroom monitor.  It provided a FASCINATING glimpse into Chinese daily life while showing that bribery and bullying was the most effective way to win votes.  Hmmm…..Thanks, though, for that recommendation, Kirsti. 

Our weather has turned quite chilly over the last three days.  We actually turned on the heater this morning.  The cooler temperatures did not go well with the outdoor wedding the quartet had to play for yesterday evening.  Our violist was livid that we were going to still play but we currently do not have a low (or high) temperature limit clause in our wedding contracts so we really had to go ahead and suffer.  She made the most of it, though, by wearing my gloves and the two blankets I fetched from my trunk – one around her shoulders and one around her knees.  Too bad the bride’s colors were not forest green (with bits of pet hair), hot pink, or powder blue!  This was wedding #2 for the day.  Our first one was in Hermann – takes an hour to get there…..when there is not a traffic back-up on I-70, which there was as we were preparing to leave.  We got to the church, the second church we tried – aaak, hate getting lost – about 10 minutes before the ceremony was to begin.  That put a wacky spin on the whole proceedings for us but we muddled through and still got compliments afterward.  Thank goodness no music critics were on the guest list.  Finally, after the two weddings, Civic Orchestra had a concert last night.  We played two pieces by Beethoven (I can NEVER play too much Beethoven) and it was well received.  This will be my only fall concert with CCO as I have two school concerts conflicting with upcoming rehearsals for the November concert and I just don’t want to be any more busy than I already am by preparing for the December performance.  Hopefully, I can jump back into the game in January.

We went to St. Louis last weekend – started with the temple and finished with peeling wallpaper from Emily’s dining room walls.   

 

 

Oh, how evil the wallpaper/decorating industry was in the 80’s convincing homeowners to cover their entire homes.  However, the chore was made more pleasant by happy conversations and delightful grandchildren.  

 

 

   

 

  Lucy is officially walking – and doesn’t she look adorable in the pinafore Emily made for her?

Melanie finally received her graduation gift from the family.  We had to wait until she got the second diploma in the mail for Hobby Lobby to do the final matting.  

 

 Looks nice, doesn’t it?

OK, Music and the Spoken Word is about to begin and then General Conference.  I am so looking forward to all the sessions today.  I was sad to miss parts of both morning and afternoon sessions yesterday.  Thankfully, there is internet to replay everything as many times as we want.

Autumn is here and feels great!

 We had a nice surprise last Sunday.  Emily, Joe, Noah, and Lucy drove over from St. Louis just for dinner!  Following are some photos from that evening.

 

  Lucy playing with the lamb salt and pepper shakers at dinner

 

Noah demonstrating his drinking-straw glasses

 

 Emily and Joe

 

Sarah and Melanie

 

not a great photo of Steven and Tamara but Steven was busy clearing the table

Emily and Lucy

Noah and Sarah and I had a nice little walk around the block after eating and Noah collected all sorts of nature treasures.  Oh, I love that boy.  Lucy took steps that day – her first real ones.  Hooray!

The Really Terrible Orchestra had its first rehearsal of the season last Monday.  It looks like I will be the conductor of this group – that is OK with me.  We had three violins, one viola, four cellos, one trombone, one trumpet, and one flute show up.  And, they sounded pretty good for sight reading adult-beginners.

Other highlights of the week included lunch with my long-time friend and music colleague, Kaye Miller, on Tuesday.  Alfred had a vet appointment and he has lost weight!  He now weighs only 17 ½ pounds.  And, I get to put five drops of an antibiotic in his ears twice a day until Tuesday.  He is so big, I have to lay my whole body on him to keep him still while I count out the drops.  You know he LOVES that!  I got to watch a movie (Devil Wears Prada) and sew Wednesday evening.  Oh, it was so enjoyable.  (ah, my old life)  I picked up my repaired wedding band/diamond on Friday. And, Prairie Strings had three weddings on Saturday!  Two were at the same time so I split us up in twos and found substitutes.  As you can imagine, it took a bit of coordinating. 

Finally, Steve and I did more room shuffling on Saturday morning – this time, it was our bedroom.  We moved a small couch out (I really loved that couch but the fabric was torn and frayed and stained) and traded a brown book case for a black bookcase we bought from Beckie.  We also moved the bed around and transferred my bill-paying desk into the quilt room.  Just a bit of trivia – my mother  used this desk for bill paying when they lived in Payson.  And, the same desk was in my teenage bedroom in California  only it was painted green).  My dad painstakingly stripped the green paint off after I moved out but I can still see little bits of green in some of the out-of-the-way corners.  Before California, it was in the “office” bedroom in our house in El Paso. 

Here are photos of after the re-arranging….

 

 

Sadie likes the new set-up
 
the television is sitting on a PURPLE table - I love purple but not in that bedroom.  It will get painted sometime......
 
Here is the desk in the quilt room (the hanging quilt and the front quilt on the rack were both made by my Grandma Young) 

Cleaning time

I woke up this morning with a crick in my neck – probably because Steve and I spent all yesterday morning and I also spent the evening re-arranging bedrooms, now that Sarah and Beckie are back out of the nest.  In the room that Sarah occupied, we moved the bed around and added a tall bookcase (thanks to Beckie) to house all the children’s and Christmas books.  We purged the games from the top shelf in the closet and we moved all the toys into the quilt room closet and put all the family history tubs (both Steve’s and mine) in their place.  Here are photos.  

  

 

Notice the wood chest at the foot of the bed?  It belonged to Steve’s parents and it fit perfectly in the storage well in the back of the van we rented to attend Iola’s funeral.  It is a treasure.

While cleaning, look at the mother of all dust bunnies we found!

 

 

I moved all my sewing and craft tubs into the Noah’s Ark room closet last night and then I treated myself to a couple hours at the sewing machine while finishing up watching “Newsies”.  Oh, how I have missed sewing.  It is just not going to happen very much this year, I am sad to say.  Happily, though, teaching is great.  All my ensembles are making good progress and I am always energized when I am done.  Isn’t that crazy?  I will say, though, that I was extra tired during my Thursday teaching at Central Methodist and I could NOT stay away for my first student.  Thankfully, I have a 30-minute break right after him and I just leaned my head against the cinderblock wall in the practice room and had the best little 15-minute power nap! 

Steve and I visited Jenna for Family Home Evening on Monday.  I brought my cello and played some Bach for her and her housemate and the nurses aids.  Jenna cannot talk but we are all fairly certain there is a coherent woman trapped inside that palsied body.  Columbia Civic Orchestra started up on Tuesday.  We are playing a lot of Beethoven this year – love it!  Had a stake Relief Society presidency meeting on Wednesday night.  And the annual CIS family picnic was Friday evening.  Oh, and Prairie Strings had a wedding Saturday evening at a place north of Columbia called Alpine Park and Gardens.  It is SO lovely there under the tall trees and amid beautiful landscaping (not too fussy, mostly native plants).  But the bride’s mother was not present – she and the bride had a falling out a few years back and so she was not included in the celebration.  How incredibly sad is that?????

Finally, I have to show you some address labels we got in the mail recently.  These are the unsolicited kind from a charitable organization – you know the kind.  Sometime in the past, I requested they read
“The Lambson Family” (rather than just Steve Lambson or Jeanne Lambson because we also have PLENTY of those, too).  Well, obviously, these labels are outsourced to some foreign country because look what they came up with?  

 

 Hilarious!

Weather has turned cooler - the AC is off (yay) - leaving the horrid heat of the summer a painful memory.  

Oh, one last thing.  Many of you have seen Sadie's "welcome home" ritual.  First, she greets you on the stairs - sitting on her rump with her little paws in the air inviting you to rub her tummy.  Then, she runs to our bedroom and jumps on the couch and burrows her head between the two cushions in pure excitement.  There, she gets more petting and greeting.  This happens EVERY TIME either Steve or I come home.....even if it is just coming in from collecting the mail!  As you can imagine, with all the comings and goings I now have between all my schools, we do this several times a day.  Wednesday had FIVE.  I should try to capture this on video because it is so cute.  

farewell, Beckie

We drove Beckie and Max to St. Louis on Friday night.  She flies to Hawaii on Tuesday.  Poor Beckie had to work at MBS all week up through Thursday so she had an intense 24 hours to finish all her packing.  I helped as much as I could when I finished my teaching for the day.  Oi, her four suitcases are HEAVY.  And, she has many priority boxes full of items I will mail to her once she gets settled.  BUT, I will give her credit – she REALLY purged her life and whittled her many belongings (31 years worth!) down to almost NOTHING.  And, now, wherever I look around the house, I see things that belonged to her and I am reminded that she has really left and then I get a little sad and even weepy, sometimes. 

It got REALLY weepy Saturday afternoon.  We had left for Columbia and Beckie had gone on an errand with Brandon and she had left Max behind at the Southerland house.  Well, Max was already on heightened alert that maybe Beckie was going to leave him (packing, suitcases, leaving in the morning for Soulard Farmer’s Market – more about that later) so I am sure he felt that his person was gone for good and he set out on his own Incredible Journey to find her as soon as he saw an open door (while Joe was coming in and out).  Fast forward about two hours to first time he was missed and I got a tearful and panicked cell call from Emily to pray that he be found.  So, that is what we all did.  We prayed and wept and hoped and feared.  And, thank Heavenly Father, Max was found a couple of hours later.  He got about seven houses away around the corner and was picked up by a fellow who could tell he was pampered and valued and I guess he hoped for a reward – which he got.  I still get a pain in my heart thinking what MIGHT have been.  My testimony of the power of prayer just got even stronger yesterday.

 Sadie with her best friend, Max.

To end on a more cheerful note, we went (sans Max) to the farmer's market at Soulard on Saturday morning.....

 

Aren't these peppers pretty???








 
 Steve and me outstanding in our field...


 
Emily and Noah visit with a sidewalk musician

 
Noah and Lucy at the market


 Sadie was quite the hit at the farmer's market - she loved being carted around in Beckie's purse.


 

Thank you, Isaac!

It is so ironic that Hurricane Isaac could cause so much destruction and heartache in one part of the

country and create so much joy and thankfulness in another.  Look at what he gave us!   

 

Two days of slow, steady rain to quench our thirsty drought.  I don’t know where that puts us as far as rainfall amounts for the year and where we stand in dryness but I gotta think this put a dent in it. 

Last Sunday, I took this picture

 

And I was so thrilled that we got a pathetic half-inch of rain that day.  That was after over two months of nothing.  Pretty scary in this part of the country where rain falls regularly all throughout the summer. 

The dry conditions have caused the trees to go into fall mode – look at our deck.   

 

 This usually doesn’t happen until mid-October.

In other news, I got to my Rock Bridge orchestra on Monday to learn that we had pictures that needed to be taken ASAP.  All the other ensembles were done that day but I was given until Wednesday (since no one remembered to tell me – ah, the joys of being part-time and hardly ever in the building).  So, the first part of our rehearsal was spent trying to sort out all the tuxedos and dresses and size them to everyone.  Not all got a good fit, it turns out.  One poor cellist looked so ridiculous (he had about 10 inches too large waist and his shirt cuffs hung down below his jacket by 4 inches) that we had to hide him in the second row.  He is a funny kid – name is Alan – and he told me he IS familiar with that silly animal you-tube where the gopher looks like he is saying “Alan” and that his dad wakes him up that way every morning.  He he.  The rest of the kids in orchestra are also great.  We finally finished sight-reading and have decided which pieces we will do and which ones we never want to see again.  Since not all of these wonderful kids are strong players, we have our work cut out for us.   

Steve and I had a music colleague and her husband over for dinner on Friday.  She plays viola in Prairie Strings and in CCO and she is the other high school orchestra director.  He played euphonium with the Army band for 20 years and now works for the hospital in Moberly.  Steve is hoping to buy his own euphonium (baritone is NOT, nor has EVER, been the correct name for the instrument, apparently) so we asked this couple over so the guys could talk shop.  Of course, the gals did too and it was a nice evening. 

Beckie continues to make progress towards her departure for Hawaii.  Our garage still looks like this...

 

  BUT, she says it is organized chaos.  I helped her take the last items from her storage unit Thursday night and she has sold several items since then.  I WISH I had taken a picture of her paper-shredding project.  Oh my, it was about four boxes stuffed with shredded documents and other parts of her life she didn’t need nor want others to paw through. 

 I cannot think of her leaving without getting misty eyed.  And, this occurs in the most random places – like Aldi!   Less than a week left with her before we drive her to St. Louis next weekend.  Sniff.