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. 

Sarah's birthday pictures

Sarah with her kayak and her double chocolate ice cream birthday cake (that was gluten-free)

Happy 29th birthday, Sarah!!!

I will have photos of her birthday to share later on….

Here is a photo of the Mid-Missouri Community Orchestra just before our spring concert yesterday at Parkside Manor.  We sounded pretty good!  (most of us are wearing bandanas to go along with a couple of western songs we were performing - Theme from Gunsmoke and I'm An Old Cowhand)

 

 Here is a photo of us during the performance.  Virginia Dooley is a terrific conductor.  I wish I could say I was a terrific violist.  Ha!  It is so much larger than the violin that it hurts to play for very long.  Maybe I will play saxophone next year? 

 I don’t know about your part of the world but we are having just about perfect weather here in Columbia.  The daffodils and lilac are all gone but now there are purple iris, daisies, and these late-blooming tulips lining the front walk.  Gorgeous! 

 The journey of digitally converting dad’s slides continues…..So, I got the FHC computer all set up here at home (had to wait until I could get a mouse and keyboard) and I started scanning.  And, I realized the scanner was seriously washing out many of the slides.  I could hold the slide up to the window and it would seem perfectly normal but, when viewed via the scanner, it was too bright.  And, this particular scanner has no brightness adjustment.   So, I went to good old Amazon and found a scanner that does have brightness adjustment (and color adjustment) and it does NOT need a computer (with Windows 7 or 10 or anything) and it was under $100 and I just bought it.  When I finish, I can always sell it back used.   So, back to square one.  Initially, when I began this whole slide converting endeavor, it seemed there was no way to determine when they were taken.  But, during the scanning – when I was handling each slide more closely - I noticed that most of them have a date stamped (embossed) into the cardboard sleeve.  It is kind of hard to see unless you really look.  This is GOOD news because now I can sort all these slides by date before I begin scanning again. 

Otherwise, a pretty normal week for this time of year. I have been sewing up little boy teething bibs and I have watched “Great Expectations” (the 2015 BBC version) and it was pretty good.  I watched “Peggy Sue Got Married” and it was pretty “meh” but it had a surprising the number of stars (a very young Jim Carrey, Nicholas Cage, Joan Allen, and Helen Hunt plus the actress from Star Trek IV -  Catherine Hicks). 

Final note – as I was switching summer clothes with winter clothes, I found that my “Christmas” amaryllis that was supposedly in dormancy down in the basement closet had decided to bloom no matter what (minus light, water).  

It had a completely white stalk with blossoms starting to pop out.   I guess because there was no light, the stalk got REALLY tall.  But, the flowers were too heavy so I had to cut them off.  They are in front.   Another bulb was not as far along and it looks like it will bloom this week.  When it was first brought into the light, it, too, was albino but you can notice it greening up.  This stalk is also exceptionally tall.  Isn’t that crazy?