She survived!

Today was the big day! Cakes had her piano recital this morning. She was required to introduce herself and her piece, play a solo piece and a duet. I was her duet partner, so this was my first recital too. Her solo piece was Yankee Doodle, and both her pieces were "traditional" so she had to give some background on her song rather than composer info like all the other students. After many weeks of emails between me and her teacher, conversations between me and Scott and several tearful practice sessions with Cakes, we made it to the recital. We got there about 30 minutes early and all the kids got situated, most of them played at least a few notes on the piano to familiarize themselves with a different instrument. Cakes did not, and neither did I. I tried to take her picture, and then my MIL took a few, but I could tell any little bit of attention was making her more nervous, so I didn't dare try to convince her to give the piano a try beforehand.



There she is trying to ignore everyone, but she was very excited to be wearing her new dress, shoes and headband (she made it with a neighborhood friend last week).

 She was the third kid on the program, which was good, because that didn't give her too much time to get nervous, plus she was sandwiched between all the other first-time recitalers. She got up, said her part very fast and was mostly understandable (or maybe I just understood her because I've heard her say it so many times) at any rate, she sat down and played Yankee Doodle, with only one tiny mistake. Then she bowed and I went up to play out Russian Sailor Dance duet. I messed up my first chord. Why? Because I didn't try out the piano like the teacher told us to. But, Cakes played perfectly. We finished and went back to our seats and before I knew it she was smiling and later mouthing to me that she was bored.

I should mention that the boys were an excellent audience. They sat very quietly through most of it; Silly eventually fell asleep and after about an hour and a half I went and stood in the back with Bubba because he was getting squirmy.

Soon enough it was all over. Gummy gave her a wrist corsage that matches her dress. I talked her into letting me get one picture (I was holding her candy bar for ransom).

She wouldn't smile so I told her she owes me a bite of her Twix. She wore the corsage for about 20 seconds. On our drive home (several hours later, but I'll get to that) she brought up her performance. Scott and I both told her she'd done a great job. She pointed out her one little mistake, saying she only messed up one little time. I pointed out that all the other students made mistakes, most of them big or multiple times, so to be able to say she made only one tiny mistake at her first recital is pretty awesome. She has seemed pretty content all day; I think it's a mix of proud of herself but glad it's over. I haven't dared mention (to her or Scott) that there's a year end recital too...

Between the recital and home we went to lunch at Red Lobster to celebrate Gummy's birthday. She brought everyone's favorite chocolate cake to eat after lunch. Bubba was pretty entertaining, insisting on using his utensils to cut up his biscuit and his chicken. Usually he likes to dip things, but this time he even used his fork to spread ketchup on his chicken.

Silly's word of the day was "lunatic." Not sure where that came from.

After lunch we went to a nearby park to play with Gramma and Gramma as Bubba calls them. It was a little chilly, and I thought to have Cakes bring herself a change of clothes, but I should have brought some for myself too. Oh well.

At some point Silly wandered over to the picnic table area and Scott went over to talk to him. Silly said he was going to stay there forever. Then he asked Scott, "Daddy, will you bring me some food next week?"

Bubba's Life

Just a few minutes ago I was sitting here at my computer and Bubba came over wanting me to take the clothes off of his babydoll. Then I hear him marching back and forth, sounding very serious. I finally decided to turn my head and see this:

He completely emptied his dresser and made this nice little pile, all of maybe 8ft away from me. I asked him what he was doing and he said they were for his baby. I asked him where his baby was and he dug through all his clothes to find him burried at the bottom.

He's quite proud of himself. And he needs a haircut. Scott says I should just buzz his head again, but I don't think I want to do that. I think Bubba has actually passed the fuzz-head stage. His hair doesn't stick up like it used to, but maybe that's just because it's too long and not because his hair is becoming more normal. Guess I'll have to cut it and find out.

 


Also, he really likes to do the dishes. The other night he did a surprisingly good job; he rinsed off each piece and put it in the other sink. I finally wised up and put the apron on him so he doesn't end up completely soaked. Who do these picture remind you of, siblings of mine?

And here is how Bubba gets ready for family prayer:

He was helping Cakes color and didn't want to put the pencils down. Usually when we pray he puts his head down on whatever is closest; me, floor, couch, table, whatever. He takes the bowing you head part very seriously.

A note about the socks on his hands - if he manages to get one sock on each hand, he pinches other people. If he only gets one sock on, he pinches himself, usually his other hand, most often in the car. It turns into a whole conversation with himself with the sock saying things like "pinch" and "I bite you" and his other hand saying, "Ouch" and crying.

He's also started this funny baby talk. It's funny because really, he is a baby, and therefore talks like one, but now he talks baby-baby talk. It is very amusing, but also a little, well, odd.

Bears

Apparently there's a bear walking around the oceanfront. We were watching the news this morning and of course they were telling people to back away slowly if they encounter the bear. Then it turned into this conversation between Cakes and Silly:

S: But what if I had a gun?
C: Mommy would never let you have a gun.
S: But it's just a dream!
C: Besides, Jesus would be sad if you killed his animals.
S: But that's how you get meat, you have to kill something to get meat.
C: No, people kill animals just for fun.
This is where I jumped in and said some people do kill animals just for fun, but they shouldn't. Real hunters kill for the meat, and they don't kill more than they need.

There are quite a few hunters in my family, so my kids are somewhat familiar with the concept. I was listening to this whole conversation wondering what my little brother would have said.

And whenever I hear anything about bears I think about this:

We saw this sign when we went to Alaska for our tenth anniversary a few years ago. My favorite part is where it says, "If the bear continues to bite you long after you have assumed a defensive posture, it is likely a predatory attack. Fight back vigorously." I always wonder how long that means I ought to wait. I mean, how many times should I let a bear bite me before I assume he's trying to kill me and not just having fun?

March Wrap-up

There was a sci-fi convention at a local library last weekend so we went to check it out just for the fun of it, only it wasn't very fun and not because I'm not much of a sci-fi person, but because it was lame. Even Scott thought so.

This was about as exciting as it got:

R2D2 was pretty much the only thing that anyone stopped to look at. He talked R2-talk.



See, she looks like she's having fun, right? (Notice the black)

Then we went to the nearest mall to get the kids some good sandals. Why is it necessary to buy sandals so far in advance of summer? Does anyone else have this issue? If I wait until it's actually hot around here, I can't find anything.
We went out to dinner Tuesday night having no idea it was "kid's night" there. This guy was making so very fascinating balloon creations of things we'd never seen before, like sharks and orkas. Cakes said she wanted a monkey holding a flower; he told her his monkey climbs palm trees and she was fine with that. Silly just wanted a sword, but his swords come with shields, so he got both. Bubba didn't have a preference, so he got a bear riding a motorcycle.

All Bubba wanted was Silly's sword once we got home, which led to lots of wailing. One of us should have thought of that during the balloon-making. We've noticed that if Cakes has something Bubba couldn't care less. If Silly has something, Bubba wants it.

We've been dealing with some sickness around here. Bubba had his regular 2yo checkup several weeks ago and the dr saw that his left ear was infected, so 10 days of the pink stuff. That crossed over the ward reunion, so we took he medicine with us, but then left it at the in-laws, so I had to bother Dr. L on a Sunday afternoon to call in a new Rx for us, which he did.

Last Friday he was scheduled for a recheck and woke up with a fever and threw up a couple times. Get to the dr and now his right ear is infected. I've never made it to round 2 before, but apparently that means the kid gets to take the really nasty medicine. And it is nasty. I think most of it came right back out the first few times. The doctor said to mix it with something, but I don't know what in the world he thinks I could mix that stuff with that any kid would gobble up. After maybe 3 doses, Bubba would cover his mouth and cry when he saw the medicine, but then take it anyway. Now he wants to give it to himself. I give hims something to drink right after he takes it because I know he needs to get that nasty taste out of his mouth. On top of all that he is finally cutting his canines. Poor kid.

And finally, this is what I come home to if I'm ever out past bedtime:

Scott usually puts him in bed, or I put him in bed before I leave, but as soon as I'm gone he comes out and sets up his pillow and blankets on the floor next to Daddy where he eventually passes out.