Piano playing!

At the piano duet recital last weekend, they ended with an amazing song...Waterfall by Jon Schmidt. It made me want to go get the sheet music and learn it. So I went to his website and listened to the song again, and all the other great music, and decided I love ALL of it. Today, I called a couple of music stores to see if they had the music, and both of the songs I wanted were in books that were 18.00 each. While I was still researching, Steven hopped on the other computer and found the single sheet music on Jon's website that you can down load as a pdf file for .99 each. Score! Bought them, printed them, played...played...played them today!!! Waterfall is wonderful and also "The Dumb Song". It has such a great catchy rhythm. (no driving 30 minutes to the store, and no finding other music; which I'm sure Steven was thinking about from the beginning. I have this gift of finding things I like!) Now my fingers are a little sore, but it is worth it. I always enjoy having music I like to play, and learning a new song is the BEST.

JAM

So today I decided to make Strawberry freezer jam. It's the BEST! There is something wonderful about seeing the "fruits of your labors" all in a row on the counter. We love being able to pull yummy jam out of the freezer all year round.

It is amazing to me how we are influenced while we were young. When I went to elementry school I took Homemade wheat bread sandwiches with peanut butter and honey. I love'em. They are still one of my favorite things to eat. Especially when the honey soaks into the bread. Then there is the jam issue. I love to have jam with white bread. Why is that? Who knows, we hardly ever have white bread, but when we do...homemade jam is on it.

Cavalcade Dynamic Duos!

I love for my children to participate in the Cavalcade duet recital each year. There are 25 pianos on stage. Each group plays 2 duet songs. It is wonderful. This years theme was Dynamic Duos, with Guest appearances including Batman, Robin, and Madam Treble. Hunter's group played Starwars theme, (with his director using a Light Saber to direct with), and the Batman Theme, where they wore batman masks. It was great! They meet together for 3 weeks of rehearsal and then put on their performance. This was Stacie's 10th year to participate, Kinsie-9th year, Hunter 3rd year, Ashleigh 2nd year and Ginger's 11th year as a teacher.(plus many years as a young girl. Did we ever figure out "who let the cows out" JoAnn?)


Stacie's and Kinsie's group--Maple Leaf Rag and Greensleves.

Hunter's group--Batman, and Star wars.

Ashleigh's group played Blue Danube Waltz and Skip to My Lou.
Ginger's Group played Finiculi' Finicula, and Morning has Broken.

Steven and Bracken with Batman, Robin, Madam Treble, and Mario.

Hunter, Batman, and Robin!

Stacie and Ashleigh with Batman and Robin. Grandma Peterson was even excited to get a picture with the Dynamic Duo!

My musical children.

Merit Badge King!

We are pretty big into scouting over here. I am the Webelos leader, which I totally love, and Steven is the scout master, of which Hunter is part of. Many of you know that Hunter has done a TON of work in his short scouting time. This picture was at the last court of Honor in December where Hunter received his STAR rank and his 33rd merit badge!!! Anyway, I can't help but give him a big shout out this week, after having his BLUE card signed off on his last required merit badge # 34. (camping) Way to GO Hunter!!!

Ashleigh's 10th Birthday

Ashleigh turned double digits (10!) on the 26th of February. She had a great birthday. We enjoyed pizza for dinner and cheesecake for dessert. YUM!!

Just love watching them open presents!

Her Dad just couldn't resist getting her a PINK DS Lite! She was very excited.

American Girl movie--Chrissa Stands strong.

High School Musical watch necklace.

What b-day wouldn't be complete with out some cute clothes.