Month: March 2006

A Fitting Tribute

Sarah Music

You know someone must have touched many, many lives when an entire auditorium goes completely silent at the announcement of his death. My piano teacher from many years ago, who also worked on the musicals I was in during high school, passed away two days ago. He had moved across the country a few years ago, and so we only found out this afternoon.

The concert grand piano I play for the shows was his, there’s a piece of masking tape with his name on it in sharpie on one of the bottom rails- he had let the school borrow it, but then gave it to them outright when he moved. The director dedicated tonight’s show to him. The kids outdid themselves, putting on the best opening night I’ve ever seen. It was a fitting tribute.

Gary, you will be missed.

Carrie’s Stage Debut

Sarah Carolyn

We did a teaser for the intermediate school kids today, for Sound of Music. Carrie came with me since it was the middle of the day, and the director and vocal director sat with us in the pit in order to watch Carrie. She seemed to have a good time, despite it starting right when her nap should have started.

I think she wants to grow up to be an accompanist like mom. Every time I played she came over and threw in a few extra bass notes. And then she decided she needed a solo and started playing a bit before I started one of the songs. I was a little worried that people would be upset about it, but everyone thought it was hysterical. After everyone left I let Carrie walk around the stage a bit. (Side note: I’m a bit sad about the theater, that’s the stage I performed on in high school, but they’re completely renovating the theater next year so this is the last show that will ever be performed in it. I’m going to be a little weepy at the end of this run…)

When we got home, Carrie fell asleep within a minute of me laying her in the crib – I now know how to completely tire her out: have breakfast, go to open gym, come home, watch Blue’s Clues, play for a bit, have lunch, go to the school, play piano, and wander around getting oohed and aahed over by Mommy’s old teachers. Reading all that, now I know why I’m ready for a nap, too!

Random Bits Of Nothing

Sarah General

I just got home from the first dress rehearsal for Sound of Music. It’s still strange playing with an orchestra…but at least if I miss a page turn I don’t have to worry about not playing for a measure or two!

Carrie and I had a really busy morning: we went to Babies Love Books, then we went and got her feet measured again at Stride Rite (I was concerned that maybe her shoes weren’t fitting well because she’s been falling a lot lately, but that doesn’t seem to be the problem), then we went to the gym. Yes, I made it to the gym again a mere two days after joining. Yay for me! Carrie wasn’t thrilled with being left in the childcare room, but she survived, and we discovered that the woman taking care of the kids has two deaf sons and knows ASL. I could kick myself for not mentioning that Carrie signs before I left her there, but I just assumed (silly me) that it wasn’t likely that the childcare staff would know sign language. Next time I’ll know better!

Couch Potato In Training

Sarah Carolyn, General

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If this was how Carrie always watched TV, she would never get to watch it at all. But she was having a super cranky no-nap day last weekend, and we asked her what she wanted to do. She signed “blue” and said “clue!” so we let her watch Blue’s Clues, and this was how she opted to watch it. Normally she’s up and dancing and signing along with the show, but I guess she just needed 20 minutes to be a couch potato. I think it’s pretty funny that she figured out how to slouch like this – I don’t think Denis or I do that while watching TV, but she has to have gotten it from one of us…

Today, though, I am not a couch potato: I joined a gym today! They have childcare, so I should be able to go some mornings and let Carrie play for a half hour or so while I work out. And lest you think Carrie is always watching TV, we also go to a gym for her – the building on the school campus that houses pre-K holds an open gym each week where they get out balls and blocks and mats and such. Carrie adores it, and it’s something of a workout for me as well, because I’m constantly chasing her or lifting her up to make a basket. I think I can get to my gym three times a week, and her gym once a week, and now that the weather is warming up we should be able to go for walks on some of the other days. Maybe by the time we go to Disney this July I’ll actually be in a little better shape?

Long Day Already

Sarah General

We got our new stove delivered today! Hooray! It’s a ceramic (flat) top electric range, which means…drum roll, please…NO MORE DRIP PANS TO CLEAN! (Or not clean, depending on how good a housekeeper I feel like being.)

But then we were noticing that Molly was acting a little funny – holding her head at an odd angle and squinting a lot. If I thought dogs could have migraines, that’s what it looked like. A quick trip to the vet, and she has doggie conjunctivitis – a.k.a. pink-eye. The vet promises that Carrie can’t catch it, but Murphy definitely can, so we’ll have to keep an eye on him.

And Carrie is not napping well. I just settled her back down for what will hopefully turn into the second half of her nap, because I don’t want to leave Denis with an extra-cranky munchkin while I go to rehearsal tonight. I don’t know if it’s the howling wind or just teething pain, but she’s not a happy napper today.

I think I need a nap myself. Too bad I’m not getting one!

Note To Self

Sarah SockapalOOOza

Sarah, when planning to steal random moments of knitting time during rehearsal, it helps to make sure that the knitting project you bring currently has the correct number of stitches on the needles – after all, you’re practically knitting in the dark. If you do discover that there’s a major error, it is not especially wise to try to fix it, still in the dark, during the 30 seconds in between two songs. This is even more important if, for example, you happen to be knitting a lace sock on size 0 needles. And Sarah, if you fail to follow this advice, you only have yourself to blame if you need to rip back an entire 12 row repeat of the lace pattern because you’ve somehow dropped a stitch and can’t exactly find where it went.

Oh, and quite frankly, Sarah, you wouldn’t have this problem if you hadn’t been so fickle about the second SockapalOOOza sock in the first place and had finished it before moving on to other projects. Instead you could be working on something simple like an intarsia baby sweater in the dark during rehearsal. Won’t you ever learn?

Life Is One Long Rehearsal

Sarah General

Or at least, that’s how it feels lately. We’re in crunch mode for the musical, which opens next Thursday, and rehearsals have been running late and are beginning to feel a little stressed. At this point, I’ve been in or played for The Sound of Music so many times I think I could play the music blindfolded. Tonight was the first time I’ve played it with an orchestra, though. It was heavenly! There are definitely parts where the piano is featured, but there are lots and lots of parts where if I don’t play all the notes on a particular page it’s no biggie – which is good, because there are lots and lots of parts where I just couldn’t play all the notes on the page. (The key of G-flat? What on earth were they thinking?!? Who can think in the key of G-flat?)

And the sitzprobe (yes, it’s a strange word, google has the definition) ended early enough that I could be home to put Carrie to bed.

…and…

Netflix sent me Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire today, so I just finished watching that. I was disappointed to not see it in the theater, but hey, I got the DVD in the mail the same day it was released in the stores, so, yay! I almost didn’t watch it tonight, because the sleeve they sent it in had a running time of 4 hours and 40 minutes listed, but it was only 2 hours and 40 minutes. It was my favorite of them all so far!

Look, Ma, I Cleaned My Room!

Sarah General

Today I cleaned my craft room to the point where I was actually able to vacuum it. I’m afraid to even admit how long it’s been since I was able to vacuum this room. Doesn’t it look fabulous? You can actually see the sewing machine along with my stack of things that need to be sewn (that’s the pile of plastic bags on the right side of the table):

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That is, it looks fabulous until you see exactly how I cleared off the floor:
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Either I have way too many craft supplies, very poor organizational skills, or not enough time to knit/quilt/scrapbook/etc. I’m leaning towards that last one.

Crayons Taste Icky

Sarah Carolyn

But they sure are fun to color with! Carrie adores coloring now. We’re talking borderline obsessive here. If she sees her box of crayons she absolutely has to color. Even when she doesn’t see her crayons she’ll sign “colors” and say “cuh!” to let us know that it’s time to get the crayons out. She’s actually getting really good at taking one crayon at a time out of the box, and putting it back when she wants to get another color. I can tell she’s trying very hard to keep it on the paper, but the 9″ x 12″ construction paper is too small – I’m going to have to find a big easel-sized pad for her to color on. (Good thing I bought washable crayons!)

Up until a few days ago I think Carrie saw crayons as just a neatly packaged snack. I had managed to keep her from actually biting into a crayon up until then, but that day she got a good chunk of orange crayon…and based on her reaction it was apparently quite disgusting. She hasn’t really tried to eat them since!

FLAK decisions

Sarah FLAK

I wasn’t sure how I wanted to have the front of my FLAK cardigan look – the way my cables relaxed when I washed my swatch meant that taking out the center 12 stitches as suggested in the pattern would have given me a button band that was about 1 3/4″ wide instead of just over an inch. Since I couldn’t decide between using my filler stitch or using a different cable I “swatched” them both: I did the left front with the moss stitch and the right front with the wave cable.

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After pondering it for a bit, I think I’ll go with the moss stitch. (The little yellow “blips” are where I put in a lifeline so when I rip it out I don’t have to worry about picking up the stitches in the right order – all those cables make it a bit more complicated!)

Once I rip and re-knit those 22 rows on the one side I’ll be ready to start the sleeves!