Garage Sales and Piano Recitals

It seems like we have been going and going lately!  Our computer crashed again, and once again, T was able to do some serious hard drive CPR and resurrect it.  One of these days it’s going to die for real, but until then it seems to be working…for the most part.

We got to spend the last four days with Auntie Karen!  She came up for a short visit, and we spent the time relaxing, playing games, reading, and doing some shopping.

Saturday was the annual garage sale-ing event that we go to every year…the one where the whole town participates and there are maps and vendors and hundreds of garage sales.  We’d all planned to go but the weather took a turn for the worse so T and I ended up going by ourselves and meeting up with Auntie Danae and her family. 

It had been raining all weekend but the forecast for Saturday was rainy and a high of 51.  Unfortunately that ended up being true, and it was also windy.  It was pretty cold.  My hands felt that deep wintery cold where they are all red and just ache.  Usually we are re-applying sunblock and hitting the gas station for Pepsi or lemonade but this year we went to the gas station to get hot chocolate!  Brr. 

The one good thing is that it wasn’t as insanely crowded as usual so we were able to keep our pickup with us and warm up between streets.  Normally it is so crowded you have to park and just walk through the neighborhoods because there are wall-to-wall cars, although I was impressed with the large numbers of people who still braved the weather.

We got some fun deals including a wagon for the girls, papasan (sp?) chairs that matched their rooms, some toys, books, and clothes for all three girls, tools for T, and a nice driver that actually matches his set of clubs.  We didn’t get anything too big but it was fun and we enjoyed it even though we were cold.

The girls had a great time staying with Noni, Papa, Aunt Karen, and Mama.  We went back to the house and spent the evening playing more games and just hanging out together. 

The highlight of one of our evenings was a piano recital.  Over the past 6 months Bug has been taking lessons from Noni.   We don’t have a set schedule so they just fit a lesson in whenever the girls are over there, but she has actually learned a lot and can play short songs out of the same book I used as a child!  She is very proud of her accomplishments. :)

We all gathered around one night so she could give us a show.

When I was little my mom taught piano lessons and kids would come to our house.  I started when I was 5 so Bug has a few months jump on me, since she started at 4.  I hope that she will continue to play and enjoy it.  I can’t say I always enjoyed it as a child, practicing was definitely not my favorite thing to do, but I love playing now.

For some reason Boo was off-the-wall hyper and was dancing and chattering the ENTIRE time Bug was playing.  You can see how excited she is in this video.

Then she wanted a turn to play a song. :)

My mom has a little brown ice cream cone on the wall and every time Bug practices for a certain length of time she gets a scoop added to it.  When she gets so many scoops she gets to go out for an actual ice cream so that’s what Boo is talking about here.  What a little nut. 

I hope all our girls will eventually learn to play the piano!  And hopefully they won’t have as hard of a time practicing as I did. :)