While I spent all day doing that, the kids had a good day with Steve; he took them swimming – something I *never* thought he’d do! In the evening we cracked open a bottle of fizzy wine and spent our mealtime making toasts to various little things – sometimes it’s good to celebrate the small things too After that, we watched Slumdog Millionaire, the start of a good weekend for films.

Saturday was orchestra as usual (though Anna took her bassoon as well as the spare cello which she doesn’t like!), and jobs as usual – cleaning out the guinea pigs, hoovering, etc. The girls had friends round again, too. Steve went back to work, as that was infinitely preferable to helping with housework, apparently After dinner we watched My Sister’s Keeper, and I blubbed all the way through. Thought it was very good though, and a reasonably close adaptation of the book – different ending but I still thought the film kept to the feel of the book despite the alternate ending.

Today Josiah and I drove down to South Devon to meet some new friends that we’ve got to know through our Suzuki Group – Joe and their little boy hit it off instantly over Pokemon cards, as you do. The mum is a piano teacher, so we arranged for her to accompany Josiah at the upcoming festival, so we needed to get together to practise for that. I *think* it went well, it certainly helps to focus on the things that need polishing between now and then. Very wowed by their house, which was beautiful, including purpose built music studio! Had to drag Josiah away as well.

Then I suppose I ought to think about what I’m teaching tomorrow ….

Orchestra this morning: both Josiah and Abbie are now playing in the percussion section which they are really enjoying. Abigail decided she’d rather do that than be one of a hundred flutes, and likewise Joe thought he’d rather do that than play his violin. I don’t mind – the percussion section needed players! Abbie’s going to be having kit lessons from the orchestra drum tutor too and she’s really excited about that

This afternoon we’ve been kicking around at home; Anna’s had a friend over and the kids have all played Singstar, Guitar Hero, eaten lots of sweets, some pizza, and are now watching Bugsy Malone on video – mainly because it’s the show that Anna and her friend are doing at school.

Steve and I went out on a quick cache hunt when he got home from work, but that’s another story; it’s part of a long-winded multi cache so I’ll blog about it all when it’s finished!

Came home for an hour to swap washing on the line (it’s the first day in a week that I’ve felt confident to actually hang it up outside!) and a few other jobs, before going out to Josiah’s Suzuki group’s Summer Picnic.

His teacher had written a piece of music which he gave them all to practice over the past couple of weeks, and they were planning to record it today. It’s a lullaby (possibly the most energetic lullaby I’ve ever heard!) which is for his daughter’s first baby, due at the end of the month – his daughter Anna lives in NZ so the track will be winging its way over electronically I think! The cello part was an added afterthought when our Anna asked for it, having helped Joe to learn his part, and also being taken with the name of the piece! Video is a bit dark unfortunately, that’s what comes of the sun being out …

They played a few more fun pieces too, and then children and parents all joined in with some Circle Dancing, apparently the speciality of the ex-Suzuki group teacher’s partner (random, I know!), which I hadn’t been expecting, but it was a bit of a laugh. Went on for ages though! Followed that up with tea and plentiful cake, the kids went outside to play in the park adjoining the village hall while the rest of us chatted – a lovely afternoon. Have had to have a bath this evening though, my legs were aching!

Steve was racing and came 2nd today; I’m annoyed now as the prize glass doesn’t match the rest of the glasses in the cupboard

That was excellent enough but tonight Joe got tired of waiting so phoned his violin teacher to find out that he also got a distinction for his grade 3, with a grand score of 134, currently the household record for ABRSM exams.

Huge well done to both of them, they both worked really hard in the run up to these exams so I’m really pleased for them

Friday evening was surprisingly pleasant. Anna went out to a BBQ with a school friend and then when she was reminded about her show rehearsal, dashed over to that as well. The other two children decided not to go to their usual kids’ club as they were too tired, so we popped some popcorn and settled down to watch Pete’s Dragon instead. I’m not sure I’ve ever watched it all the way through!
I got some much-procrastinated-over ironing done, and Steve had a nap And then we waited up for Anna to come home (this is becoming a common occurrence, at 12 yrs old!) Guess I will give up on waiting up after a while, but I always think it’s nice for her to have a little chat with us when she comes in, even if it is only quick!

Had to use my time well on Saturday but I did manage to get everything done. Essential shopping beforehand, then on to orchestra where I was on duty. Josiah joined in with a junk drumming workshop on at the same time as orchestra, which he really enjoyed. He was due to be re-joining orchestra in September and is now prevaricating over whether to join in with percussion rather than playing his violin!

My sister and brother in law popped in to see us on their way down to Cornwall for a holiday (lucky them) so we stopped for a cup of tea with them, but otherwise the afternoon was taken up with cleaning out the guinea pigs and fish, some music practice with Joe, trying to help Abbie with her end of year project (that ended in tears, will have to try again), and Anna did her music practice then sat around looking relaxed, without any homework to do, which annoyed Abbie even more – honestly, I think Y7 has been a doss!

Anna went out to Caitlin’s birthday bash, and after tea the rest of us went out for a walk and found a new local cache, which was much nicer than just slobbing around doing nothing – I like after dinner walks

On to today, which started early with someone coming to look at something we’d advertised in the paper. Thought if I made an early appointment that it would get us up and moving! (sold it, now we just have to take it to pieces and get it downstairs!)
Spent the rest of the morning sorting out a leaving present for the orchestra leader, Hannah’s (messages from the orchestra members framed around a photo montage) and then we had lunch.

Josiah’s concert was first this afternoon. I have grown to love the Suzuki thing over the past four years, and we’ve now known most of these kids for most of that time, so it is really nice to see how they’ve all grown up both in themselves and in their playing. Some of the older ones are *very* impressive these days!

I had tried to encourage Joe to practice a bit this morning because his piece hadn’t been sounding very good over the past few days, but he refused, on the basis that he knew he could do it. I despair, but didn’t want a fight! Steve upheld his refusal and he sat and watched Prince Caspian instead – and then played his piece beautifully. Could do with being louder in the loud bits but the dynamics are there …

The Suzuki concert finished just before 5pm, and the girls’ orchestra concert started at 6pm – couldn’t have packed them in much more closely, but we managed a quick cuppa with Steve’s parents inbetween. Because I knew I’d potentially be fairly rushed, I hadn’t volunteered to help with anything this time, so it was nice not to have to get there early but just to sit and watch Grandma wins lots of grandma points for making it to both concerts; Grandpa joined us for the orchestra one as well.

Stopped to pick up fish & chips on the way home, which was a lovely end to the day. Hustled children to bed rather quickly, caught up on Top Gear (samey) and the news, and that’s about it!

Josiah had his first group lesson with the older, more advanced children in our Suzuki group today (and was sight reading his part in the piece in the video because it was his first time). He found it tough in some ways but managed well, and seemed to really enjoy the extra challenge, having been at the top of the younger group for quite a while now. Probably also a bit pleased to have achieved big kid status in the group – he really likes a couple of the older boys there, although his favourite violin friend wasn’t there today. In fact on the way home Joe was telling me what he would have to practice and being generally super positive about violin, as he has been for a while now (better not speak too soon here though!), which is such a relief after a couple of years of very hard slog!

The beginning of last week was taken up with music; I had the day off work on Monday to accompany Anna and Josiah to the strings day of the Devon Performing Arts Festival. We’d bumped Anna up into the G6 class which she promptly won, so felt very proud of herself for that – and Joe came joint 2nd in his G3 class too, he played beautifully, the best he’s ever played his piece. And as we pointed out later, coming 1st out of 4 was marginally less impressive than coming 2nd out of 7!!

The ultimate best thing, though, was Joe’s admission later in the day that perhaps I’d been right to say he should carry on practicing his violin, as he would like it when he was older. He didn’t quite admit that he liked practicing (does anyone?) but it was excellent to see him get a glimpse of the POINT of it all! Lovely to hear some of the other kids we know performing as well – and I *really* enjoyed having a day off with Anna and Josiah Have said that next year we’ll have to do a woodwind day as well, then Abbie can have a turn, and Anna can play that jolly bassoon of hers!!

Josiah sat his G1 piano exam on Tuesday lunchtime, no results as yet though. Then on Wednesday night we had the primary school Music Extravaganza, where everyone who does any music at school gets to stand up and do their bit. Abbie played her flute duets with Riona, and all three kids sang in the choir, with Anna’s accompaniment on the piano for a couple of the songs. Oh, and my three had learnt a descant for one piece at the last minute, which they sang well, too

The choir has got huge recently, with a lot of very little ones – on the way home I commented that perhaps they should have a KS1 choir and a KS2 choir, then the very next day a letter came home from school announcing the very same thing. They’re also inviting more hangers on (like Anna!) but while I’d quite like to be part of it alongside the kids, that is the half hour in my week which is mine, all mine. Not sure I can give it up! Lots of other great music opportunities from the school next term but I’ll write about those when we get to them.

Spent Thursday and Friday suffering from what felt like extreme exhaustion, to the point that Steve wondered afterwards if I’d had some sort of virus. Felt worse than just a late night after he got home from Glasgow late on Wednesday. Not clever when trying to make decisions about things. Survived, anyway – and immediately felt better after Josiah’s violin lesson on Friday night, which was such an odd time to suddenly recover that I thought perhaps Steve was right (he is, occasionally)!

Anna came home with an extra cello on Thursday – one that she’s been given, it had been sitting in the school cupboard for years and years. We took it to our strings experts in town to see if it was worth restoring properly but as suspected, it’s not. Steve and Anna are still going to try and get it to a playable state, as cheaply as possible, but then I think they’re actually intending to paint it and hang it on the wall rather than anything else! Still, it will be an original and interesting piece of artwork!

The weekend has been uneventful. Orchestra, housework, I spent some time catching up on jobs at the garage, and Steve entertained the children by burning stuff that needed shredding (shredder has given up the ghost) in an old saucepan on the patio!
On Sunday, Abbie, Joe and I went to church then did lunch at Tescos, then more housework/homework/lego while Steve took Anna out for a Subaru meet on the moors.

I’ve been meaning to do this for ages as one of the things he’s had to improve on is ‘leading in’ and carrying on even if he makes a mistake – I thought having a duet part might help him. Tried playing the piano accompaniment but I am rubbish at it, so we threw something together for Anna and they practiced then played it for the grandparents this evening. Final performance couldn’t go on flickr as it was too long. (This, of course, is what it’s meant to sound like!!)

Oh, and here’s Moon River, too – not quite the best it’s been but not bad, all the same – we still have a month or so to go until the Grade 2 exam.

The good start was largely due to a very successful violin practice with Josiah; we had been struggling to help all the children understand the difference between playing a piece once, and practicing a piece – to the extent that Joe made me ask his teacher last night exactly how many times he should play a piece in order to practice it! 5 down this morning, 5 to go this afternoon (not counting the review pieces).

It’s a fun song to play anyway, as Mr Featherstone has taught him the alternative ‘actions’ to do while playing each bit (plucking instead of playing open strings with the bow, turning around during the arpeggios, going down on one knee and then up again in other arpeggios, turning the bow upside down in the middle ‘sad’ section, and then some stamping during the triplets at the end). If anyone’s really interested, the piece in question is Theme from Witches’ Dance by Paganini – I searched on Youtube to find vids of the actions but couldn’t find a good one so you have to make do with this amusing double act! When Joe’s ready he might oblige and let me video him … or then again he might not

Other than that, over the past week or so we’ve just been winding back up into normal life with all the activity that entails; we had a weekend where Steve worked and the kids and I didn’t do very much at all, friends round to play on Monday, and school started again on Tuesday. One person came to miscarriage support group that evening, but hey, as long as it’s helping even one person a month then I don’t mind giving my time.

I’m in the middle of what seems like a very long interview process at the Apple Store – there was an interview seminar on Friday night, and then a further interview yesterday, but I won’t actually know the results until early next week.

Steve and I are both delivering cars long-distance this week; he went up to Oxfordshire yesterday and I’m going down to the bottom of Cornwall tomorrow.

But that’s about it, hence the lack of blogging – ‘life as usual’ doesn’t make for a very interesting post, does it?