Almost on the road again

In a startling turn of events, we are "snowed in" while everyone back home seems to be enjoying a relatively green Christmas. I say "snowed in" because of course we could get out if we had anywhere to go today.

Last night was the crazy church-hopping night. It started with our sitter calling at 5 p.m. to find out if we were still going out or if our gigs had been cancelled due to the weather. At that time, there was sleet and some ice/snow pellets but not much accumulation. She said that her dad would drive her over, and I volunteered to take her home later.

When we arrived at Church #1 (the Presbyterians) it was deserted. I think that less than 100 people showed up for the 9 p.m. service. When we left, it was snowing but the wind was also blowing enough that scraping the car wasn't an issue. We headed out for Independence and Church #2.

The roads were somewhat snow covered but visibility was just fine. I wished that I had brought my camera when I saw the following road sign:

"Blizzard warning. Travel not advised."

Hmm, I thought. And what are we supposed to do when we're already on the highway with no easy way off since the minimal plowing that was done managed to nicely block several of the exits!??!

We arrived at Church #2 with about 10 minutes to spare before the pre-Midnight-Mass concert began. Mass ended at 1:15 and we headed out to see what awaited us in the parking lot. We were met by bitter winds and drifting snow. Thanks to our super-long scrapers, we had the van cleaned off and were on our way in no time.

The drive home took a little over an hour instead of the usual 40 minutes. There were a couple of points with poor visibility, but it was mostly slow due to snow-covered roads and lack of snow removal equipment. Ben would think it wrong if I did not mention the plows we saw driving by with their blades in the air doing nothing!

Once we reached the main road that leads to our street, we ended up behind a couple of snow plows. This would have been good were it not for the fact that they were nicely plowing the main road but effectively blocking the side streets. Luckily for us, they turned around at 155th St. and we had to turn in on 157th. Ben gunned it around the corner and we happily sped down the drifting snow on our street.

No, we weren't stupid enough to pull in the driveway. Instead, Ben turned around and parked the car at the end of the drive so that I could easily get out to take the sitter home. I warned her that she was in for an adventure, and off we went gunning it up the hill and back to the main road.

Unfortunately, the sitter's house was off the beaten path. The first road we turned down had tire tracks but after that it was all up to me and the good old Canadian van with snow tires! I apologized to her for not pulling into her driveway and asked directions home, hoping that I wouldn't have to attempt to turn around on her street. I was able to head down the hill, around a few corners, and back out to the main road, albeit driving on the wrong side of the road for a few blocks since that side had been cleared!

When I arrived back in our neighbourhood, it was as if I hadn't even been there a few minutes prior. "Eh, I drove through more snow than this in a 2-door Civic while 7 months pregnant with Anna," I thought as I cheerfully gunned the van down the street and onto the driveway where I beached it in a lovely drift of snow.

Rachel and I went out for a bit this morning and I did shovel some snow, but I will need to go back out later to get it right down to the driveway. She had a great time playing in the snow - Grandma Karen, the fleece pants over leggings worked just fine for now, but we still eagerly await the pretty purple snow pants at your house!

And while this could have been mentioned earlier, I should say that Anna woke up at 2:45, just after I left with the sitter. When I got back, she was in our bed with Ben. I got changed and then Ben got up to get changed. During this time, Anna decided that she was done sleeping for the night, thank you very much.

So Ben headed downstairs with her at 3:30 a.m. Before anyone feels sorry for the good doctor (more on that in another post!), he has been napping for 3 hours now. Anna took a 2 hour nap from 10:30-12:30 and woke up screaming. It's now almost 3 p.m. and I cannot wait for bedtime to arrive. I "slept" from 3:30-7:30 and I need to clean the house and get packed since we are leaving first thing Sunday morning.

In case you didn't know...

...the pumpkin pie I baked this afternoon would be infinitely better if I had remembered to put the sugar in it.

Apparently we're on a break

From homeschooling, that is. December is insanely busy for us and I would rather spend the time baking or doing other things with the kids. I'd rather sleep more too, but that doesn't really factor into the homeschooling time!

So, the semester in review:

Rachel can read, and more than that, she understand what she's reading. She flew through 2 phonics workbooks and is now very confident about long and short vowels, as well as basic blends. She has been doing some "reading comprehension" and if the cover of the book is to be believed, she finished a Grade 2 level book in a whopping 2 weeks or so. Yes, I'm bragging. I get to do that in my blog! Her printing is getting better, and she is starting to figure out how words are spelled using her new phonics skills.

Rachel also finished up a little book on "map skills", where she learned about directions, legends, and other stuff that I can't remember. This was apparently a hit since she has asked me several times if we can get another map skills workbook.

She's been working her way through a Grade 1 math book but we're temporarily stalled at subtraction facts up to 10. She can do them, but it's not intuitive the way the adding has been, so I think we'll go back and do some review. I need to go back and look at the Math-U-See curriculum I picked up last year to see if it would be helpful to finish up the Primer level of that or not.

Religious school has gone extremely well this fall. Kindergarten Consecration is next Saturday night and Rachel seems to be pretty excited about it. Her teachers are wonderful - they understand her, and she is able to confidently participate without being pushed too far out of her comfort zone. When the kids acted out the story of Noah's Ark, it was (too) conveniently arranged that Rachel would get to be an elephant. Needless to say, we have no trouble getting her out the door each Sunday morning. (Yes, I am daring to type that for posterity. Someone can throw it in my face in a few years!!)

We've done a few science-y things this fall, but not a lot. I think that I'll try to find some more experiments that we can do in the new year. We've decided to put Anna in preschool two mornings a week starting in January. She will love it, and that will give me some good focused time with Rachel. It will also give me some good, uninterrupted time at the coffee shop with a good book since preschool is on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9-12 and Rachel is doing a 7-week art class from 9:30-11 on Tuesdays starting in mid-January! I will fully admit that I'm looking forward to this. While I have no desire to work full time, I have a fairly high need for personal space and "me" time, and that's been difficult to obtain this past semester.

Although Ben will "only" be working full-time out at UCMO in January, his schedule is more scattered. He will be gone from roughly 8-3MWF, 6:30-6 on Tuesdays, and 6:30-3 on Thursdays. So Tuesday does seem like a nice day for some Jane time, wouldn't you say? :)

We're also planning to try Rachel in private swimming lessons in January. She's taken Preschool I about 3-4 times now, and the only thing holding her back is her reluctance to put her head underwater on a regular basis. I can't say that I blame her, but she does need to learn to swim. I'm not concerned about when she learns, but since she's been enjoying her lessons, we might as well keep going.

Anna was attending a gym class at My Gym where we used to take Rachel, but we'll be pulling her out at the end of December. The class time conflicts with preschool, and she also would need to move to a different age group with less convenient times. Ben might take her to a parent and tot gymnastics class at the local rec centre, but that's dependent on me remembering to get up early and register her next Monday morning. I've heard that the spots fill up FAST.

And now I should stop taking a break myself, and get back to the kitchen. Oh wait, I'm in the kitchen. I should step away from the computer and go make the pumpkin pie I've been meaning to make for a few weeks now. Yum!

Here we go again

It was very busy at Costco this morning. The lady ahead of me and the cashier were discussing this, and then I heard one of them say, "Probably everyone is trying to get their shopping done before the snow comes."

Ah, yes. The big, bad, NOT EVEN IN THE FORECAST UNTIL TUESDAY snow. Scary stuff, especially on a sunny, cloudless day like today. While the temperatures are in the low 30s (so just below freezing), that is really the only sign of snow that I can see at the moment.

I'm driving out of town four days in a row this weekend for gigs. Do I seem worried? We don't have our snow tires on yet. Again, do I seem worried? And *gasp* I haven't stocked up on bottle water in case it snows. That's because if it snows so darn much that you can't get water, um, there's this thing called SNOW. It melts. Then it becomes water. That, my friends, is called the water cycle.

I'll spare everyone the rant on inappropriately dressed people and cold weather. Suffice it to say that my children know how to dress for winter. I even found an adorable pink kitty cat hat that Anna loves, so no hat throwing for her this year!

December madness

Oh, the insanity. Here are the highlights of the upcoming month for us:

*One thesis defense
*4 final exams for Ben to give, plus serving on the piano proficiency and composition juries
*One final theory project for Ben to hand in
*Two choir performances
*Kindergarten consecration
*Family Hanukkah party at shul
*Ben's convocation
*14 babysitters in 24 days plus an additional 7 services for me that don't require a sitter since Ben isn't playing
*1 wedding
*1 drunken Christmas party gig
*2 churches on Christmas Eve
*1 cheesy Christmas concert
*2 performances of Messiah
*2 choral concerts with cello
*1 church gig with possibly decent music (we'll find out in a couple of weeks!)
*1 church gig with awful music (last year included real snow falling on the choir members' heads during White Christmas and what Ben has dubbed Mary Potter, aka a ballet version with Mary dancing on/with a broomstick)
*1 visit from the piano tuner
*1 quick trip to London for Ben
*1 "big girl" excursion to the play version of "Little House on the Prairie" with a friend and her daughter

December 25th can't come soon enough! In addition to all of that, Rachel wants to do a 3-day "Mommy and Me" skating session, they both have 2 more Kindermusik classes, Rachel has 3 more piano lessons, and I think that Anna still has 3 more gym classes. Ben and I are teaching our two students, and I think I have at least 1 client meeting scheduled this month.

Someone will have to remind me in January that I was craving calm. Oh wait. Who am I kidding? I love the craziness!

Little comedian

The other day at breakfast, Ben looked over to see Anna gnawing on the edge of our kitchen table. She was very proud of being allowed to sit on the "big girl chair" and not in the highchair.

When she spotted Ben looking at her, she looked up and said, "I eating table!" Then she changed to a lower voice as if she was imitating one of us and said, "Don't eat table!"

Yesterday while Ben was in the shower and I was still in bed, Anna was running around in our bedroom/bathroom. There isn't a door to the master bathroom, so she likes to zip all around while we're getting ready in the mornings. I heard a crash, followed by "Oof! I fall down!" "Are you ok?" I called out half-heartedly from underneath the warm covers. "I ok!" she yelled back cheerfully.

An update of sorts

First of all, a public apology to Karen D. who has probably endured many a sleepless night wondering what happened with the Anna pj experiment! (Ok, she probably has been having sleepless nights because she has a little baby - yay! - but I digress.)

We have concluded that the pjs have nothing whatsoever to do with Anna's ability to sleep through the night, although she does get unreasonably excited when the monkey jammies come out! Socks also do not have a noticeable impact.

We are fairly certain that Anna is almost done teething until the 2-year molars come in. She's been drooling a lot, and it looks like there are only 2 more top teeth that need to poke through. Since I still have a baby tooth, Rachel has yet to lose any teeth, and she didn't get her 2-year molars until she was closer to 2.5, I suspect that we will have some time without teething pain and sleeplessness.

I don't want to jeopardize the pleasantness of the past few nights, so I won't say that Anna has slept 9-10 hours straight and has woken up in a cheerful mood at 5:30 or even 6 a.m. several nights in a row!

Is it the monkey jammies?

I have a theory. It's very unscientific, but bear with me. Last winter, just after I bought 6-8 fleece sleepers, we realized that Anna slept better in lightweight sleepers.

This winter I decided to skip any warmer pjs for Anna. My plan was to stick to lighter weight long-sleeve/pants combos. And yet every time we put her in these jammies, she has horrendous nights.

Ah, but what do monkeys have to do with it? An excellent question. For the past two weeks, we have put Anna to bed in either her short-sleeved monkey nightgown, or her short-sleeve/pants monkey jammies. She has slept well, despite being sick last week. For the past two nights, she was in lightweight long sleeve monkey pjs and she resisted going to bed and had poor sleep both nights.

Tonight is the final experiment before the long-sleeved pjs head to Ebay. Anna has a pair of Ariel pjs that are short-sleeve/pants. If she sleeps well in them, I will be safe in concluding the following:

a) It's not the monkey jammies.
b) She's the Jane-child who does not need layers to sleep
c) I probably wasted my money buying sweaters for her this winter.

If she sleeps poorly in them, I will likely conclude the following instead:

a) The Children's Place clearly has sleep-inducing narcotics embedded in their pjs (both short-sleeve monkey options are from there)
b) Monkeys are generally good except when they're not (ie. the long-sleeved monkey jammies from Target)
c) If I was getting more sleep I wouldn't feel the need to conduct experiments with my 21-month-old's sleepwear.

I guess she pays attention

Last Friday, Ben was keeping the girls busy while I got Shabbat dinner ready. It's ironic - Shabbat is supposed to be a haven of peace, and yet the lead-up to it is inevitably an insane rush (mostly on my part, who are we kidding?) to get work done and dinner on the table and candles lit 18 minutes before sunset. As it gets closer to the shortest day of the year, this time gets earlier and earlier.

When I finally called everyone to the table, Ben brought the girls downstairs. Apparently on the way down, Anna told Ben, "I want to do that Baruch-atah-adonai-eloheinu-melech-ha-olam!" (the beginning of most blessings - she ran it all together as one long word)

It's really amazing to me how much kids soak up when you're not even trying to "teach" them anything. Maybe she'll be doing the four questions at Pesach next year after all!

Sleep.... dare I post?

Anna hasn't been feeling well for about a week, but her sleep has never been better! Although she's been waking during the night, she's come into bed with us and slept decently after that. We'll leave aside the issue of whether or not Ben and I can sleep well with a flipping dolphin in bed with us. Seriously, this morning Ben and I sat up in bed and watched her flip-flop her way down to the foot of the bed IN HER SLEEP. Crazy toddler...

She has been taking 2.5-3 hour naps, which is wonderful. The downside to this is that she has only been sleeping 8.5-9.5 hours at night. It makes for very early mornings still, but at least we've finally figured out that she really only seems to need 12 hours of total sleep in a 24-hour period. At that age, Rachel was sleeping closer to 12 hours at night and still taking a nap that was usually 1.5 hours, sometimes 2-2.5 hours. Clearly we were spoiled with her!

And no, we're not considering limiting Anna's nap time. It is annoying having to get both girls ready for bed at the same time (and honestly, I think Rachel needs to be in bed earlier than Anna because she (R) has been getting up way too early again), but the trade-off of steady sleep is awesome.

Ah, the age of innocence

Rachel is working on a word search that is appropriately titled "Sick" - both she and Anna are under the weather with colds this week. She was looking for the words fever and flu, and just told me the following:

"Mom, I found an F but it doesn't spell any of the F words!"

Yes, I managed not to snort my coke out through my nose.

More from the trenches

Yesterday I cooked a "nice" meal for lunch since Ben has rehearsals every night this week and he was taking pasta with him for dinner. I filled all of the water glasses at the beginning of the meal as I always do.

About halfway through eating, Rachel reached for her water glass which was empty. I told her sternly to pay attention and that there was no point picking up her water glass because there was nothing in it.

"But why didn't you give me any water?" she asked.

"I did. You drank it." *stifled laughter from both adults at the table*

Yes, I gave her a refill.

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Last night after the girls went to bed, I finally took on the arduous task of cleaning up the playroom. I sorted (read: purged) the toys and by the end of the night, the room was looking much cleaner. We just won't talk about the large bin of stuff in the basement waiting to be donated somewhere!

When the girls got up this morning, neither one had anything to say about it, but I noticed that they both played happily with various toys. I think that Rachel was pleased to see her little Strawberry Shortcake dolls after such a long absence, and Anna had plenty of space to dump things and generally create disasters in her wake.

Since Rachel has a "late" (4:15-5:30) Kindermusik class on Wednesdays, we didn't really have time for the girls to clean up the playroom before they went to bed. I went in there a little while ago, figuring that it would only take a few minutes to sort things out.

I hadn't banked on Anna playing a little game of hide-and-seek with the pieces from her new, beloved chunky transportation puzzle. The police car and boat were in a corner of the playroom behind Rachel's old carseat. The train engine turned up in a bin of Little People and toy cars, while the airplane was found in a bin of Build-a-Bear clothes. The (rather large) school bus and fire engine are still at large. I suspect that they may have been tossed into the blocks bin, but I'm not about to dump it to find out!

While searching for the elusive puzzle pieces, I was amused to find a foam bath shark in Anna's ball popper. Tempting though it was, I refrained from pushing the button to see if the shark would shoot up and out accompanied by irritating melodies. I'll save that for the morning instead.

A few random things

The other day, Rachel was playing piano and Anna was not so patiently waiting her turn. After a few minutes, I asked Rachel to get down so Anna could play for a bit. Anna got up on the bench before Rachel got off, and she pushed Rachel.

Um, no. "Sorry, Anna, you lost your turn," I told her sternly as I lifted her down from the bench.

She proceeded to throw herself on the floor and had a lovely temper tantrum. In between sobs, I heard her yelling "I want to practice piano, I want to practice piano, I want to practice piano!!!" (To my mother and anyone else who notices/cares: Yes, I agree that practise as a verb should be spelled with an s, but no-one else does it that way and I just can't be bothered. Don't worry. I won't be taking out the letter u any time soon.)

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Rachel has developed a bad habit of sucking on her fingers lately. We're not sure why, unless it's time for those elusive and mysterious 6-year molars that I may have heard about. Or perhaps I invented that concept in a sleep-deprived stupour. In any case, she was having a snack a couple of days ago at the kitchen table. I had asked her to sit at the table because she wanted to eat her snack, read her magazine (ok, it's a Hanna Andersson catalogue - what can I say, the kid has good taste?!) AND watch the tv show that was on.

Apparently this was too many things for poor Captain Oblivious. I turned around from the computer to see her silently sobbing.

"What's wrong?" I asked, all worried.

"I accidentally put my fingers in my mouth instead of my snack and I bit down on them and it hurts!!! But I didn't bite my finger off!" she informed me in between sobs.

I managed to tell her that I would go upstairs and get Dad since he was the expert in checking wounds. I fully admit that the minute I got upstairs, I was doubled over laughing.

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We didn't go trick-or-treating on Saturday night since Shabbat didn't end until just after 7. Rachel knew it was Halloween but didn't really care about going out. I think she figured that she got her candy at Boo at the Zoo last weekend, so it was all good.

Just before Havdalah (end of Shabbat), I told Anna that after that it would be time to go upstairs and have stories. "No thank you, I want to stay downstairs," she informed me. Hey now, who said the 20-month-old was allowed to have opinions?

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We had a rather long weekend, not even factoring in the silly time change. Ben found out not that long ago that he had to have a final-looking version of his (at that point UNWRITTEN) thesis in to the graduate school office by today. Needless to say, his wife was not very pleased about this, especially since it meant giving up a gorgeous weekend to write, edit, criticize, re-edit, and finally put together something resembling a thesis, the point of which remains to be seen.

We're both amused that his advisor does not seem to have even read Ben's thesis, but instead emailed to say that the signed approval forms were in the office for Ben to pick up. This morning he emailed to say that he would read the thesis in a day or two and then they could set up a meeting. Whatever works, I guess!

I suggested the following text to Ben for his acknowledgements page:

"The author wants to thank his family for their support, especially his wife and mother-in-law who would like to throttle him for his inability to write a coherent, grammatically correct sentence."

He didn't go for it. I can't imagine why not. He does owe my mother a few drinks for giving up several hours of her Sunday morning/afternoon to proofread though!

It's just after 8:15 a.m. Since Rachel hadn't yet come downstairs, I called up to her a few minutes ago:

"Rachel, are you up yet?"

I got the following response in a very cheerful voice:

"Still sleeping!"

Ha!

Rachel's first piano recital!

An engineer in the making?

We were all enjoying pumpkin muffins after lunch today. Anna looked like she was having a little trouble, so I broke hers in half thinking that would be helpful. Apparently this was the wrong thing to do. Anna immediately got upset and started saying, "Want in piece! Put in piece!" over and over again. She eventually figured out how to shove the pieces together and cheerfully announced, "There we go!"

I stayed home with Anna because she's got a bit of a cold and we knew she'd need an early nap. It's currently 1 p.m. Anna has been asleep for 2 hours.

"I want a Daddy, I want a Daddy!" Anna screamed as Ben and Rachel got ready to leave for shul this morning. "I wear pink shoes! I want a Daddy!"

So Ben picked her up and she immediately said, "Put it down! Put it down!"

Fickle toddler.

No, Anna, that's not quite right

Rachel and I were discussing the Torah portion for this week which is the story of creation. Since they'll be talking about it in religious school tomorrow, I figured I'd do a little preview with her to make sure that she wasn't freaked out by anything. Not only was she unafraid, she was able to tell me on which day various things were made. She knew that G-d gave Moses the Torah on Mount Sinai (her favourite holiday is apparently Shavuot!) and many other things as well.

During this conversation, Anna showed up at the table. She heard us talking about the Torah and why G-d gave it to the Jewish people. So, not content to be left out, she piped up, "Dora? Dora? Dora!" No, Anna, G-d did not give us the Dora. And we can be thankful for that.

Highlights Magazine

Sometimes people will ask me what's different about Canada? As in, how is it really so different from living in the US? I tend to answer this way:

"Do you remember the Highlights magazines with the two pictures in them? The object was to spot the differences. On the surface, both seem identical. But as you look more deeply, you can see many differences."

Yesterday, Ben and I stopped by the violin shop on the way to our gig so that we could drop off our bows to be rehaired. (Yes, I have a spare bow, and Ben got a loaner bow. We didn't pluck the entire gig, although that would have been entertaining, I'm sure!)

There are a couple of businesses adjacent to the violin shop. The first is a gunsmith. There was a big sign in the window that read, "We don't want your socialism here!" My jaw dropped open. Yes, I realize that a gun shop of any type is not likely to welcome more gun control, gun registry, etc, but I guess I'm still a little stunned by the vehemence expressed by many citizens here. The term socialism is also widely applied to "Canadian" health care, which I've noticed Americans refer to as socialised or nationalised health care (Yes, I'm using the British/Canadian spelling. That's my prerogative!). "How do you like your socialised health care?" Um, I like it just fine, thank you very much. When I am in Canada, I am not worried about being in medical debt. Nor do I worry about being shot at or whether or not my friends have guns in their homes.

But I digress slightly. Next to the gunshop was another business; I don't remember exactly what it was, but there were signs in the window that read, "Patrons and employees are likely to be armed."

While there are things I enjoy down here, I will readily admit that we are more than ready to go home. Home where the only people with guns are cops, criminals and hunters. Home where we don't worry about paying for Ben's Crohns' treatments and I can give birth without going into debt. Home where people know who the prime minister is and that we use the Canadian dollar as currency. Home where people actually expect their goverment to make a positive difference in their lives. *Please note that I'm not even close to suggesting that Harper is capable of doing this! But I do expect a decent education, access to health care regardless of income, and yes, I expect that guns are a rarity, not a necessity.

I'm not interested in negative comments, by the way. Our countries were founded on very different principles. It therefore should come as no surprise that the US and Canada are so fundamentally different despite supposed outward appearances.

Important Things

"You can't be too hungry or too dirty for your first piano recital!" we were informed at dinner tonight. Good thing that Rachel liked her dinner and is now in the bathtub.

In about an hour, she has her first performance at Village Shalom. She's pretty excited about it, and it's very fun to see this from the perspective of parent instead of teacher! I used to giggle when I'd see parents making their students pose by the piano after the recital, and now I'm planning my own photo shots. Ha! (Sue, if you're reading this, stop laughing at me. And yes, Ben plans to video the whole thing!)

Best.answer.ever!!!

Yesterday I was out at a local mall with a friend killing time and trying to fit in some adult conversation. We somehow got on discussing holidays. Since Christmas stuff is already in the stores, I commented that it won't be long before people start asking my children what they want Santa to bring them for Christmas.

When this happened two years ago in London, I replied that we don't celebrate Christmas because we're Jewish. "Oh? What DO you celebrate?" was the oh-so-brilliant response.

Anyhow, my genius friend (who is also very conservative and devoutly Catholic) suggested the following dialogue:

Ignorant store person: "What do you want Santa to bring you for Christmas?"

My lovely child: "The real Messiah!"

I don't think I'd actually teach her to say that, but oh, it's tempting!!

Really?

Rachel hadn't pooped since Saturday, so I told her last night that if she wasn't able to get it out first thing this morning we'd have to try the new dissolvable/chewable laxatives. I had Ben stop at Wal-Mart on the way home from the airport last night so we would have it on hand just in case.

So of course she managed to poop this morning. Not that anyone needs to know this, but I find it amusing that all three of us tend to go at the same time every day. Just imagine in another 12 years or so... Ben will be running from all the hormones!!

Anyway, I was telling Rachel how good it was that she got it out, and she said to me, "Does this mean I don't get to have the stuff?" "Yes," I said. "You don't need it now."

"But I want to know what it tastes like! Can I have it anyway?" she asked hopefully.

No, I did not give her an unnecessary laxative. Much as I admit to curiousity myself, I happily put the box away unopened.

Perhaps my next blog post will be slightly more innocuous than this one. We shall see.

Oops

I had an orchestra concert this past Sunday, and we decided to bring the kids since it was fairly short, and it would be easy for Ben to take the kids out as needed. They both did very well for the short first half.

I suggested to Ben that he NOT take them in for the second half, but I had also made the fatal mistake of telling Rachel that there was a trumpet solo at the end of the fourth movement of the symphony in the second half. So basically, she was not going to accept listening from the lobby as a viable option.

I thought that Ben would bring them in for the last few minutes, but apparently I thought wrong. Imagine my horror when during the slow movement I, along with everyone else in the hall, heard the sounds of a small child. Said small child was not removed quickly enough for my liking, but was at least removed. Said small child's older sister sat quietly through the whole concert and loved it, so that at least was good.

Downstairs after the concert, while we were waiting for someone to unlock the door to the green room, someone asked me if it was my daughter that had been crying. For once, I was quick on my feet. I responded, "No, that was my husband's daughter." Hahahaha.

I don't think Anna will be back at concerts any time soon. I had to take the girls with me to my choir gig tonight since Ben's on his way back from London. While Rachel sat quietly and listened, Anna threw herself on the floor and yelled "Kaboom!" repeatedly. At least the gig was at a seniors' home where no-one minded! (And I don't think that it was clear to anyone else exactly what she was saying!)

She talks too much

This morning we dropped Rachel off at her art class and went to Oak Park Mall to wander around. I also wanted to get passport photos taken so that I can finally send off my work permit renewal forms. Too bad there isn't anywhere in the mall that takes passport photos. Once again, I just do not understand...

Anna emphatically told me, "I want to walk!" when I got her out of the van. She has started using "I" in the past week, and it makes her sound way older than she is! I told her that she could only walk if she held my hand. If she didn't hold my hand, she would ride in the stroller.

She did extremely well with this, and walked for a good 15 minutes through the mall with me. She let go of my hand at one point and I reminded her of the rules: "If you want to walk, you have to hold my hand. Do you want to walk or ride in your stroller?"

In response, I was informed that she wanted to walk and that, "I don't like my stroller!" She is 19 months and 3 weeks old. What's up with that?!!? I suppose I should be happy that she is using full sentences. Of course, she only does so when it's to her advantage.

The other day, she told Ben, "I need to open the door!" in reference to the fridge. Ah, food, the great motivator.

So much for snacking

I was rather tired this morning, so I decided to have some leftover honey cake for breakfast instead of making something else. Anna noticed, and came running over: "Want to try it! Want to try it!"

She was excited beyond belief that we actually got to her Kindermusik class this morning. She had a great time and happily went down for her nap when we got home. We'll see how the rest of the day goes.

I really should know better

This morning I took the girls to the bank. Instead of using the convenient, silent & trustworthy bank machine, I went into the bank. Why? For various reasons, I needed to obtain a money order in Canadian funds. Apparently asking for that was akin to speaking Greek. "I don't think we can do that. We don't have Canadian money orders."

Me: "What? Really? I just need to get a money order in Canadian funds. Can you tell me where I can get one?"

Bank lady: "No, I don't know." *goes to ask another employee* "We can possibly order something in but it will be expensive and it will take at least 4 days."

Me: "No, never mind. You really don't know where I can get a Canadian money order?"

I didn't realize that BANKS weren't equipped to deal with currency requests!!! And yes, I realize that I am not in a border state. But still... to not even know? Surely some people from Kansas travel out of the country and want foreign funds before they depart. Surely some people do business in foreign countries and occasionally need to use something other than Pay Pal. Or perhaps I am truly naive.

At home, as far as I understand it, I can either go to the bank or I can go to the handy-dandy currency exchange place in the mall where I once obtained a gig's worth of pesos to pay a friend as a joke. I do not recall seeing such a place in the mall here, so to the bank I went.

Now I do understand that the post offices here sell money orders, but it also implies that said money orders can be cashed at the post office of the receiving country. That will not work for my needs. I am loath to go to the post office myself with this request since it seems that ignorance abounds. I might send poor, unsuspecting Ben later on. Yes, I think that would be best. I'm currently not capable of politeness in the face of stupidity.

(Yes, I am a stranger in a strange land. Yes, I should be polite. But you know what? It's not the lack of ability to carry out my request that annoyed me. It was the disinterest, and lack of assistance to find a solution that currently have me riled up. Fine, you can't give me a money order in Canadian funds. How about suggesting somewhere that can?!!??!?)

More Anna

"Boofiful!" (beautiful)

"One two three four five seven eight nine TEN! Eleven twelve thirteen nineteen!"

She also randomly yells out, "Wonder Pets, Wonder Pets, ON THE WAY!" So much for being done with cheesy tv characters. Anna is also in love with Dora and Diego. Surprisingly, she doesn't much care for Curious George.

Anna also doesn't care much for sleeping. She did get a new tooth - #9. We also suspect that more teeth are coming. Anyone know if there's a quick way to force them through?!?!? Last night Anna slept from about 6:30-9:30, then midnight-4 a.m. She napped from 11-1 (it would have been earlier but I forced her to stay up) and she was desperately ready for bed tonight by 6:35 despite our best attempts to keep her up a bit later.

At least she's happy. According to Anna, life is boofiful.

Five-year-olds are funny

On Friday I took the girls to Costco to pick up a few things. Since it was around lunchtime, let's just say that we all did very well with samples:

*marble cheesecake
*sunflower seed cookie
*grape juice
*breaded mozzarella stick
*spinach & cheese ravioli (both girls gobbled this down!!)
*peanut butter & chocolate protein bar (only Rachel had this)
*probably a few more things that I can't remember

We got to the checkout lane, and our cashier was a nice-looking young man in his mid-20s with very long hair. As I was paying, I heard a small voice pipe up:

"Excuse me, Mom, but how can it be a boy if it has long hair?"

Yup, that was my daughter. And yes, she apologized to the cashier who laughed and said he'd heard much worse!

**********************************

At dinner on Friday, Rachel was being rude and I called her out on it. Immediately, another little voice started calling out, "Rude! Rude! Rachel rude!!!" At least that's all she was saying...

**********************************

Rachel walked two doors down all by herself on Friday afternoon to see if her friend wanted to come over to play. She was told that her friend would come in about 15-20 minutes since they were about to eat lunch. Rachel waited eagerly on our stairs by the front door, and she was very excited when her friend finally got here.

It's possible that I'm just inexperienced at this playdate thing, but wow, was the other girl bossy!! She kept saying that she was the guest so they got to do whatever she wanted to do. "The guest gets to choose," she would say. I'm sure this is the rule at her house, but really, I think there has to be some give and take in all situations. Yes, the guest gets to go first, or choose the first activity or whatever, but really? Everything? Am I just naive here? I just can't imagine how that would be fun for both parties if one person chose everything.

I'd still say that overall it was a good afternoon. Rachel told me later that she was really upset because her friend wanted to play "Sleepover". I asked her what was wrong with that. "She said she was going to read me a book, but then she didn't read what it said, she just made up a story!!!!" Rachel sobbed. I guess it hasn't occurred to her that not all of her peers can read yet. Once I realized what was upsetting her, it was very difficult not to laugh.

***************************

And in another literary vein, I had a few books from a Scholastic order that I had stashed away. One was an "Ivy & Bean" book. I gave it to Rachel to read this afternoon while the rest of us enjoyed a leisurely Shabbat afternoon nap. When I asked her how she liked it, she said that there was a really bad part. Surprised (I had pre-read it to make sure it would be ok for her and that she wouldn't be scared!), I asked what part was bad. At first, I thought she was upset that Bean's older sister was mean to her. No, that wasn't it. After a little detective work, it turned out that Rachel was upset because Bean's older sister told her that the bones they had found in the backyard weren't dinosaur bones, they were dog bones.

I assume that no-one reading this sees the problem with that. Of course dogs bury bones in the backyard, everyone knows that. Well, everyone except for Rachel who assumed that they meant real DOG BONES from an actual DOG. She was extremely upset about this, and I had to explain to her that it was bones for a dog to chew on that were buried back there. This satisfied her until bedtime, when she expressed her disappointment that she never did get to find out what the bones were. I told her again that they were bones for dogs, and she asked where they were from. I explained that they probably came from meat and left it at that.

We think that Rachel still thinks there is a difference between "Chicken the bird" and "Chicken the meat". Anna, on the other hand, sees me serving chicken for dinner and yells things like, "Chicken! Cluck cluck!"

A house full of music

Our house has always been full of music. Violin, viola, piano, cello, singing, Kindermusik, CDs of all kinds... not to mention the various in-utero experiences that both kids had. I can't remember if I've posted this before or not, so I'm going to go ahead at the risk of possibly repeating myself. *gasp* The horror, the horror! (Quick, what book am I quoting?)

When I was about halfway with Rachel, we were playing Fagans' Messiah at Centennial Hall. The second last piece before the intermission is #20, "He Shall Feed His Flock", which has to be the slowest, most repetitive aria on the face of the planet. (Ok, it's likely not that bad, but when you've been playing almost non-stop and are really, really ready for a break, it definitely feels like it lasts forever! And just when it could come to a close, Handel decides to do the whole thing over again with the soprano, in a different key!)

About halfway through the piece, I started to feel very unwell. It took me a minute to figure out the odd sensation - Rachel had started to do somersaults in utero while I was playing! I suspect that I was also sitting up too straight and not paying attention to my pregnant body telling me that I needed to relax a bit! Still, every time I was involved in some kind of choral concert, there was extra movement from the baby.

About 6 weeks later, I had the questionable privilege of playing with Orchestra London for their Celtic concert. This included pipes and drums. At one point, the only thing happening on stage was a very loud, rhythmic drum solo. Shortly after it started, I began wondering (not without some irritation) who on earth felt it necessary to be tapping their foot so emphatically in time with the music on stage. Then it dawned on me - it was the baby inside of me, kicking IN TIME to the music.

I'm generally skeptical of things like the "Mozart effect", although of course if you have music in your environment it seems logical to conclude that music study will come easier, among other things.

That said, Rachel has been in Kindermusik since she was 1 week old. No, not because I thought that she would really benefit from it at such a young age, but because I needed to get out and do something! By next May (2010), she will have completed the entire program, which culminates in the Young Child curriculum. She will have learned to play the glockenspiel, dulcimer and recorder. She will know how to read at least 6 notes on the treble clef, as well as knowing about different rhythms and "technical" names such as quarter note and fermata.

Rachel started piano on August 17th of this year. In 5.5 short weeks, she has learned to play various left hand patterns, Hot Cross Buns with both hands, one of the Twinkle variations from the Suzuki book, and the "regular" Twinkle in the right hand. She can clap and recite all kinds of rhythms with the infamous "Blue Jello" system. She has an innate understanding of what she is doing and why she is doing it. We listen to all kinds of music almost every day, and she runs around singing the words to the Suzuki pieces that were provided by her teacher. I am 99% sure that she has perfect pitch, and she has an uncanny ability to concentrate during practice sessions. Little Miss Compliant emerges many times, insisting that "Miss Jean told us to do it 5 times" so trying to take a short-cut if we're running out of time simply won't do.

While I was teaching this afternoon, Ben took the girls to the music store to pick up the theory/technique book that Rachel's teacher had asked us to buy. Rachel "read" it all the way home, and asked me just now to read it. I peeked over at her, and caught her quietly clapping the rhythms at the end of the book (accurately!). She loves the piano, and has yet to complain about practising. (I said "has yet". Don't worry, I'm under no illusion that that time won't come!)

Ben and I are still glad that we waited until this year to get Rachel started. In the past 6 months, we've seen huge changes in her. She is much more enthusiastic about participating in various activities. I suspect that part of it is due to homeschooling. Since she's not having to put out a huge effort to play social every day at school, she's more able to focus and participate happily in the activities that she enjoys. Or maybe I'm smoking the bad crack again... or should I say it's time for a new bong? ;)

Now for Anna. A little while ago, I posted about her saying "bwoo jewo". Yesterday, out of the blue (haha), she looked up at me and said in perfect time, "Half note! Half note!" She randomly says things like "Pepperoni pizza!" (for a left hand exercise) and "Lightly row!" throughout the day, and when Rachel is actually playing the piano, Anna provides a running commentary. "Rachel playing! Tinkle little star! Pepperoni pizza! Ready, go! Anna's turn! Anna's turn play piano!"

I'm glad that the girls are four years apart, because it scares me to see just how much Anna is picking up from her sister! Even if we choose to start Anna before age 5 (and I suspect we'll have to, just because she won't take no for an answer. Deanna, I'm starting to feel really guilty that I wouldn't take Lydia sooner. You can come flog me anytime!), she will have had an insane advantage just from listening in on Rachel's practice sessions. Then again, maybe we'll be able to convince Anna to play the violin or cello instead. We'll see. I actually have no objection to both girls playing piano though.

Ok, I'm all done bragging for tonight. ;)

Back to the holidays

The coke brisket was awesome! Much to our chagrin, Rachel loved it (less for us). Surprisingly, Anna did not like it. She also kept calling it "burger".

I thought I had more to say but apparently not.

News links

http://lfpress.ca/newsstand/News/Local/2009/09/23/11070591.html

It's Hanson Crescent, not Hanson Court, but close enough.

http://www.londontopic.ca/article.php?artid=16098

And I love how this one has a typo and lists the event as a "grow-up" bust. No kidding.

http://www.frommybottomstep.com/2009/09/22/hanson-cr-gro-op-bust/

Because our former house is now infamous so I have to link all I can. Haha.

http://www.altlondon.org/

This one you have to scroll way down now since it lists all kinds of local news.

Wow. Just wow.

Remember all my tales of woe from when we moved into our "Forever Home" in London in 2007? Well, apparently it is now a "No Longer Home".

No, it didn't burn down, but it may as well have. I got an email tonight from our former neighbour who is also a friend of ours from before we were ever neighbours. Apparently the people who bought our house were taken into custody today for running a grow-op in our house. Yes, you read that correctly. Our beautiful house that we brought Anna home to as a baby has been seized by the police. According to my neighbour, the entire house was being used for the grow-up, not just the basement! There were cops everywhere this afternoon, and they used my friend's house to let the drug-sniffing dog clear his nose. Um, wow.

What a colossal waste. From the minimal research I did online tonight, chances are good that the house is pretty uninhabitable unless someone were to buy it and gut and rebuild it from the inside. Supposedly houses with more hardwood have more problems since the humidity levels in grow-op houses are so high. I can't believe that I now have a reason to know this. Ben and I are both sick over this. Regardless of the time we spent in that house, it was our home. We designed it, and we lived in it. And no, we did not smoke pot in it!

I guess that now we know why they kept trying to get us to leave our curtains in the house when we sold it...

Now I'm homesick...

http://home.cogeco.ca/~husky66/Milk/

I wish I knew how to make a clickable link, but every time I try it just doesn't work in Blogger. Anyway, I am currently chatting online with an American friend of mine, and she had no clue what a milk bag was. I googled it for kicks, and found this website which is totally cracking me up.

O Canada...

Not your grandma's brisket!

Since Rosh Hashanah starts tomorrow night, our kitchen has been a whirlwind of activity today. This afternoon I baked honey cakes, and Rachel helped me make challah tonight - 2 round loaves, and 1 regular one. She'll proudly tell you that she put the raisins on top to decorate!

As we all know, it isn't a holiday at our house unless I've cooked enough food to feed at least twice as many people as we'll be having for dinner. This year it's just the four of us and the menu is as follows:

Challah
Apples & honey
"Shake'n'bake" Honey Chicken (from Rachel's Kosher by Design: Kids in the Kitchen cookbook - this series is awesome!)
Carrots
Roast potatoes
possibly devilled eggs just because I feel like making them
Honey cake
Chocolate chip cookies (I admit it, I bought these today. I love having a local grocery store with a kosher bakery!)
Apple spice muffins

So obviously that isn't enough food, even though I'm hoping to feed us for Saturday and Sunday as well. That said, I bought a small brisket today. I know that Ben loved his grandma's brisket, and I won't pretend that I can do it justice. Instead, I looked around online and found a recommendation for this recipe:

http://www.gourmania.com/recipesmlym/mlnym_cokebrisket.htm

Yes, folks, tonight I seasoned a brisket in the roasting pan and then poured half a can of Coke Zero all over it! I'm equally horrified and amused that I just did that to a $20 piece of meat.

I'll be sure to report back on how it turns out. In the meantime, to those of you who celebrate, l'shana tova!

She has a point...

Rachel's piano teacher suggested that we get some flashcards to work on learning pre-reading skills. Although I suspect that the cards we purchased will be learned within a week or two at most, I have no problem going at the teacher's pace. I think that she is often surprised at the extent of Rachel's knowledge. Anyhow, today I showed her a card with a quarter rest and asked her what it was.

"A Shh!" she proclaimed proudly, clearly having paid attention to the system in Kindermusik. "Yes, but what other name does it have?" I asked. "Rest?" she said. "Yes," I answered, "But what kind of rest is it?"

She thought for a moment and then the lightbulb went on:

"A silent one!"

She has a point there. The correct answer, by the way, was quarter rest.

Rachel homeschools herself

We were at the bookstore this morning. In addition to picking up another book that is referenced in the Caldecotts book that Rachel so dearly loves, I thought we'd get a tree guide since we've been learning about trees. I went with the Audubon Pocket Guide - Familiar Trees of North America (Eastern). It's got pictures of real trees and their leaves, and has just enough information to satisfy Rachel without being too wordy.

She's been reading it for about 20 minutes, and keeps coming over to tell me about the different kinds of trees that we might find in Canada. (It tells you where various trees are found; and yes, I know that Kansas is probably not included in Eastern but it was the only pocket guide they had, and I figure she might as well learn about "Canadian" trees!)

I am highly amused that Rachel came over to me to tell me how much she liked the cockspur hawthorn. And I was just informed that the slippery elm has stripy textured leaves - she could tell from the picture.

So far I am doing very little work. But no, I am NOT unschooling!

Funny Anna

Anna is speaking in little sentences all the time now. It cracks me up to hear her say, "Thank you, mommy!" and "All done bagel!"

That said, she has some very cute misunderstandings regarding vocabulary. We have some word books that were given to Rachel as a baby (Thanks, Kate! We still love them!). One of these books has a cup in it. Anna calls it a "waterpease!" (water please) She is convinced that this is what a cup is called.

Also, when Anna wants more of something, she says "morepease!" - again, this is all one word.

While I was typing this, Anna just walked up to me with Rachel's Cinderella backpack and said, "Mommy have a bag! 'Rella!"

I think one of Ben's favourites is when I serve chicken for dinner and Anna yells out gleefully, "Chicken! Cluck cluck cluck!" Although our 5-year-old is still firmly convinced that "chicken-the-bird" is not the same as "chicken-the-dinner", Anna apparently has no such issue.

When Rachel is practising piano, Anna usually shows up and demands a turn: "Anna's turn piano! Hot dog! Tinkle Little Star!" The really funny thing is that she can almost play some of the rhythms that Rachel is doing.

Funny answers

This morning Rachel and I read, "A Tree is Nice". I picked up a book from Scholastic back in the spring called "Caldecotts across the curriculum". Basically, it takes good children's literature and suggests lots of lesson plans and activities based on the books.

My plan for today was to read the book, have Rachel name 5 kinds of trees, draw a tree, and then bake leaf/twig cookies as per the book's instructions. (Don't worry, they're real cookies - just shaped like tree parts!)

We read the book after breakfast and went straight to tree-naming. Here were Rachel's 5 trees:

1. Evergreen (we narrowed this down to fir)
2. Aspen
3. Spruce
4. Maple
5. Pine

I then got a lesson from Rachel about how to tell a spruce tree from a fir tree based on the sharpness of their needles. Yes, Grandma Karen, you've finally found someone who likes all things botanical!

When I brought up the idea of drawing a tree, Rachel predictably burst into tears. "But I don't know HOW to draw a tree!" she wailed. I pointed out that trees have leaves and trunks and branches. When I asked her what kind of tree she wanted to draw, she suggested an apple tree. But she wanted to draw the apple tree with flowers, not apples. This brought fresh tears because she didn't know how to draw the flowers either.

In desperation, I googled "apple tree with flowers picture" and got this:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/victor1805/3592496962/

It's a very nice pic with a bee visiting the apple tree. From that, Rachel got the idea to draw a butterfly visiting her apple tree. Too bad she burst into tears again because she thought she couldn't draw a butterfly.

In the end, I took out some paper and sketched her all the elements - leaf, flower, trunk, branches, and butterfly. My point was that if Mom could do it, Rachel could certainly do it. While I don't generally believe in talking down your abilities, it is fairly undisputed in our family that some of us have less artistic ability than others!

The plan is to run errands, and then do the tree drawing and cookies while Anna naps. We'll see how that goes.

Ah, television

Anna is sitting on the couch in a dazed kind of stupour watching the Backyardigans. Since she got up at 6:15, I'm quite happy to let her hang out for a little bit. She is still way overtired from her little party last night that lasted until a little after midnight.

Rachel, on the other hand, is still firmly asleep in her bed. Works for me.

Party time

So at 10 p.m. tonight, Anna woke up. She stood up in her crib and yelled, "All done!" until Ben came to get her out. Meanwhile, Rachel had yet to fall asleep. I suggested that she go to the bathroom. As she washed her hands, she sang, "It's 10 o'clock and I am very tired! I should be asleep!"

We all went downstairs for cookies and strawberries. Ben and I followed this up with specialty cheese & crackers that were part of an anniversary gift basket from Ben's grandma. Then Rachel told us how she was very tired and should be in bed. So up she went. It is now 11:30 p.m. and she is still muttering to herself in there.

Anna hung out downstairs for quite a while. At one point, she was sitting on the couch with Ben when she turned around and said, "High five. Mommy, high five!" So I came over, and sure enough, she gave me a high five and grinned.

I finished cleaning up the kitchen and sat down to watch some mindless tv. Anna came over to join me, and I cuddled her and patted her. She almost fell asleep that way, but I figured I'd try to at least get her on board with the idea of going up to her crib, so I invited her to come up to go to sleep with her monkey pillow. "Monkey pillow!" she whispered, and she grinned at me, half-asleep already.

Unfortunately, about 5 minutes after being put in her crib, she was screaming again. So now it's Ben's turn to catch up on some tv and hope that eventually Little Miss Insomniac will transfer to the crib and sleep!

Rachel and Anna are ready to go!

This was taken just before we left for Beth Shalom on Friday night. Are they excited, or what?!

Thoughts on a Sunday night

Our shul has recently started a new type of service: Shabbat l’Mishpacha (Family Shabbat) We attended the first dinner & service on Friday night. While it was awesome to see so many young families and kids there, it was thought-provoking in several ways. The evening began with candlelighting, Kiddush, and keeping the challah knife out of the hands of various youngsters. This was done in the corner of the social hall where chairs were set up for the service that would take place later.

Dinner followed promptly, and was a buffet-style family-friendly set-up. There were name tags for everyone, so it was easy to introduce people and not forget names. Although we enjoyed the dinner, we were less than enthusiastic when the rabbi encouraged the children to lead the Birkat Ha-mazon (Grace after meals) prayers if they knew them. Actually, that’s not entirely accurate. We thought it was a great idea until the children started literally screaming the prayers and no move was made to stop this from happening. The children who knew the prayers were probably 5-10 years old.

The senior rabbi (who has 4 young children himself) called the children over and invited them to sit at the front on the floor. He encouraged this by saying that the closer you sat, the more ice cream you would get after the service. That’s definitely one way to get a couple dozen pre-schoolers’ attention!

We sang a few songs and then they invited the children to follow the (new) assistant rabbi out into the hall for a story. Parents were strongly encouraged to remain for a 7-minute Ma’ariv (evening) service. I went out into the hall, because our 1.5 year old decided that she wanted to go along with the big kids. It was rather chaotic. It’s a long hallway, and getting kids (and parents!) to sit still and listen was no easy task.

The rabbi read “Sammy Spider’s First Rosh Hashanah” to the children. Since it was obvious that they had very little attention span remaining, he tried to cut out a lot of the text, much to someone’s chagrin: “But those aren’t the real words!” was heard from a nameless five-year-old in the crowd.

After the story, we rejoined the adults in the social hall for ice cream. My husband told me later that he wasn’t sure what to think of the Ma’ariv service. He initially told me that at one point, he and one other man were the only adults participating. My response was that perhaps a lot of the parents of young kids haven’t been to shul regularly in a long time and are only starting to come back now because of their children. I could understand if they were unfamiliar with some of the Hebrew, especially since I am still in the learning process myself. Then he told me that this was an English response and no-one was participating.

Still determined to be positive, we ended the evening thinking that perhaps these events would help bring people back to shul on a more regular basis.

This leads me to another item of frustration: the new “Young Family” services that are being held on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. In previous years, our shul has always run concurrent services in the main sanctuary and in the social hall. The sanctuary service is more traditional, while the service in the social hall incorporates instrumental music and a less formal feel overall. Part of the reason that they run multiple services is to have enough space for those who attend at this time of year, but I also thought that part of the reason was to give a choice between “styles” of worship, ie. traditional or modern.

In addition to these services, there is babysitting for children ages 0-5, and age-appropriate programming/services for children ages 5-10. These services last the same length of time as the “adult” services. I have opinions about separating families, but at the same time, when services can last up to 4 or 5 hours on these days, I understand that it’s impractical to keep your young children in the service the whole time.

Last year the shul tried a new family service that was somewhat in the middle of the regular services. We attended it, but were in the sanctuary both before and after this service. Actually, I should be honest. I spent about 75% of last year’s High Holy Day services nursing Anna in the comfort of the women’s washroom – yes, by choice! There are comfy chairs in there and I got to nod off along with her when necessary.

This year, in addition to the sanctuary and social hall services, there are Young Family services in the Chapel on both days of Rosh Hashanah and on Yom Kippur as well. The problem that I see with this is that the sanctuary and social hall services begin at 8:30 and 9 a.m. respectively (and 9:30 for both on Yom Kippur). The Young Family services are from 9-10 a.m., after which children can go to the babysitting or age-appropriate programming of their choice.

So this means that the parents will be walking into the main services anywhere from 1-2 hours late. While it is much more acceptable to walk into a Jewish service late than it would be in church, to me this is not a good proposition. All joking about getting a good seat aside, I think that it sends a negative message to the children: “Oh, it’s ok if we don’t go to shul until about 10:15 or so. They won’t be reading Torah until then anyway.” And actually, they are anticipating the Torah reading starting soon after 10 a.m. How do I know? I know this because Ben has an aliyah (honour) in the Torah service on the second day of Rosh Hashanah and he has been told to come up to the bimah (altar) by 10:05 a.m. I find it frustrating having to choose between being in the main service and taking my children to support the young families’ initiatives that are being started.

At the same time, I can understand the desire to have the children participate in a way that is meaningful to them. And I agree that it’s also desirable to have the parents participate with their children, but since when is a worship service all about bringing it down to the children’s level? Why not have the parents bring their children to whichever service they wish to attend, and take them in and out as needed? (For the record, this is what we do on a regular basis.) I would be surprised if the children weren’t engaged by a lot of the music in the social hall service, and really, it’s ok for them to learn that it’s not all “fun”.

Would I do away with the family service entirely? No. Our former (Reform) shul back home has what I think is an ideal solution to this dilemma. While babysitting is provided for the youngest children during the service, all others remain in the sanctuary. Later in the afternoon (after a good lunch!), families can return for a special Family Service. Of course I can understand that many people would not be willing to come back to shul after spending half a day there already, but this would at least alleviate the issue of forcing people to choose between their religious obligations and providing an age-appropriate experience for their children.

We’ve been revisiting the subject of Orthodox Judaism in our house lately. One thing that I really respect is that Orthodox Judaism is by its very nature inherently family-friendly. Women are not obligated to recite the same prayers that men are, at least not at specific times. Why not? Because Judaism recognizes that families are important. I do spend a lot of time at shul either walking our 1.5 year-old around or quietly reminding our 5-year-old how to behave. Sometimes I don’t attend if the 1.5 year-old needs a nap and it makes more sense for me to stay home with her. Am I grateful that I am not obligated to time-specific prayer? Most definitely.

Some people feel that Orthodox Judaism is anti-feminist and that it’s ridiculous to deny women the “right” of participating fully in services. I think it’s equally ridiculous to insist on “equality”. Women wearing tallitot (prayer shawls) and kippot (male head coverings)? Ok, but why? I don’t see men wearing bras (and believe me, some of them should at least consider it!) At our former (Conservative) shul back home, it struck me as to just how overdone this concept could be. At every service, someone would make an announcement about how it was an egalitarian shul and how proud they were of this fact. Not only was it tedious constantly hearing this, but it made it appear that the congregants were very much in defensive mode about how the congregation was run.

When Ben and I look to the (not-so-distant!) future of Rachel becoming Bat Mitzvah, we find ourselves thinking about where we’d like to be in our own Jewish lives at that point. We’re becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the idea of remaining Conservative Jews, yet Orthodoxy seems to present more dilemmas that are not easily solved. In part, I suspect that our path will depend on where we move to next summer. And yes, it will also depend on our willingness to give up a lot of what we do.

Stay tuned… the more sleep I get, the more thoughts I have!

Again?

As the early evening sunlight streamed into Rachel's room and I went in there to put a few things away, I noticed that the shelves of Rachel's headboard looked a bit dusty. Since I'm having a lot of trouble breathing again (yeah, we're so not staying in Kansas beyond next spring.), we've been trying harder to keep up with dusting, vacuuming, etc.

I leaned in for a closer look at which point I noticed that the inner sides of Rachel's shelves looked rather mottled, almost like the wood was chipping off in places.

I have a prize for any blog reader who can guess why this was so.

Bittersweet...

Yesterday afternoon, I walked Rachel and her friend (J) two doors down to see if the little girl there (O) wanted to come over to play with them. O had another friend over, but her mom invited us all in. After about 15 minutes, I had to leave because I had left Ben home with a sleeping baby G and a sleeping Anna, and he had to leave for a meeting. I asked Rachel if she wanted to stay or go, and she was very emphatic that she wanted to stay and play with O, thank you very much. I decided to trust that J's mother wouldn't lynch me when she came back for her kids, and headed home to let Ben get to work.

When I came back to pick the kids up, O's mother mentioned that if Rachel wanted to come over the next afternoon, they would be home. (O also has a napping little sister, thus limiting playdate options in the afternoon!)

I had told Rachel that we could walk over there after Anna's nap, but about 10 minutes ago, O knocked on our door to see if Rachel could come over to play. Rachel was ecstatic. She informed me that I did not need to walk her over because she would be with O and they would be careful. I walked them outside anyway, until I could see that O's mother was out waiting for them.

So to everyone who has been pushing me to send Rachel on "solo playdates" for, oh, more than 2 years now, all I have to say is that there is a time for everything. And now it's Rachel's turn to fly! (And no, I am NOT crying. No, I am not. I am happy that my "baby" is confident enough to go play down the street without me. There are no tears on my keyboard.)

That is all.

Funny things

Anna and Ben went for a walk on Saturday. While out, Ben suggested that they look for a dog. Anna suggested looking for a monkey instead. "Monkey! Monkey!" Ben kindly informed her that he highly doubted that they would find any monkeys on their walk. He explained that they were not at the zoo, there would probably not be any monkeys, etc, etc.

Imagine his dismay when they turned a corner and Anna spotted a big stone gorilla on someone's driveway! "MONKEY!!!! HI MONKEY!!!" she said with a big grin.

I suspect that Ben has lost some credibility over this.
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Anna loves to go swimming. Whenever we pass the Blue Valley Recreation Centre, she loudly exclaims, "Swimming!" However, since we now only go twice a week for swim classes, she has taken to saying, "Swimming. Not today." in a rather dejected tone of voice.
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I will admit to being happy that the girls will watch tv together sometimes, thus leaving me a few minutes of peace and quiet. Anna loves the Wonder Pets. We recently figured out that she thinks the guinea pig is actually a monkey. (Hey, she thinks the Yak in her Alphabet Train is also a monkey. Who am I to dissuade her?) Anyhow, we were out at Target this morning and in a weak moment I agreed to go look at toys. "Wonder Pets!" said Anna gleefully, upon spotting a toy fly boat with 3 Wonder Pets inside.

Well after we left the toy section, Anna was very happily (and randomly) saying "Wonder Pets!" Even at the checkout she felt the need to mention it. Of course, she also had to comment on all of the fruit we were buying. She doesn't miss a thing.
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Rachel is loving her piano lessons. She has learned to play Hot Cross Buns and is quite particular about how she plays it. I played it two ways for her and asked which way she liked better. "The perfect way," she told me. Oy. She meant the legato (smooth) version. In true childlike fashion, she is also quite the egomaniac: "That was great! I did it perfect! I'm so good at this!" The thing is, she's generally right on with her self-assessments but I can't really say so all of the time!

Also related to piano, Rachel's teacher uses the "Blue Jello" system for teaching rhythm. Rachel and I have been going back and forth with different rhythms, to the point where Anna will try to join in: "Bwoo jewo, bwoo jewo!" Apparently there is something to this whole concept of immersion at a young age after all... (Please note that I've never questioned that. I did and still do question what I have seen from too many Suzuki teachers back home - not you, H!!!!!!)

The Big Pink Bear

This morning Anna was up at 5 a.m. By 8:15, she looked exhausted, so I put her in her crib where she stayed for about an hour. I'm not sure how long she slept, but she was mostly quiet so I also semi-snoozed my way through an episode of Dora the Explorer.

By 9:30, both kids were on the couch watching Diego. Anna was hungry, so I offered her leftover pizza but she kept insisting, "Ban! Ban!" (banana). When I asked if she wanted a banana, she gave me a huge grin and nodded.

She's had bananas plenty of times before, so I didn't think anything of it. Today she got a piece stuck and started choking to the point where she was turning blue. I tried everything I knew, but banana is a soft food and it just was not working. I saw someone outside the neighbour's house, so I went outside with Anna. It turned out to be the water guy, and he asked me if I wanted him to call 911.

By this point, I was pretty sure that Anna was ok, but she was still doing that shuddering, gasping cry, and I could still feel something in her throat that wouldn't go up or down. So he called, and the paramedics and a police car showed up at our house. Fun times. Of course she was perfectly fine as soon as they showed up, so I felt like an idiot for wasting their time.

I was surprised to hear them say that I should have called them first. I assumed that I should try to get her to cough it up and only call if it really wasn't going anywhere. One of the paramedics told me that techniques have changed a lot in the past few years, especially regarding babies and choking.

Anna is fine. She is understandably rather angry, but who wouldn't be angry after being whacked, having fingers stuck down the throat, and being poked and prodded by strangers? She's currently napping, and at this point it looks like we will miss our first Kindermusik class of the year.

And of course there is no chocolate or caffeine in the house... I wonder what I'm doing when Ben gets home!??!

Our week so far

Yesterday, Anna got up for the day at 3:30 a.m. Although she napped from 6-7:30 and again from 11-1, Rachel was up at 6:30, and Ben was gone from 6:15-3:15.

By early afternoon, I was exhausted. I suggested to the girls that we find something on TV for everyone to enjoy. "TV!!!!" yelled Anna gleefully. "Up! Couch! TV!"

And that is how we came to be watching Lingo on the Game Show Network and calling it "spelling class". I'd say our second week of homeschooling is off to a great start.

Today, it is only 9:20 a.m. We have already been to the grocery store and resisted the temptation for Starbucks. Both girls are sitting reading in the living room while we listen to piano music on a CD in the background. I don't expect it to last, but it's nice while it does!

Seriously!??!

We just returned home from a family trip to the zoo. Anna headed straight upstairs for a nap (ok, she was escorted up!), and Captain Oblivious took a book and headed for the washroom. About 10 minutes later, we heard, "Oh no! My cap!"

Yes, folks, Rachel's elephant cap had fallen in the toilet. But don't worry, she fished it right back out and put it on the floor! And don't worry, she claims that she did this all before she pooped.

Oy.

It was bound to happen eventually

Rachel just opened the gate and went upstairs singing "I'm going upstairs, I'm going upstairs, and you may NOT follow me!"

Earlier today she was upset because Anna was reading one of her Dora books and playing with her ball. "Those are mine!" she said. Never mind that she was reading and playing with other things. I guess the "fun" years are starting! And how do I justify letting Anna play with stuff that for almost 4 years was only Rachel's!? I don't mind letting Rachel have a few special toys to keep in her room, but I'm not going to say that Anna can only play with her specific baby toys. That's just silly!

Yes!!!!!!!

It only took 18 months and 5 days to get Anna to actually stop moving long enough to watch something on TV. And no, I haven't really been trying to get her to do this, but I will admit that I'm quite happy that both kids are currently happily watching Dora the Explorer. It's even a circus episode complete with elephants and monkeys. What more could they possibly need?

I have a feeling it's going to be a long day. Rachel's diarrhea has yet to disappear, so we're housebound again. Hopefully she'll be done with it very soon and I'll still be able to contemplate taking her to her second swimming class tomorrow. (She missed the first one yesterday.)

Anna keeps getting her shoes and trying to put them on. I keep explaining to her that we're staying home today. She's not buying it.

Ah, the good doctors S.

Anna loves to bring us books and ask (demand) that we read them to her. She even has this adorable backwards walk she does that ends with her plopping down on the first available lap.

She currently has a few favourites. One is "You can go to the potty" by Dr. Sears. She will ask for it by name. "Potty? Potty? Potty!" and she brings it over to be read.

She also adores "Green Eggs and Ham" by Dr. Seuss and has taken to randomly yelling "Ham! Ham! HAM!!!"

So I may have taught her to finish the following sentence: "Anna, ham is..."

"TRAYF!" she says cheerfully. "Ham ham ham! Trayf!"

(Trayf = forbidden)

We'll work on getting her to say shellfish next, I suppose.

I feel a little like a spy

Today was Rachel's first piano lesson. She is taking Suzuki piano, for a variety of reasons, the main one being that we think it's a good fit for her. We are driving out to Lawrence for this (about 50 minutes away if I drive, well over an hour if my mother was driving! Hey, she's away for a week, I can say that!) because there are very few Suzuki piano teachers in the area. This particular teacher also teaches at the UMKC Community Music & Dance Academy but signing up at that location would have required a Friday lesson time at which Anna would have had to be present. Her group classes there are also on Fridays, and it's more expensive to do it that way. (NOT that I even asked about fees!!! I know better, LOL. I also know what the Academy charges since both Ben and I used to teach there.)

It was fascinating watching the lesson. I honestly feel like I should be paying double - one fee for Rachel to get the lesson, and another for the "teacher training" I will magically get just by sitting in on (and taking notes in) Rachel's lessons.

Her teacher had me come up at the end of the lesson to play a duet with her while Rachel sat in the "parent chair" and watched. I was amused, because I could tell that the teacher had forgotten that I had told her I used to teach piano. I was also amused at how self-conscious I was since she was only asking me to play the first Twinkle variation with the right hand and yet the first thing out of my mouth was, "I just want you to know that I haven't had a piano lesson in 17 years!"

I'll have you know that no mistakes were made in the playing of said duet. Go me!

Rachel really enjoyed her lesson and was excited to come home and tell Ben all about it. I'm glad that we didn't start her any earlier than this. Many of our friends have started (or are starting) their kids at age 3 or 4, but Rachel just wasn't ready to take "serious" instruction from anyone until this year. Let's hope the novelty doesn't wear off and she enjoys practising as much as she enjoyed her lesson!

Astute observation

On the way home from her very first piano lesson tonight, Rachel and I were discussing how it went. When I brought up the topic of practice, I asked her if she thought that there were any days on which she shouldn't practise. She suggested Friday afternoon, and I pointed out to her that Shabbat starts after sundown. She then decided that Saturdays were a no-go for practice.

"What about Sundays?" she then asked. "Is that ok?" When I told her that Sunday would be a perfectly fine day to practise on, she said, "Well, I'll have to practise really hard on Sundays because that's the day before my lesson!"

As Ben says, she's already practising the fine art of cramming. At least she's not doing car theory yet!

I can't believe I now find this funny

Copied and pasted from AM980 Radio's website in London:

The Middlesex-London Health Unit has issued a heat alert.

The alert was issued due to the combination of Environment Canada's smog advisory and the humidex reading exceeding 36 degrees Celsius.

It is London's first heat alert of 2009.

Given that it's often 36C BEFORE humidity here, I am unreasonably amused by this. Not that I don't think the heat alert is warranted, but it does make me giggle a little.

Where is my husband?

I'd like to know exactly where the University of Central Missouri has taken my husband. The man who looks an awful lot like him has just informed me that all full-time faculty have to be on committees and he somehow has been placed on the...


*Wait for it.*


SOCIAL COMMITTEE!

I'm definitely looking forward to hearing all about this.

The voices are getting louder

I love the imaginary friend stage. Technically, Rachel's little friends aren't imaginary though. They are stuffed elephants. This morning Diana was being mean. She wanted to watch a certain Mama Mirabelle episode and Rachel wanted to watch another one. I intervened eventually, and told Rachel that I thought that an appropriate consequence would be that Diana didn't get to watch any tv and of course Rachel could watch the episode that she had chosen.

I will admit to being tired of Rachel coming into our room in the middle of the night saying that Tuskie was keeping her up all night, or that Diana wouldn't stop talking. Unless stuffed elephants are the new Chucky doll, I don't think we have anything to worry about.

My girl - polite even through the tantrums!

Mom: "Anna, let's go get your diaper changed."
Anna: "No thank you!"

Anna is fascinated with the little potty we used to use for Rachel. She likes to take her clothes off and sit for a nanosecond before leaping up, pretending to get toilet paper and flush. Then she claps for herself, looking very pleased, and starts the whole game over again. This would be more amusing if she wasn't having huge temper tantrums when it was time to put the diaper back on! "NO thank you! NO! NO THANK YOU!"

When Ben and Rachel were out yesterday, I showed Anna some pictures and videos on the computer. There was one of her at the zoo, with Ben asking her questions about the animals. The "real" Anna sat on my lap yesterday and answered all the questions and also waved at the animals. Then she threw a fit because she heard Daddy's voice but he wasn't there. Oops.

Anna and food again

Anna loves food. Here are just a few of her food-related words:

Applesauce
Cheese stick (string cheese)
StrawbeeYES! (yes, that is what she calls strawberries)
Berries
Pizza
Fries
Chicken
Milk (but she won't drink it)
Water
More please
Cheerios
Bugger (burger - yes, we like this one!)
Fork
Forking (as in, "I am using my fork. Look at me. I am forking!")
Bun
Yogurt (but she won't eat it)
Cracker
OPEN! Open door! (No, she can't quite open the fridge just yet.)
Food
Fooding
Chippies (chips)

The other day I put a single-serve applesauce on her tray. I hadn't opened it yet since I still needed to get her spoons (yes, plural). As I returned to the table, I saw Anna trying to open the applesauce, saying, "Applesauce! Come out!"

Oops

We're getting ready to go out, and the girls are just sitting having their morning snacks. I was cleaning up the living room when I noticed a pair of (clean) underwear on the couch.

"Rachel," I asked, "Did you by any chance forget to put on your underwear this morning?"

"Oops!" she replied. "I guess I'd better go put it on."

In other news, Rachel has informed me that one of the good things about a bowl of Raisin Bran is that you never know where the raisins are hiding.

Our "first day of school"

Rachel has been amusing herself reading my "school" resource books - I picked up a bunch of little books from Scholastic a few months back that have good, short activities to do with kids her age.

The other day, Rachel came up to me all excited because she'd figured out that "we could use this book for science, Mom!" (The book in question is called "5- to 10-Minute SCIENCE Activities for Young Learners".)

Yesterday we did two of the experiments. One was predicting what would happen if we put marshmallows and chocolate in baking cups and then put it out in the sun. We used the dashboard of the van since we wanted to be able to eat the results! Rachel had a lot of fun and even willingly drew a picture of the experiment and helped dictate our hypothesis, observations and conclusion. (See?!? Science class wasn't a total waste on me!)

The second experiment was to build a bridge between two chairs, using marshmallows and toothpicks. We didn't have toothpicks, so we improvised with skinny popsicle sticks. Rachel had some really good ideas for how to do this, and she was again quite eager to eat the results and draw another picture.

This time, Rachel commented that when she put the first marshmallow on a stick, it wasn't very stable. I looked at Ben and said, "Did she really just use the word stable?" Rachel overheard me and said, "What? Don't you know what stable means?"

By this point, Ben and I were both doubled over laughing. Rachel added cheerfully, "I bet you thought it was a homonym!"

Um, yeah. This is why my kid apparently is not suited to public school Kindergarten. Plus, if she was being forced to be "socialized" (It's in quotes because I think it's a stupid word. What's wrong with saying "learning how to get along with others"?), she would have had to share the marshmallows. ;)

As it stands, the principal from the public school near us called yesterday to say that they have 22 kids signed up. He did say that they would be very likely to split if they got 24 kids, but since school starts on Monday, I'd say that's pretty unlikely. And that's apparently fine with Rachel. She's already planned out what subjects she would like to study and what she'd like to do. Less work for me...

Smart, isn't she?

Rachel just came dashing quietly up the stairs. When I told her she could have some computer time, she was very excited. She asked if she could have one "print" and was ecstatic to hear that she could.

She was quick to inform me in hushed tones that, "Just in case you didn't know, I didn't bother Dad at all on the way up here because I noticed he was teaching!"

I think she's hoping that will translate into bonus computer time or something. We'll see.

Almost 18 months old!

Ing

Anna's favourite thing to do with words right now is to add "ing" to words that she knows. Sometimes this is logical, such as the following scenario:

Anna spots Rachel with some food and says, "Rachel! Eating!"

Other times, it is utterly absurd and at the same time, extremely cute:

Anna sees a snack being served and says, "Food! Food-ing!!!"

We have also heard up-ing, book-ing and a few others that of course I can't remember.

On the subject of food (a favourite), one day Ben and Anna came into the house just as I was finishing getting a meal ready. Ben put Anna down and she heard the sounds of food being served. She zipped around the corner to the kitchen as fast as possible, yelling "Foooooooooooooooooood!" with a huge grin on her face. Yes, she does like to eat.

We do speak the same language, right?

We got a gas bill today forwarded from our old address, which made me realize that we have yet to get a gas bill here at the new address. When Ben called to figure out what was going on, the lady told him that we had asked for the bills to be sent via email. We tend to use our gmail account for that since getting people down here to understand the .ca extension is totally futile.

Well, here's the thing. Apparently, in "American" the letters "v" and z" rhyme. So the gas company heard festiZostrings instead of festiVostrings. The really dumb thing? This is not the first time that we've had this particular problem.

Zed. Zed, zed, zed, zed, zed. That's all.

Really, socialism is not a bad thing!

We called our insurance company today to check on why we had yet to receive our renewal notice for our Sienna. While Ben was on the phone sorting that out, he decided to ask our agent if we had to contact the health insurance people with our address change, or if they would do that for us.

He was told that they would take care of it, but because we have moved to a different zip code, our health insurance will go up $60/month or $720/YEAR. Apparently I now live in a zip code where more insurance claims are made and therefore I need to pay more for my health lack-of-care insurance.

We'll have to look more seriously into the (lack of) coverage offered by Ben's current employer, I suppose. The fear and skepticism of Americans regarding a national health care system just boggles my mind. I have read arguments for both sides, but for me it comes down to this:

At home, I take my children to the doctor and don't postpone appointments because I have concerns about being able to pay for it. At home, I can go to the ER with a sprained ankle and not come out $1000 poorer. Yes, at home I will eventually pay more taxes once we have a "real" income again, but I'm ok with that.

I sometimes wonder what Americans think the purpose of their government is. I can understand thinking that the government will screw things up, but quite frankly, I expect my government to provide schools and health care, among other things. No, OHIP (the free portion of my health care) doesn't cover everything, but it does cover the essentials.

I realize this subject is fairly contentious, but when has that ever stopped me before?

Captain Oblivious - A New Low

We have friends staying with us for a couple of days. They have a daughter who is about 6 weeks younger than Anna. Tonight, Rachel was in the bathroom. I asked her to finish up as she had called out that she was done. Since Rachel had declined to close the door, neither G's mother nor myself was too concerned when G wandered in to the bathroom.

We continued chatting out in the living room until both G's mother and myself simultaneously realized that there was a sound coming from the bathroom that sounded an awful lot like splashing!

We raced to the bathroom, where I found Rachel STILL SITTING ON THE TOILET as G splashed happily right behind her in the toilet water.

I'm not sure what's funnier - that G was splashing in the toilet, or that Rachel was totally oblivious to the whole thing.

In other news, the experiment of putting both Anna and G to bed in the same room was an epic failure. But at this present moment, all is quiet in the house, except for the sounds of four people typing on computers!

A long overdue rant

I am a musician. I teach music lessons. So does my husband. So does one of my best friends. Actually, so do several of my good friends.

NO, it is not our "side job" to do this. It is our main source of income. NO, playing at weddings is not our "side job" either. We do not have "side jobs" - we are musicians. And while I'm at it, NO, it's not ok to hire an inexperienced teacher for your child because he or she is "just a beginner." Would you want a Kindergarten or Grade 1 teacher that didn't go to university teaching your child how to read? I didn't think so. (We'll ignore for the moment that my child already reads. I'd still like a qualified teacher teaching my child.)

I agree that all teachers must start somewhere. Heck, when I was 15 I taught piano lessons for $7/half-hour to a girl named Brooke. It didn't last long, and I wonder sometimes if she even remembers it, whereever she may be now! By the time I was in university, I was charging $30/hour. When we moved away from London last year, we were charging $45/hour and that was still really "middle of the road" for pricing.

Yes, music lessons are expensive. We are trained professionals. (No, not trained monkeys. That will be my 1-year-old's profession to train the primates, I'm sure.) We have years of experience on our instruments, and in many cases, years of training to teach as well.

The first two questions we most often hear from prospective students' parents are:

1. Where do you live?
2. How much do you charge?

I don't think those questions are particularly relevant. In most cities, the qualified teachers are all in the same ballpark regarding price. I'll get back to that in a moment.

I think that parents should be asking how the teacher teaches, what the goals are, what the performance opportunities are, etc. I think the teacher should be able to articulate what he/she does and why it's important without feeling like a "sell job" is necessary to get the parent to cough up for lessons.

While we're at it, let's discuss the concept of the private music lesson. It is a time that is set aside for you every week. If you miss lessons, don't expect the teacher to make them up - your absence has caused a hole in the teacher's schedule and it's inconvenient to find another time, especially if the teacher is full! And even if the teacher is not full, likely the teacher had plans for his/her free time. How many parents really try to do make-up classes for any group classes that their children miss, such as dance, gymnastics, soccer, skating or hockey? I can tell you that it's likely not nearly as large a percentage as those who attempt to get a make-up for a private lesson.

Now I'm not saying that teachers should never be willing to reschedule lessons. Sometimes the circumstances are warranted. But many times, music teachers are poorly treated and not respected.

And that's not even the main topic of my rant. Can you believe it?

Let's get back to wages, the real topic at hand. When we moved down to Kansas City, I was initially surprised at the low wages charged by music teachers. I thought that maybe it was a big city thing because there were clearly lots of teachers. Then I thought that perhaps it was a case of "degreed" vs. "non-degreed" teachers. I started looking at ads on Craigslist. Some samples (paraphrased):

"Piano lessons - $15/half-hour or $20/hour" $20/HOUR??!!??!??!! What rock has this teacher crawled out from under? This was an experienced piano teacher, not a beginner or high schooler. (And speaking of kids teaching, there's a hilarious ad on the London Kijiji website right now where a 13-year-old is advertising herself as a violin teacher "just like the professionals, only cheaper". Actually, she didn't spell "professional" or "cheaper" correctly, but I suppose that's not the point.)

Here's another one: "I make lessons FUN!" Um, ok. I agree that lessons should be fun, but too often "fun" = "no homework" in a student's mind. And too often, the parents agree. "Oh, I just want my child to learn and have fun." Um, NO. Playing an instrument is hard work. Yes, we can have fun along the way, but you need to practise!

And my all-time favourite: "Violin lessons: Regular price $50/month. Summer price: half-off" Hey, lady, if you want to teach a month's worth of lessons for $25, go right ahead. And this was someone with a music degree.

Lest you think this is just a problem in Kansas City, let me assure you that it is not a unique quirk of the midwest. It happens everywhere, although I do think that it is worse here. The entire focus seems to be on undercutting the competition in order to get more students. The (huge) downside to this is that the teachers don't seem to see that by undermining their "competitors" they are cheapening their own services and that of all music teachers.

While I agree that something is only worth what you're willing to pay for it, there are reasonable price ranges and sheer idiocy. Reasonable would be offering to pay $16K instead of $20K for a new car, and settling somewhere in between. (NOT that I'm suggesting negotiating prices for music lessons. No way am I advocating that.) Sheer idiocy would be cutting your price on the new car to $10K just to get the sale back in your car lot instead of at *Dumb Darryl's Dumpy Dodge Dealership down the street.

Now let's discuss people who do teach "on the side". Does that mean they should charge much less than someone who is a full-time professional musician? I say yes and no. While I would expect to pay the concertmaster of the symphony more for lessons than I would expect to pay someone who played violin seriously but didn't pursue it as a career, I wouldn't want to see the non-professional undercutting by a huge margin. Actually, I wouldn't pay the concertmaster of our orchestra back home much of anything, but that's because I wouldn't send my child to him for lessons of any kind! (And yes, that's a whole 'nother rant.)

We have friends who also have a string trio. While all of their members have other "day jobs", they charge the same as we do for their services. Could they charge less? Sure. But I appreciate that they don't!

Let's get back to my point. I think I have many points actually, but the main one today is that Ben and I have chosen to NOT lower our teaching rates substantially in order to "compete" in this crappy market here. (And no, it's not related to the economy. Not here in yuppy Johnson County. Trust me. If skating lessons are $15/half-hour for GROUP classes, parents should be willing to cough up the measly $20/half-hour for PRIVATE lessons that I'm asking.) We have brought our rate to $40/hour (which I suppose you could argue is the US equivalent of $45 Can./hour) and, well, I have one student.

And that is another reason why we won't stay in Kansas City long term. I know it's a problem everywhere, but it's particularly bad here since the music teachers don't seem willing to work together to make the changes that are sorely needed.

*Please note that while I went to high school with a boy named Darryl who ate steak with his hands, this choice of name is in no way related to that Darryl or any other Darryl that I might know. Also please note that the choice of Dodge was deliberate. Some people (ie. my mother) might be fans of the Dodge Shadow, but others might have to disagree. ;)