Sheree's Alchemy: Music

Hello Friends, (go here to enter my latest giveaway...ends June 25th).

Well, school officially ended for the year on last thursday. Both kids enjoyed a great school year. They were blessed with amazing teachers and a great group of classmates! I wanted to share a few images from the last day of school.

Those of you that have been reading my blog for a while will remember the art quilt I made for Leah's teacher last year. Well I made a quilt for her 3rd grade teacher.

Unfortunately, we were not able to get the artwork together to do one for Lucas' teacher. He had such a great teacher and he misses her already. He definitely developed a little crush on her. Like his mama, I think he has a soft spot in his heart for teachers!

We wrapped up the school year on Sunday with the kids piano recital.

This was Lucas' second recital. His first was back in December 2009. He had his first lesson in October 2009 and fell quickly in love with the piano! For his recent recital, he worked on 2 recital songs for about 6 weeks and mastered them. Then he made a big jump in his abilities, so his teacher decided to change his recital songs about 3 weeks ago. I was stressing, big time. But Lucas took on the challenge and did pretty well. He was off to a great start and then the audience clapped, as they thought the piece was over. The clapping definitely messed up his concentration, though. He fumbles a bit on the second song..Bless his little heart! That's what doing these recitals is all about though. Learning how to stay focused in the midst of distraction is certainly something his momma has yet to master herself. :)

This was Leah's first piano recital. She took lessons for a year while we lived in Germany. And then just started back up again in February. She is progressing quite well. She is not as in to the piano as her little brother....she prefers to sing and write songs. She'll start up guitar lessons in a couple weeks. But she'll have to keep doing the piano lessons as well. It is just great fundamentals for her.

We are really proud of both of them! Playing in front of a crowd (there were about 100 people there, including the students) is difficult even for adults. All the kids did a great job!

After the recital, the kids requested to go to Cold Stone Creamery for a little ice cream treat. They have both grown so much over the last year. Leah (who's 9) is 4 feet 10 inches now and Lucas (who is 6 and a half) is about 4 feet 2 inches tall. I think they both grew atleast a half of a foot this school year!

Here is a family picture taken after the recital. I am usually running away from the camera, but recognize that I need to stop or my kids will not have many pictures of me to look back on when I am old and gray!

As parents, hubby and I are tickled to see that the kids are taking on a keen interest in music. Hubby and I actually used to have a band. Yes, we did!lol I was the lead singer and he sang and played electric bass. Our band was called the Blues Doctors because we were all Chemistry PhDs. We played a few times in the Saratogo Springs, NY area where we used to live. We even played at our old CSA Roxyberry Farm's annual family picnic. And we played at our old company's Holiday parties. We are thinking it is time to start a family band. Now, wouldn't that be fun!

I should mention that if the kids end up showing real talent in music, the hubby and I really can't take too much credit for it. My mother in law is actually the real musician in the family (you can download many of her recordings on itunes or find her work on amazon! She spent a ton of time working with them when she was here for a visit back in March.