C is for

 Cookie, of course!  I realized a couple of weeks ago (sorry this blog isn't more up-to-date) that Tassia was actually unclear as to what the letter C looks like.  So, we made a batch of C cookies.  Learning should always be so tasty!

 Um...Alina, that's backwards.  You're the one learning to read, right?

Sybille couldn't wait to take a bite out of hers!

Did anybody know

that , if you fill a sterilized jar half-full of quince sauce, put the lid on for fun to see if it would seal anyway, then turn it upside down with the rest of your jars, that somehow the cooling quince sauce will blow the bottom out of your jar?  I didn't either, until today.  Alina so optimistically told me, "Mama, it's good that that happened.  This way we'll know never to do that again."
 
She's right about not doing it again, anyway.

Concert pictures

As much as the journalist walked around on stage, I would have thought he could get better pictures than this, but here are the pictures from my concert.

Batter up!

TASSIA: (in the backyard, holding whiffle ball and bat)  Mama, you be the batter, and I'll be the ball-er.

Accomplished!

FLASHBACK: It's 1998. It is spring of my junior year of college. The university orchestra is playing at the ASTA conference. I'm browsing around the stands. I stop at the Rockley music stand (back when Rockley's still did other things besides pianos.) I rifle through their bargain bin, coming up with a couple of pieces that look interesting enough to spend a couple dollars on. One of them, titled simply Sonata in G, by some P. Ben-Haim that I've never heard of, catches my attention when I have time to look through it a bit more. Wow, this piece looks cool. Man, this piece looks HARD!!! Someday, I'll perform it. Someday...




BACK TO THE PRESENT: This piece of music with the faded green cover has followed me around through various moves over two continents and across an ocean. Sometimes, I'd dig it out and try and play it a bit, but between the demands of school, and then teaching, and one, then two, then three beautiful little girls, I usually didn't get very far. I actually learned the slow movement and performed it a few years ago. But, the first and last...whew, what a lot of work THAT would be. But so, so cool. Well, I played it on Sunday. All three movements. I was extremely, extremely pleased with how it went, and feel an extraordinary sense of accomplishment at having done so.



The person who organized the concert has promised to send me pictures, and if they're worth it, you'll see them.

Scatology

SYBILLE: Tip.
ME: Sheep?
SYBILLE: (Nodding.) Uh-huh.  Buh.
ME: (this word could mean a number of things, but considering that she was on the potty chair, I hazarded a guess)  Poop?
SYBILLE:  (Nodding)
ME:  Do sheep poop?
SYBILLE: (Smiling and nodding.)
 
OK....

Two and counting

Last night at dinner, for the first time, Sybille put two words together.  I don't know if you can call this her first sentence, but she said, "Moe tee," which, very obviously, means "More cheese."