Sweetness

I'm sitting here after dinner watching Mary Grace and Evelyn color at the dining room table together. They are so sweet, with each one dramatically complimenting the other's work. Evelyn: "I LIKE the plant you drew!" Mary Grace: "I see you used a lot of GREEN! Good job!" Adorable. Willa decided at the last minute to go with Jason to adult choir rehearsal, so it's just two here tonight.

I know the whole kids-say-the-darndest-things is mostly just interesting to the particular child's parents, but the twins really do say such adorably weird stuff, and Mary Grace is so matter of fact and yet also patient with them. Makes for some hilarious conversation as I eavesdrop:

Evelyn: "I like purple. Only girls like purple."
MG: "No, Daddy likes purple."
Evelyn: "Yes, that's right. And there are stars at night."
MG: "Yes."
Evelyn: "I don't like storms. Sissy, do you like storms?"
MG: "Sometimes."
Evelyn: "Storms are BAD! There. I drawed a Redbud tree."
MG: "Mom. Evelyn just drew a Redbud tree. Isn't that awesome?"
Mommy: "Yes. Wow."
Evelyn: "I want to give this to my teacher tomorrow."
MG: "It's a stay home day tomorrow. You can give it to your teacher after the summer."
Evelyn: "Ok. Next time I want to draw a monster."
MG: "Well you have to draw it scary."
Evelyn: "I have a funny dance...watch!"

Love these girls!

Looooong day.

Wow. It's been a really long day. This morning we got up, ate
breakfast, then packed up and checked out of the hotel all before 9am.
We headed to Schlitterbahm Beach waterpark here in S. Padre which was
one of the more highly anticipated parts of the trip...for the girls
anyway. After spending what felt like 2 hours putting spf300 sunscreen
on the whole family, we were ready for fun. We went one time around
the lazy river to get everyone "warmed up.". This is usually a safe
bet. Bummer that at this particular waterpark, the lazy river ends
with a four foot waterfall drop off and about a minute long ride
through white water rapids. When we went back through it later in the
day, I noticed the four or five HUGE warning signs pointing this out
and giving you multiple chances to get out before the drop off. After
their harrowing experience in the ocean yesterday, I'm pretty sure
I've successfully scarred the little ones for life. They spent the
rest of the day playing in wading pools and eating junk food, while
Jason and Mary Grace rode all the rides. Everybody was very happy
with this arrangement...that is, until I accidently got some sunscreen
in Willa's eye. From around 12:30 on, she was fairly inconsolable. And
by "from then on" I mean until we left the park AT NINE THAT NIGHT.
Poor baby...poor everybody else.

We're on the bus now and the good news is, Evelyn and Willa are
already asleep. And as we left the park today, Mary Grace turned to
Jason and said, "I had fun on the beach trip! I love you Daddy!"

I'll second that.

Sent from my iPhone

Day 2

Got in really late last night, but the girls were troopers
throughout. The high school kids and directors went to their festival
this morning while the girls and I stayed behind. We would have
enjoyed hearing the groups play, but with all the logistics and down
time, Schayot statistics show that the chances are very good that we
would have added unnecessary drama. And Daddy doesn't like drama. So
we went to the beach this morning. It was overcast and windy, so not
ideal beach conditions, but the girls didn't care one bit. They
sprinted for the water as soon as it was in sight and it was all I
could do to keep them from drowning themselves before I could even put
our blanket down. Our first foray into the water met with a mini-freak
out from Evelyn and Willa. The waves make them nervous, the surf was
really agitated, and I am obviously doing something seriously wrong in
trying to help them feel comfortable in the water. Near the end of the
morning, they finally agreed to sit next to me in the tide and let the
water wash over their laps a little. That was as close as they got to
swimming in the ocean. Mary Grace, on the other hand, seemed pretty
sure she needed to swim to Cuba today. I managed a happy medium
keeping her in sight while helping the twins build sand castles and
make sand "pasta.". We headed back in for lunch, but couldn't walk by
the hotel pool with taking a dip. I think they had even more fun
there. We had a ridiculously expensive lunch at the hotel restaurant,
although the food was spectacular and we were waited on hand and foot.
The only other option was to walk down a busy street 10 minutes to
McDonalds. No thanks! We wen up to our room where Evelyn and Willa
immediately fell into sweet little child comas. Jason eventually got
back and took an eternally grateful Mary Grace back out to the beach
for some "real" ocean swimming complete with several near-death
experiences I'm sure. Right now we're headed out to the pier to catch
a boat that is taking the whole high school group to an island luau
party. Never a dull moment!

Sent from my iPhone

To padre!

We just finished the first leg of our bus trip to south padre with the
Georgetown High School band, orchestra, and choir. Mary Grace has been
on several of these trips, but this is the first for Evelyn and Willa.
I felt confident that they would all be fine thanks to the DVD players
on coach buses these days. Sure enough, thanks to Nemo, Princess
Giselle, and those two fuzzy guys from Monsters Inc, the girls sat
riveted through the whole ride so far. The giant carton of goldfish
crackers and the sack of Dum Dums didn't hurt either. Then, when we
got to Corpus Christie, and the Joe's Crab Shack where we were
scheduled to eat, we discovered that they have a big playscape here at
the restaurant! What good deed did I do in a past life to deserve such
god fortune? I'm doing some serious knocking on wood, but so far this
trip is going pretty nicely. On to the hotel in South Padre after we
scarf down some burgers and shrimp!!

Sent from my iPhone

The Pianist

We had Mary Grace's annual piano recital today.  Her teacher has a studio of about 20 students.  At the recital, each student plays one solo, and also plays one or two duets in which they play with the teacher, a parent who also plays piano, or another student.  

I kept Evelyn and Willa at home last year during her recital, so I haven't heard her play along side her peers in two years.  I've heard her practice plenty at home.  She practices every day, so I know how she plays.  I just haven't heard what other children her age sound like in a long time.  

(I'll warn you now that I'm about to brag on my child.  If you don't want to hear it, I don't blame you.  You can skip the rest, and go browse YouTube now.)

Mary Grace is good.  If I do say so myself, she's really good.  She plays the right notes and right rhythms of course.  But her musical understanding and expression comes from somewhere deep inside.  When she plays, she means it and makes the audience feel it.  I don't know how else to describe it.  Her solo blew me away.

Then she played a really cute duet with Jason (who gets tons of credit for working with her nearly every single day, going with her to every lesson, and playing for her and the twins as much as he can.)

Then came the piece that impressed me more than anything else.  She played a duet arrangement of Frere Jacques with another little boy.  He played the somewhat easier melody line while she played the accompaniment.   She counted them off and started the piece, following his tempos, slowing down when he did, and speeding up when he did.  Pretty awesome for an 8 year old!  Then after a few measures, he got a little lost and stopped playing.  Uh oh.  So Mary Grace did what any professional musician would do and VAMPED!  That means she had the wherewithal to play the last few notes over and over until the other child came back in, then as soon as he started playing, she immediately was right with him and along they went.  What?!  Who taught her to do that?!  Jason says, she "just knew what to do."  Pretty amazing...if I do say so myself.

If you want to see the video of the recital, go to http://gallery.me.com/schayot/100114