Piano Recital 2012

Aubrey, Connor, and Ronin performed at their annual piano recital last night.  Every year the number of students has increased, which makes these recitals so much more fun!

I also love seeing my kid's progression from year to year as well.  It makes all those melt-down moments and "I wanna quit piano" requests worth going through.  I am really proud of them!  They did so well despite all the nerves kicking in.

Concentrating so hard!  :)

Lovely Rebekah is a sweetheart to put this on every year for her students and my moms.  :)

Wow, look how many students played this year (including my nephew, Briggs, for the first time!)  Just three years ago there were only three students, this year there were eight. 


I am very grateful that my kids have such a wonderful teacher, my mother!

Ending the night off with refreshments!

Here are some videos of the songs my kids played that night:

Aubrey - "Phantom of the Opera"


Connor's "Novella D-Moll"


Ronin's "Spring"

See You at the Finish Line! Pine Wood Derby Time

Ronin participated in his very first Scout Pine Wood Derby this week.  :)

Ronin's "wolf" car. He came up with the car's cut, design, and look all on his own.


This year the derby was done much differently.  There were two church wards participating together instead of just one, which meant a whole lotta scouts and family members attending!!!! 

First half of the room:

Second half of the room:

There were a total of 21 cars racing that evening - that's one very large and tough competition!


This year was also different because we were using a new race track!


This new track was set up electronically so that it would automatically show the results and race times as the cars passed the finish line. Not only that, but the data was sent to a computer where the results for each car were stored and flashed up on a huge white screen. It would also automatically call up the next cars for the next race.  Each car got to race eight times.


Let the races begin!

The derby was fast paced, so the kids were always keeping on eye on the screen to know when they were up next to race or to view their results:

Check out the Angry Birds car.

Ronin's car is in the number two spot (second from the right.)

 It's a fast track!  The computer also recorded the speeds too - average speed for the derby cars was 190 miles/hour.  I had to look at that twice - really, those little cars go THAT fast?!

Ronin's car did very well . . . he came in first place six times out of his eight races.  The other two races he placed in second and third. (Below: showing another first place finish for Ronin!) 

The results were calculated automatically by averaging the racing times.  Ronin took second place in our ward! (Each ward's results were separated from each other.)

Getting high fives from his fellow scouts.

Now for the final raceoff!  The top two cars from each ward were raced for the final top spots.  Good luck, Ronin! 

Each car was raced four times.  Ronin came in first place twice!  The other two times he came in third and fourth place.



 The final overall race times were averaged and Ronin ended up coming in first place! 

Great job, Ronin!  Not too shabby!  A second place for the individual ward competition and then coming in first place in the final overall competition! 

Our crazy, little scout, whatever are we going to do with him?

Joining the Ranks

Well, today Connor joined the ranks of those who have braces in our family (me and Aubrey.)  Which means that now half of our family is currenly in the "braceface" category.  Not pretty on the pocketbook by any means. 

For now Connor only needs a partial brace put in because a majority of the next few months will be working on just two upper teeth in particular.  One tooth came in directly behind another tooth, almost in a switched place position, instead of on the side next to it like it was supposed to.  It's gonna take 8 months just to get that baby put back in place.

But, his teeth are in the right hands with his skilled orthodontist.  Dr. McCord's a super great guy who knows his stuff.

Speaking of other toothy news, I had my upper wisdom teeth surgically removed yesterday.  I was supposed to have them done back when I was 13, during the same time when I got my lower wisdom teeth taken out.  But whoever that oral surgeon was decided not to take the upper out because he "felt like" they would "never be a problem."  HA!!!!  Not only did they come down, they shifted horizontally too, causing damage to my permanent teeth.   Nice.

Comin' home right after surgery, all gauzed up to stop the bleeding.



I'm just hoping that I don't ending up looking like a stuffed chickmunk like I did the first time around:

(yes, you can all stop laughing now.)

Oh yeah, I took my souvenirs home with me too (despite all the weird looks from the nurses.)  They were a lot bigger than I anticipated . . . makes me wonder how they fit in my mouth in the first place.


But hey, I'm betting these large honkin' widsom teeth are worth a few extra bucks from the tooth fairy!  They are going under my pillow tonight!