01/30/12

1.  Brigham has perfect pitch!  I was practicing the piano with Mosey, and Brigham called out from the living room, "Play a note, mom, and let me see if I can guess what it is." 
He guessed every single note right.  Even sharps and flats.  Even high up or low down on the keyboard.  At first I thought he must be seeing the reflection of the piano in a mirror or something, but he wasn't.  What a neat trick! 
After getting a D# right, I asked him how he did it.  "I don't know, it just sounded like a D#!"  :-)  I'm not sure what advantage this gives to a musician, but it sure is cool.  I'm hoping that Joseph and Mosey won't feel bad that they can't do this.  Ben and I definitely can't!

2.  To jump start the 1st day of our 2nd school semester, I introduced a new practicing schedule.   The boys will rotate weekly who does piano 1st, 2nd, 3rd.  When Joseph is practicing piano, Brigham has to practice violin, and vice versa.  I practice with each of them on one instrument per day-- so we'll have a piano day and a flute/violin day.  I will still practice with Mosey every day on piano and cello.  If we can do this successfully, we can be done with practicing in 2 1/2 hours, instead of the 4+ hours it often takes.  As an incentive I've told them that each day they are done with practicing by 11:00 AM, they get one point.  When 20 points are accumulated, we'll do something fun like go to Dave and Busters or stay the night in a hotel somewhere.  If we can just get through practicing quickly and without resistance, my quality of life will vastly increase.  :-)

3.  Mosey had his first day back in speech therapy for the semester.  Monday afternoons are going to be a bit complicated.  We'll drive down to UT to drop Mosey off by 4:00, then drive up to Joseph's flute lesson to drop him off by 4:15.  Then back to UT to pick up Mosey at 4:50, and then back to flute to pick up Joseph at 5:00.  Then home in lovely rush-hour traffic.  Mosey wasn't too thrilled about speech, and I'm wondering if it is worth it.  If he doesn't want to go, will he be getting any benefit?  I guess we'll see how it goes the next couple of weeks.