04/28/2012

1.  Oh, poor Joseph!  He woke up feeling sick this morning.  I thought he was just tired (up too late last night), and encouraged him to get ready for archery.  But instead he curled up in the fetal position on the couch and moaned, so I knew he was serious about the "sick" thing.  So he stayed home from Archery, and it was a good thing because just a few minutes later he started throwing up, and did so several times throughout the morning.  And today was the big Spring Piano Recital which Joseph (and Brigham and Mosey) have been preparing for for the past 4 months!  Such rotten timing.  But he still wanted to play in the recital, sick or no.  The recital started at 1:00, but Joseph was still throwing up at 12:15 as we were driving down to the Stake Center (where the spring recital is always held).  When we got to the church, he was in such misery that he couldn't walk into the church building.  I held him on my lap and Ben wheeled the two of us in on my wheelchair.  He lay right down on one of the padded benches in the chapel and I tracked down their piano teacher to let her know of the situation.  I asked if Joseph could go first so he could still play, but then be able to come straight back to his seat and rest through the rest of the recital.  After we promised to douse Joseph's hands with Purell before going up to play, she agreed with our plan.
So, as the recital started, I roused Joseph from the snooze he had been taking for the previous 20 minutes or so, squirted Purell on his hands, and he sort of staggered (OK, not really, but he must have been feeling like it) up to the piano, sat down and played his piece absolutely cold-- without warming up on that piano, without even playing through the piece ONCE the whole morning.  And he was awesome!  He played "Little White Donkey," one of my favorite pieces that I played growing up, and which he plays so well.  After he played, he came back to our bench, lay down, and snoozed for the rest of the recital.  What a trooper!
Brigham and Mosey did well, too.  My boys perform well under pressure, or so it seems.  They must get that from Ben, because I remember being absolutely consumed with nervousness before recitals, and never felt like I played as well as I did at home.  Anyway, Joseph said he was too sick to feel nervous.  That's one way to see the glass half-full!  Brigham played Seven of Hearts, a great song in 7/8 time, of all things.  Mosey played Roundup and also did great in his 2nd piano recital, and first big formal recital.  Yay!  Now I don't have to hear them practice those songs 20 times a day!  (Actually I'm kidding-- I really like the pieces they played this year, and I'm going to make them keep them fresh so they can play them for my family at our reunion this summer.  :-))

2.  In the morning before the recital Ben and I drove down to the car place to have my car repaired so I can once and for all get it inspected (the inspection sticker expired in February and I'm seriously living on borrowed time).  It's going to end up costing more than $1300.  Ouch. 

3.  Mosey had his cello recital this evening.  He played the last piece in the Suzuki book 1-- Minuet, by somebody or other (I really should know this by now).  String instrument recitals are always a little more painful than piano recitals simply because of intonation issues, but Mosey's teacher has a good group of students and I think it was great for Mosey to hear the older kids playing.  His teacher played the piano accompaniment for all the pieces, and I was totally impressed.  With all the irregularities of beginning students-- false starts, rhythm mistakes, skipping lines, etc., etc., she never failed to stay with each kid like nothing happened.  Afterward was cookies and juice, always my most favorite part of playing in recitals.  :-)

4.  Joseph was feeling better this evening, so we got pizza from Little Caesars and came home to eat it while watching a Star Trek episode.  Well, he had been feeling better until he ate pizza, which, in hindsight probably wasn't the best thing to eat just coming off of a stomach bug.  His dinner didn't stay inside for very long, and this time he didn't make it to the bathroom on time, and his pizza ended up on the tile floor.  Regurgitated pizza is pretty gross.  Poor guy, I hope he feels better tomorrow...  And yay for tile floors!  :-)