January 17, 2009 Play it Again Sophia...Entertaining Sick Mommy

Playing the piano to entertain mommy. What a beautiful tune Sophia!  

Sophia looks so tiny next to the BabyGrand. We bought this piano when I was pregnant with Sophia for her hoping she would really love it.  I think she loves it at least for now.

She is using both hands to play a little tune. Yeah Sophia!

Climbing onto the piano stool as mommy shouts, wait I will help you. No worries mom, I can do this myself thinks Sophia.

Hey, look at that mommy polished the piano like she does weekly and I can see myself in the reflection. How cool is that?

I have been really sick for the last two days and trying to stay away from my darling daughter so that she doesn't catch what I have. I have been literally hiding at the other end of the house in my bed other than a cup of hot tea and a meal here or there. My husband has really taken over caring for Sophia while allowing me to rest. So, this morning, I told Sophia that mommy is really sick and cannot play with her. But I told her I would love to hear some piano music. I can still hear music if I am in the other room. Sophia did not waste one second thinking about that. She ran over to the piano. She climbed up onto the piano stool all by herself. I nearly jumped out of my skin fearful that she would fall and hurt herself. As you can see I guess I was just being a helicopter mom hovering and worrying too much. She had no trouble climbing up there and sat right down and started playing. If only she would keep up this enthusiasm to please mommy as she grows older. Yeah, right, a mom can dream can't she?

Once we realized she was ready to play music on the piano, Scott grabbed the camera and captured all her piano playing for mommy. I told her it made mommy feel better to hear such beautiful music so she kept right on playing each time we applauded for her. Above are just a few of the snapshots with the full slide show of the event below.

January 4, 2009 We finally have Window Treatments in the front room

Through the magic of my Babylock Serger and thanks to a little help from a little old sewing machine, the curtains in the front room are now hanging.  Although I am ecstatic to have the curtains up, I just can't help but notice how awful that chair looks in the rooms now.  It looks worse in this photo than it does in real life.  Scott had our house built in 2000 and up until today, we had no window treatments.  After I made the ducky costume for Sophia on Halloween, Scott started shopping around for sewing machines for me strangley enough.  He knows my sewing machine was seriously damaged in the process, but I had it repaired.    One day he straight out asked me what kind of sewing machine would it take for me to make curtains for our house. I told him I had everything I needed except the fabric and the Serger thread.  A few days later, I found myself in the fabric store picking out fabric with my husband and Sophia.  I told him about the curtains I had sewn many years ago in my apartment in Cape Girardeau in college and he decided I could give it a shot here in the house.  So the above photo is the result.  I think he was impressed.  Now, we are onto another project. 

We have also bought fabric for the theatre room downstairs which I will be attempting soon.  We have an Atrium style house with windows all across the back so there is lots of sunshine peeking in the windows.  I have yet to purchase the blackout fabric that will be attached to the curtains to keep the sunshine out of the basement for the theatre room. This will be my biggest project yet since I have never made curtains that would be hung on a remote control sliding track.  This could be very interesting. 

October 2, 2008 Sophia Plays the Piano

Sophia is playing the piano for me.   When I am busy working on something in the kitchen, I often ask Sophia to go to the piano and play some music for me.  She crawls over to the piano, pulls herself up using the stool, and plays the piano for me.  It is funny that one day I just asked her to go play the piano and followed her into the other room.  I usually carry her to the piano and sit her on my lap as we practice together. We have been doing this since she was born at least once or twice a week.  The day she went to play I couldn't believe that she knew what I was talking about and demonstrated her skills.  Of course, I  had to run back and grab the camera to capture the moment.  Here is our future pianist.  

Oh, I forgot to mention her favorite red furry pal, Elmo plays the piano every day on Elmo's World so maybe that is how she learned what a piano is.  Who knows?

Granted for those of you who don't know, Scott and I do not know how to play the piano properly, that is why we bought a Disk Lavier which plays the keys on the piano from the notes of the music on CD or floppy diskettes. I am able to read music having studied music theory for several years, so I can tinker around a few simple songs like; "Ode to Joy", "Row, Row, Row your Boat", and "Mary Had a Little Lamb", although, I have not had formal piano lessons."  We bought this piano while pregnant with Sophia in hopes of having a child that would love music.   I played the music CDs as often as possible while pregnant with her so she could hear the pretty music. I think she likes playing so far, so we will keep our fingers crossed that the piano doesn't become just another pretty collector of dust in my home.   Sophia keep playing baby! You are bound to be great at music if you follow in your family's footsteps.