I learned several small pieces on my cello, and I’m in the middle of two bigger and trickier pieces.  It’s slow progress, but I just keep plugging a long.  I’m working on some of the upper positions and some tricky bowings, not to mention that elusive vibrato. Stomach acid has…

  We’ve had a lot of appliances down for the count in the past year and a half.  It started with the toaster. Our old one almost started the kitchen on fire, and we had to replace it.  Then the freezer gave out after our big thunderstorm catastrophe last summer…

I’m a home body.  YaYa is a home body.  Mr. SP is a home body unless he has the opportunity to be in a library.  This girl?  She is NOT a home body.  She’s always up for adventure, and while she can stay home and spend hours reading a book…

The boys in the family headed south to take in a Minnesota Twins game with Grandma Robbie and Grandpa Ron, along with Auntie Jennifer and Uncle Joey, and cousins. The girls decided it would be a good day to head up the North Shore, and we had a terrific day!…

It was a very short Sunday Night at the Beach.  The Banana had soccer practice, and we were a bit disorganized as we started off.  Mr. SP was at youth group and Dr. Peds stayed back to give him a ride home.  YaYa decided at the last minute to stay…

The Banana decided she’d like to try playing soccer this summer, so we signed her up.  Soccer is kind of a big deal here, and there are some people who have kids who practically play soccer the whole year through because they are in special leagues.  We are just doing…

I used to absolutely detest the month of August, until I moved next to Lake Superior.  Every year I am surprised at what a great month August is here.  We’ve been having so much rain this summer, which I love, and everything still looks fresh and green in August.  The…

We were the only people at the Secret Beach except for a large family with Georgian accents that joined us about halfway through our time there.  The Georgian accented people just couldn’t quite process these kids swimming in the cold, cold water.

Our Latvian host girls departed two weeks ago now.  I haven’t written about it because it’s taken two weeks to mentally process.  Goodbyes are always hard for me, and there really aren’t words that can adequately describe that kind of goodbye:  handing two girls back to their (wonderful) chaperone so…