Performance High

It’s the end of the school year which means our calendar has been full of year end concerts and activities. This evening was the last of the performances. Matthew’s wind symphony concert was last week, and this evening was his end of year jazz band concert. It was originally scheduled for just over a week ago, which would have been during the time that both Daniel and Nathan were here, but there was a scheduling snafu and the date and location needed to change. As such, Nathan was unable to attend tonight, but Daniel was able to drive down. Kevin’s parents also came, as well as Corynn and Aliese, two of Kevin’s nieces. 

Matthew’s heart is in the jazz music. This is his second year as lead trumpet, and he takes that role very seriously. Not only has been put in the practice time to get his playing where he wants it to be, but he has worked with his section all year and things have really gelled for them, as evidenced by their “best trumpet section” award at the Essentially Ellington competition back in February. All their work was evident this evening. The kids did a great job. I didn’t necessarily love all the music as sometimes modern jazz is too atonal for my liking, but they performed it well. Matthew came away with that performance high, the one that comes when your adrenaline gets pumping, you give it your all, and you are pleased with how you performed. It was good to see.

Three of the five members of Matthew’s section are graduating this year, and he has concerns about how next year will go. Hopefully with some time together he will be able to help the newbies come together like his section has this year. In the meantime, he has a few months to play for joy before marching band kicks up again later in the summer.

Butterflies Flutter By

There is a fairly new butterfly biosphere at Thanksgiving Point. We have been planning to visit for a while now, but scheduling has been tricky what with two teenagers going two different directions all the time. Kevin and I got to visit a butterfly habitat while we were in Texas, but the last one Matthew and Malia experienced was on our Seattle trip in 2016. Amazingly, we had no conflicts today, probably because it is a holiday and not a Saturday, so we bought our tickets last week and put our outing on the calendar. Matthew actually got there before this excursion as he and his friend Alex had a bounce back pass and visited last week, but he spent the whole time wishing he had the big camera and not just his phone camera, so he was more than happy to go again, the better camera in tow.

The traveling part of the exhibit featured beetles, and honestly, that was a bit creepy for me. I just don’t feel comfortable with the thought of beetles as big as my hand crawling around. Yes, I know that makes me kind of a wimp, but they give me the heebie jeebies. Not as badly as spiders do, but they still make my skin crawl. And yes, I purposely averted my eyes when we came across the exhibits containing black widows and tarantulas. 

I greatly enjoyed the butterfly portion though. There were some different ones than we saw in Texas, and I got to watch several butterflies emerge from their cocoons which was super cool. Matthew was in seventh heaven, taking pictures like crazy and experimenting with the camera to see how to capture the images he wanted.  On the other hand, Malia was a bit weirded out by the “flying bugs.’ She didn’t want them landing on her and she most certainly didn’t want to try to hold one on purpose. It kind of surprised me that she was so creeped out since I don’t have any adverse feelings where butterflies are concerned, but people are terrified of clowns too and I also don’t get that. To each their own aversions, I guess. 😂

P is for Pudding

P is also for purple which leads to some awesome alliteration because there was definitely purple pudding at our house this evening. Let me explain. Malia had a hankering for some pudding. Remember her deconstructed pie a few days back? She decided to up her not-pie game and wanted pudding as the newest vehicle for bananas. I don’t keep boxed pudding around as I rarely use it, so I taught her to make pudding from scratch. It’s not hard. She does mac and cheese, and pudding really isn’t any more complicated than that if you have a couple basic skills under your belt. Dairy and egg free pudding is even easier than standard pudding and since that is what works for Matthew, that is what we usually make. The one downside to going Matthew friendly is that without egg yolks or butter, vanilla pudding doesn’t have the traditional color of normal pudding. It doesn’t affect the flavor at all, but just for aesthetics, I usually put in a drop of yellow food coloring. Malia, being the free spirit that she is (or more likely just because she is my kid and I have a fondness for food coloring) decided yellow was boring and opted to tint her pudding purple. It ended up looking a little weird, but it was tasty, and she enjoyed the results of her first endeavor into pudding making. 

She assures me that there will be more pudding in the future.

Pie Deconstructed

It is Malia’s turn to choose our family home evening treat for tomorrow and she requested banana cream pie. I always make our pies the day before we want to eat them so that they have plenty of time to set up, so I made the pie after church today. Malia, however, just couldn’t wait to enjoy her chosen treat so she topped a few leftover cookies from the crust with nice, big slices of banana. I have seen Oreos consumed in a multitude of ways over the years, but this is definitely the first time I’ve seen them used as a vehicle for plain fruit. Usually, the cookie is the focus, and the healthy stuff is just the mode of delivery and not the other way around. LAUGHING WITH TEARS SMILEY

Team Choir

This evening was Malia’s end of year choir concert. With one performance under her belt and a better idea of what to expect this time, she was not as nervous. She also really likes their music this time around and that makes a big difference. She actually looked like she was having fun! Next year she will have a full year of choir instead of half a year and she has started referring to herself as a choir kid rather than a band kid. I have always been perfectly happy with whatever kind of music or art my kids enjoy and have willingly supported them wherever their talent takes them, but I have to admit that having another choir kid kind of makes me feel like we are finding a balance between choir and all the band!

Malia was extra excited that Daniel and Nathan were both able to attend her concert. With their semester over, they were able to come down for a few days which has been super nice. Matthew’s end of year wind symphony concert was last night, and Nathan scheduled several appointments for these few days, so the timing worked out great! Malia misses her older brothers, so I know that she was very glad they were able to be there tonight. 

All Jazzed Up

Last year a number of professional jazz musicians established the Jazz Mentors Foundation based in Salt Lake City. The purpose of this new non-profit is to encourage jr. high, high school, and university band students to appreciate and learn to play jazz music, to encourage the appreciation of jazz music in the community, and to provide student musicians with opportunities to participate in free clinics so they can learn from a variety of nationally recognized jazz musicians. After each clinic, there is a concert held and students who participate can attend the concert free of charge. There have been a number of clinics held throughout the school year and Matthew has attended all of them, finding some more helpful than others depending on who the visiting clinician is and what instrument is their specialty. 

This evening’s clinic and concert is one Matthew has long anticipated as the visiting musician was Benny Benack, a trumpet player and vocalist who happens to be Matthew’s favorite jazz musician at this point. He was extra excited because his jazz band was invited to provide the lobby music for the event. Not only did Matthew get to show off his skills a bit, but he also participated in the clinic, got to meet Benny and got to play with him. He was super excited about the whole thing and came home grinning from ear to ear!

A Live Dragon

Usually, our yearly experience gifts are spread out throughout the year. But this year it seems like all of them have been in April. Nathan’s trip to Texas, Matthew’s band tour to California, and Malia’s parallel trip to Cali have all been this month. And this evening was another of Malia’s experience gifts. 

Malia has been a long-time fan of the movie “How to Train Your Dragon.” She spent several years very focused on Toothless, the main dragon character. She watched the movie over and over and over again. She dressed up as a dragon rider for Halloween one year. She even had a “How to Train Your Dragon” themed birthday party. And she still has framed art from the movie hanging on the wall in her bedroom. So, when I saw that the Utah Symphony had added this particular flick to their films in concert series, I knew we had a winner on our hands.

Malia said this evening’s performance was amazing! The music was wonderful, and the audience was actively engaged in the film, cheering at all the appropriate moments, etc., which makes things so much fun. Some years back I took the boys to see “Singing in the Rain” when the symphony played and we loved it, so I understand her enjoyment of the experience. We’ll keep our eyes on the schedules so we can see what other wonderful live soundtrack movies we can catch!

A Bit Road Weary

Although the number of miles is the same coming and going, for some reason the drive home from a vacation always seems interminably long. Today was no exception. Our pitstop at Alien Jerky was an indication that we were just getting started and not a sign that we were nearing the end. Malia got so bored that her main mode of entertainment was playing with a plastic water bottle like she did when she was two. And using gas station bathrooms got really, really old. While I have enjoyed all my recent travels, two trips in three weeks is not normal for me and I’m good and ready to sleep in my own bed. Kev’s a bit road weary as well, but he is even more justified in that feeling than I am. He was in Philadelphia for work a week and a half before we went to Texas and a week and a half from now, he will be in Philly again. I’ve never been to Philadelphia, and we’ve talked about me joining him on one of these trips so I can see the sights, but right now is definitely not the time. I’m very much in need of some time at home!