Thing is… We’re “baby proofing”. 🤞🤞🤞The new fuzzy kiddos are coming up tomorrow. So we’re busy around here.😀
I’ll try to ‘stream’ the babies in if I can, tomorrow.
Meanwhile, Sammie doesn’t seem very worried.
Tag Archive: smiling turtle diamond painting
The poor basket weave hat hasn’t progressed at all so, no pics. When it can show off on its own, it’ll share the limelight.
While Sammie is happy, we got a phone call from my son with good news for us. And I hope for Sammie. I’d tell but I don’t want to jinx it
Today I went back to Phantom of the Opera. I used to play and sing these. Thirty years ago. Not for an audience, just for fun. My friends and I gathered at the grand piano on stage after voice class and sang our hearts out with these. I was surprised at how much my fingers remember, though there was a lot of sight reading. I can’t sing at the same time, yet. Soon. I am doing daily vocal warmups now.
Anyone out there go through this? I find a saturation level on pieces and put them aside for other songs. Those seem to draw my passions and energy.
Here are some of the projects I’ve been working on this week.
They are Beau Soir, God Bless The Child, Going Home, Over the Rainbow, Ave Maria, and Just the Way You Are.
Beau Soir is a leftover from my voice lessons with Alis Clausen in the 1990s. And because it showed up now while I’m playing with the Duolingo French language, I decided to start doing my vocal warmups and challenge myself to learn to play and sing the song. A few others I’m playing are fun to sing, too.
Check out how Beau Soir is supposed to sound. You can see why I love it.
YAY! My brother likes his socks!
Just for review: these were Turkish cast-on. Chiaogoo needles Two at a Time socks. Then arch ribbing. Fleegle Heel, my favorite.
I thought I was finished at a 2″ cuff, but my brother needed a longer one for his boots. Otherwise, I would have been finished on his birthday.
Towards the end I had to rely on Advil and Aspercreme. But now my hands can rest a bit.
I found a bunch of unfinished WIPs. Here are a couple calling me:
I’m nearly finished with Smiling Turtle!
I think next week I’ll record my favorite songs. I’m loving Going Home, God Bless The Child, Just the Way You Are, and a few more. With my new enthusiasm for improv or composition I now have a keyboard within reach of my every perch. (Recliner, bed, Dabbling Den)
I didn’t get ‘Dar’s Dabbling Den’ rearranged yet. I want to make more room for my Yamaha keyboard near my piano. Maybe this weekend?
I’d like to make it easier to switch gears, bring in violin, ukulele, recorders, art challenges, podcast or book narrations.
Since COVID months ago, I’ve not been able to get faster than 5 miles in 35. But I’m still trying. And now that spring may have arrived I need to find walking time. Still a work in progress!
Oh, and I am three book reviews behind.
Duolingo still plugs along. I seem more focused on Italian. It’s easier. I still visit the other languages when the spirit moves me.😉
My music is coming along. I just don’t know how to quantify or make pics. Some of the times it seemed my eyes and fingers were on different people! So maybe that I got through the week mostly playing with practice hidden in there, and I didn’t kill anyone, I am still in love with the pieces I’m working on, and I look forward to my next sit down should count as progress. Right? I’m working on another Warts and All recording soon.
Oh, and by the way…
I’m nearly finished with a couple books. I’ll share the reviews in a couple of days.
Meanwhile, I’ve started
I still haven’t touched the violin or ukulele while my hands heal. I miss them and the learning process. Piano will have to keep my passions. Today not so much. Ever have days when you are so tired you just want to stay in bed? Those are rare for me, but today. Ugh. But hey, I still did a little of my routine. A little progress is still progress.
So, I’m grateful, I guess, that a dog hasn’t found it’s way to my lap yet. I can’t imagine trying to walk a little dog in this without at least working up to this level. I’m exercising on my bike, with yoga, but since COVID I haven’t had that kind of energy. It’s there. I’ll get there. And somewhere a pup is waiting for me.
As much as I hate the ending, I needed some Game of Thrones in the background as I knitted, colored, researched, etc. I’d forgotten how much I love the music.
Hopefully, we remain warm and don’t have to dig our way out. My son reminded me of the stories of such digs in Little House on the Prairie books that I read to my kids when they were young. Cozy snows are best.
Well, that’s easy! It is Finishing Friday! A great way to keep track of hobbies and passions. A way to see progress when, at times, it seems the end is as far as infinity. Row at a time, an inch at a time, a chord played right, or a rhythm that stays where it belongs is fun to keep track of. Many keep track of grievances or pain. I have. I probably will again and again. But I feel more fulfilled if I can see good and beautiful things done from the same place as the bird’s song. It feels right. It gives me pleasure. Not because I am looking for praise. I thank you for that, but it is more for me to feel like I am moving forward.
This felt good as it hit. Some days I do a lot of lessons. For others, I just do the one to get the points. I love languages, so it is fun for me.
The last two hats were for smaller heads. So I decided to make one a little bigger. I just finished the ribbing and started on the basket weave part. It is easier on my hands than crocheting or knitting, so while I am feeling the arthritis, I’m being gentle on the fingers.
My brother’s socks are coming along. Less than an inch to the end of the arch ribbing. Then, an inch to the beginning of the heel. I feel I am at the beginning of the end of this pair.
The middle section of the ‘smiling turtle’ diamond painting is almost done. It is a fun project. I love all the colors.
I have, in all essence, finished this book. Most of it was a review of things I’ve learned all my life, especially as a music major. But toward the end, it started meeting my needs. It has a lot of ways to improvise. I still find myself trying to play every single note rather than play, but I’m seeing ways to do it. I’ll be doing the review for this book soon. Mostly, at this point, I am in love with the last song presented. It’s called Coming Home.
So my favorite songs to play right now are Baby Elephant Walk, Just the Way You Are, God Bless the Child, and Coming Home. They drive me to the piano. I actually spent an hour there today. Remember in the summer or fall when I stated I could barely get five minutes in before pain or boredom pulled me away. Now, I have the joy of actually hearing and feeling the earworms that crawl through my head the rest of the day. My own music!
My ukulele, violin, and recorders sit sadly, waiting for my hands to feel better. I miss the learning process with them.
Well, that’s my Friday report. Fini!
Your prompt for JusJoJan January 24th, 2025 is “hobbies.” Use it any way you’d like. Enjoy!
My other hobbies are musical in nature. Having gotten back to piano this past summer, starting at one song or five minutes, only as long as it was fun. Now I can go as long as an hour but seem to average half an hour to 5 minutes.
After summer and fall, working on classical, suddenly winter brought some fun carols. I loved some of the more modern rhythms. So when I had to put them away, I made a bit of a resolution or goal to learn more modern beats. I want to be able to improvise and even compose my own music. So I started working through a few books like
Much of it is elementary. I assume I am of intermediate level. But my rhythm is horrid. Especially modern beats, blues, or jazz.
I pulled out another book and started at the beginning with the song, Just the Way You Are, from this book:
It seems easy enough, but it sounded nothing like the beloved Billy Joel’s golden hit when I started. But gradually, the beat is growing in my soul.
I was trying other instruments to get back into music. Recorder, soprano, alto, and tenor. Ukulele. And finally, a violin. When my thumb, elbow, and shoulder started hurting, these also had to go by the wayside. I miss them, but the piano doesn’t hurt my arms or hands. My back, yes. But I am working on posture and yoga to help with that. Hence the shorter sessions.
I love being 75. Retired. Older than my piano teacher was when I was 12, older than my mother, who never got to play for fun. I’m trying to play for them now. And my inner sprites and muses.
Let’s try an echo from the past. It is Friday. So how about Finishing Friday? Best I could do on short notice.
For a while, I had to do very little as the bottom two knuckles of my left thumb started hurting. It went up my arm, all the joints and into the scapula. So all knitting, crocheting, even violin, and ukulele had to stop. Even the piano hurt when I’d hit notes too hard on the side of the thumb. It made me so sad.
Luckily, it is getting better. But I’m still giving the crochet and the strings a break. Meanwhile, I’m trying morning bed yoga and include hand, arms, and shoulder stretches. That is helping the sciatica stabs, too.
Back to the prompt. I wish I could go somewhere to hear an echo. Somewhere so in Nature and isolated that a whisper would repeat back. It is such a great sensation to live through. I’ve been in caves that had that kind of sound. And the acoustics were so great that when my mom and I sang out it sounded like the most beautiful sound ever.
Darswords 
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