2023 in Books

This year, for the books I read, I turned them into a giant collage. There's not that many so it won't take you hours to look at all the titles, but I figured it would be a fun visual this year to have my book conglomerate. I'm trying to incorporate some more elementary books, because in a few years, those are the types of books my daughter is going to be reading. I know, I can't believe it either. I can't even believe she can already read words and sentences.

I enjoyed a good number of these. Some were just nice "interlude" books to get to the next one. Most had deep thought, life analysis, and some good life truths. 

I already have a nice long list of holds I'm waiting for from the library to kickstart next year. Let's hope I can make it through them once they get to me. Please let me know if you read anything fantastic from this year. I'd love to put it on my list next year! 

Just Fine

There are many things I did not appreciate about my childhood growing up. Once having my own children, I shaped a lot of my parenting on the exact opposite of the way I was raised. However, there is one poignant moment which has always stayed with me and goes down as the best parenting I've ever experienced.

8th grade was my last year as a straight-A-student. I had just started high school and it was one of the report cards in the middle of my freshman year. I was attending one of the most difficult high schools in my district. High school came like a slap in the face. My report card was littered with B's and even a C or two. The A's were a rare sighting that year with only 2-3 per grading period. 

My report card had arrived and was sitting on the counter atop a pile of mail and advertisements. As we were eating, my dad looked over my report card and asked me one question: Why are your grades so bad?

I responded with a simple, truthful, answer: School is hard.

After that, he put the report card down, we finished the meal, and my guess is no more words were spoken the rest of the evening.

I don't think my dad ever asked me about my grades again after that grading period. My grades stayed more or less the same in sophomore year. Junior year, they started to pick back up again and the majority became A's with a few B's and probably one C here and there. Senior year, I was a straight A student again. 

College was, again, a slap in the face because there was a learning curve to figure out how to balance 15 hours of class spread across 5 days. And to factor in the unspoken 20-30 hours of homework and studying a week for those 15 hours of class. Again, I followed that same trend of struggling immensely freshman year first semester and figuring out in the next 5 semesters which followed. Eventually, I regained my straight A status. 

I have to credit myself for being the kind of student and child who understood responsibility. I knew what to do and when to do it. If it didn't happen, it was because it was out of my ability or I had other priorities - for better or for worse. 

I was reminded of this memory again because I had a student come last week and she seemed kind of down. I didn't pry about it, and we had a great lesson together. When her lesson was over, we had to wait for her to get picked up. She muttered something about her mother "probably still mad at her" and I asked her why her mother was upset. She told me it was because of grades. I sighed. 

I've never thought of my parents as awesome parents who modeled wonderful parenting, but this one memory from my dad still stands out to me today. And honestly, I hope I can deal with the future grades of my children with a similar straightforward attitude. Because I know firsthand the difference it makes and the impression it leaves when you handle a situation with tact.

Sometimes I do wonder if this is how my dad still sees me....
because I know I will forever see my children as my babies. 

And I think, for however much he displays it, he knows I ended up just fine. Maybe better than just fine. 🙂

A New View

Nearly five years ago, we put in new windows for the first time with a company. We were excited. It was fun to get new windows for the house and replace the original ones. But the process was a nightmare. Our first job was scheduled to start in the afternoon, and they didn't even arrive until about 2-3 o'clock in the afternoon. They didn't leave until 8:30 that evening. New windows? Yay. The install? Terrible. 

However, we did enjoy the new windows and ended up scheduling another batch later that year. This install was much better. I requested to be scheduled as the first job of the day, and we were very particular with the installers about details. After this second batch of windows, we were done for a while. 

The windows which have always stood out in our house were our living room windows. We had repainted the wood paneling on the inside when we purchased the house, but the windows stayed the same dark brown frame with grids.

The color difference provides contrast, but I've never liked the grids.  
If it were an actual pure black color, I'd be less likely to complain,
but it was the original dark brown/copper tone.

This year, we revisited the new window conversation. My husband had always said our bedroom was particularly warm in the summer - it was. We have a south-facing window in our bedroom and it would raise the temperature by about 7-8 degrees compared to the rest of the house in the summer. I think after this year, he'd finally hit his limits and wanted to do something about it. So we called three companies and got quotes from them on the same day. 

The first quote was from the same sales rep we'd worked with before, but he had changed companies. We figured we'd call him out and see what the new company was like. It was more or less comparable to our original company. We were feeling pretty good about committing with them but wanted to wait until after the other two quotes. 

The second quote was from the same company we'd worked with before (now with a new rep). I really just wanted to see how their prices compared to five years ago since the economy and pricing has changed drastically in the last few years. He came and left within an hour.

The third quote we scheduled was with a company that had "very expensive" windows. The sales rep we'd worked with before asked us what other quotes we were getting. We told him the companies and when this name was mentioned, he immediately said, "Oh, they will be double our prices." I took this into consideration as I knew they were not going to be the cheapest company. However, I wanted to see what they offered. 

When the salesman arrived, you could immediately tell it was on a different tier of company because he came dressed in a suit and dress shoes. He did his sales presentation, brought his sample window, and we went through more or less the same spiel as the other sales reps. When he presented the numbers, he did something different than the other companies. He gave his first number which was the "actual cost" of the windows, like MSRP. Then he told us he could apply this first discount, and another discount, and then gave us the final number. Yes, it was significantly higher than the other companies, but there were a few different points he emphasized in his sales pitch which stood out:

1. They use licensed installers to install their windows - I'm pretty sure this is a stretch because there is no "license" you obtain to install windows. He had used the examples of carpenters/tradesmen to back up this claim, but I don't 100% buy it. 

2. He talked about the quality of the window and the different parts involved to keep the window insulated. This, I liked. I saw the difference in their window compared to the other window samples we'd seen before as well as the other new windows already installed in our house. I even tried to bend/manipulate the vinyl in the frame, and it was definitely stiffer than the cheaper companies.

3. He sold the install as a "sit back and relax" experience. We are in the stage of life where this is what we want. I want to allow someone to come in, fix or change something for me, and I don't have to micromanage them to make sure they're doing their job properly. If I have to pay a slight premium for it, so be it. 

4. They accepted credit cards on the entire balance with no extra fees. This is huge in today's world because when I can earn credit card rewards and points on my expenses, it adds a huge benefit, even if the actual amount I pay is greater. 

He left us alone to discuss with each other for about 15 minutes. We both agreed, we liked the quality of these windows better than either of the other two companies. However, the number he gave us was much too high. So we discussed what our bottomline would be for us to sign with this company. We arrived at that number and when he came back, we pitched it to him. 

His response was, "Sorry, I can't do that. I've already given you as many discounts as I can." And we understood and let him pack up his things and get ready to go. Then, he stopped mid-packing and said he'd try to run the numbers again and see what he could do to get us our ideal number. He got really close. He asked if we could come up $83. Sure, we could do $83. 

So right then and there, we signed contracts for windows with the most expensive company we received a quote from not intending to actually buy any windows that actual day. I made sure he understood very clearly my expectations: smooth install. no payment until everything was to my satisfaction. best crew assigned to our job. He told us the windows would be ready in about 4-6 weeks, and he was actually right. Only 24 business days later, I received the phone call saying the windows we ready. We installed a week after that. 

I have to give it to him - most of what I asked for was completed without a hitch. Did we hit some bumps during install? Yea, we did. But that's almost always the case and should be the expectation. But I'm quite impressed with the sales rep and his overall demeanor. He handled everything very positively (even though he may have been secretly scowling at me through the phone). But any form of communication with me was made in a way to make me feel like I was the most important item on his agenda. And that is a special talent which even I do not possess. 

And let's not forget, we really love the windows. 

One of the six windows we replaced. These windows do not have window
treatments so it is actually refreshing to be able to see completely out with a well-blended
white frame to match the rest of the interior. 

So how did they perform on their original claims sold by the sales rep? Pretty good actually.

1. The installer - I don't know that he actually had any license, but you could tell he was knowledgeable and knew what he was doing. We had a one-person crew come out to install our six windows and he did it in about six hours. I'm impressed. For the quality of the install and to be able to do it in six hours, you have to know what you're doing and be deft. He did just that. So I'll give it to them - at least one of their crew is a competent installer. 

2. I already felt the quality of the windows on their sample, but once installed, still nice. I also was able to see the fit of the windows during installation, and they fit very well for the measurements taken. I have a feeling one of the previous window installs we did with the other company did not do a great job of measuring....

3. Honestly, the install was as close to a "sit back and relax" situation as it could have been. I don't think I can ever fully relax when someone is working in/on my house, but it was almost. I was able to get other things done and not feel like I had to constantly keep an eye on him to make sure he wasn't cutting corners. And if you know me or have read my blog, you'll know we've had our fair share of working with contractors and the full gamut of "quality" that exists. 

4. It's true, they don't require completed payment until everything is done to my satisfaction. I've currently not paid yet because they have to come out and fix some things from the install. 

Everything in this experience has told me that spending the extra money to go with a different company instead of the cheapest one out there is worth it. This has been my mentality lately since having children because spending the time on extra hassles isn't worth saving the money. 

About the children....what were they doing for six hours while our windows were getting installed? Well, they wanted to play outside, but they didn't like the noise or want to be by the installer. So they moved all their "furniture" to the other side of the house and set up shop by themselves. 

They're so creative 😍

Starred Forever

I was cleaning out my emails and un-starring emails which were no longer important. As I unchecked the star for a bunch of emails associated with the music association from previous years, parent emails which weren't relevant anymore, and other no-longer-important emails, I came to the very end of my starred emails. The last email was dated April 24, 2017. 

I refused to un-star this email. To be honest, this email is not relevant to me anymore, but I wanted to keep it starred because this email marked the end of a three-year span of my life where her presence was in it. She was the epitome of elegance and poise wrapped around graciousness and compassion. She dressed up for the office everyday with slacks and some kind of blouse or blazer. She wore heels and walked around the office in them like she was 30 years younger than her real age. She had the kindest voice and handwriting which was both difficult to read but also impressively beautiful. She didn't eat avocado. I don't remember her ever saying a harsh word about anyone.

I still remember the day I found out she passed. It was about 20 minutes before my first lesson in the afternoon. I stood in my bedroom staring out the window. I couldn't stop crying, and yet, I knew I had to because I was about to face a 9-year old in my home studio and I wasn't about to explain why I couldn't keep it together. She didn't have a fancy service or anything. She wouldn't have wanted one.

There was a time after where I'd see her in every major chord I taught in theory. You see, the major chord abbreviation my students are asked to write as an answer for their tests is MAJ. Those were her initials. I could never see the letters MAJ without thinking about her. As the years passed, MAJ started to revert back to just meaning a major chord, and the memories of her once again were tucked away. But I keep this email starred because it's a reminder of a beautiful part of my life with her in it everyday I went to work. 

The List

I don't actually know what a healthy level of reading and writing should be at the kindergarten level, but I'm pretty sure my daughter is on par if not ahead of the game. It's been a lot of work keeping up with her homework, but she's learning a lot so we choose to put forth the effort. 

She started writing "lists" recently, but it's really just a bunch of scribbles on a piece of paper. She made an H-E-B list as well as a B-B-q list. I'm not really sure what B-B-q is supposed to be, but I know where she got her H-E-B inspiration from, haha. 

She kept telling me she was going to make a shopping list and give it to me. So I told her, sure, make your list and give it to me. Anything she can write down, spelled correctly, and read to me accurately, I will purchase at the store. 

I might be shooting myself in the foot with this offer because she's a lot smarter than I think (maybe). So I gave her two caveats:

- She has to do this before her 6th birthday or the offer expires.

- There's a $50 limit on what I buy off her list.

Oh, and obviously no parental help on this list. That should be understood, but I'll have to tell my husband just to make sure we're on the same page. *You're reading this, right? Got it? 😝*

Let's be honest. If the kid figures out how to spell lobster, and adds the word whole in front of it, I'm screwed. Especially if that's not the only item on the list! (Academically, she has learned all the phonetic rules to piece together those two words. 😱)

I'm kind of excited actually. I legitimately want to see what she would write on the list and what she actually wants me to buy. "Peas" is easy, but she doesn't like peas. Probably wouldn't want "beans" either. She might write "rice" but I can afford that one. 

Am I a genius or a crazy mother for doing this? Anyone out there want to try this for your kids now?? 😄

The Power of Play

We’ve had many things lost under our refrigerator at one point or another. There was a trapped marker for the longest time which I fetched out a while after it was originally lost. There have been blueberries hiding underneath from being dropped on the floor. Once I spilled a bag of frozen shrimp and one was barely tucked underneath the fridge. It’s a good thing I saw that one in time and fished it out before it mysteriously stunk up the kitchen.

One item which had been lost underneath the refrigerator and never rescued was a lone chopstick. I no longer remember when and how it was dropped, but this one single chopstick was trapped underneath for the longest time. Multiple occasions, we said we’d fish it out, and we never did, because let’s be honest. Life gets busy. There are other things more important than fishing out a single chopstick. And quite frankly, if our children hadn’t noticed it one day while playing on the floor, we would never have noticed we were missing one because we’ve always had plenty of extra.

Yesterday, something amazing happened. My five-year-old found a way to get the chopstick out from underneath the refrigerator. She grabbed a flashlight which they already played with and built a long stick out of some Lego pieces. Then, while shining the light underneath the refrigerator, used the Legos to swipe the chopstick out from underneath. Genius, right? 

Creative genius at its finest. 

To our credit, she’s seen me innovatively fix things or solve problems for her using everyday objects. She had seen her daddy just earlier take a stick with some fabric wrapped around it and clean dust from underneath the sofa. Perhaps this inspired her to do the same underneath the refrigerator to get the chopstick out. (Now, the real question is, why did my husband not swipe underneath the fridge to retrieve this chopstick instead of swiping under the sofa? Ha….)

When I see my daughter display these moments of brilliance, it makes me so proud. At the same time, I wonder if my mother noticed these things when I was younger. Did she ever watch us do something profound or special? If she did, it’s a shame there is no record or written evidence of it. And it’s a pity she will never be able to tell me about them.

I’ve never been one of those mothers to keep the house absolutely sparkling and to discourage my children from playing with non-toys. Yes, there are things she should not be playing with. But if it’s not a dangerous or precious item, chances are, I’ll let her play with it. And as a result, I get to see her be creative, be innovative, and think in ways much beyond her years. Do I encourage this because I want her to be top of her class earning the highest grades possible? Nah. I truly don’t because I wasn’t that student myself. What do I care about? I need to know that she is going to be okay without me whenever that day comes, whether through natural, healthy reasons, or due to heartbreaking circumstances.

She’s slowly showing me she will.

PT R2

My daughter potty trained during Covid at 2.5 years old. Also, I got tired of paying for diapers for two after about six to eight months. After she potty trained, I told myself I was going to potty train my son by the time he was 21 months old - by the end of the next calendar year. 

Haha. Jokes on me. 

Here we are nearly two years later from my initial ambitious thought, and almost two months into the process since we started. In the beginning, it felt promising because he was going potty on the toilet and staying dry. However, I was reminding him and setting timers every 30-45 minutes. We soon realized, this was not true potty training as he would not go unless we reminded or asked him. The instant we forgot, he had wet bottoms.

This continued for about a month with reminders when we remembered and wet clothes when we didn't. I then started incentivizing him with candy. This definitely made a difference and he started to take initiative in going to the potty instead of only when we reminded him. We kept continuing to keep up good habits at home but wearing a diaper when we went out in public, especially for extended periods of time.

I remember watching the lead teacher give skittles to kids in our 18-24m 
old class when they could communicate their need to use the 
restroom. And now it's my reward for my own children.   

The real progress appeared one morning when I had a two-hour board meeting via Zoom. So although I was merely feet away from my children, I couldn't help them do much. I did notice my son go to the bathroom at least once in my meeting.

When I witness small wins like this in parenting and life, it warms my heart, because they're little reminders I have succeeded as a parent. When they no longer need my reminders and will do what they're supposed to do (something as simple as peeing into the toilet and not into the underwear), it's a little preview of what I hope the rest of their life looks like. 

Potty training my son took much longer than it took my daughter, but it was actually much less stressful. There was way more laundry and soiled clothing to wash but much less yelling and crying. We are far from being a diaper-free household as he still needs one at night, but it still saves a huge chunk of change to not be changing diapers during the daytime. 

Subtle Reminders

The blog has been quiet lately because life has been crazy. I've been smirking at myself this entire year because in the middle of January, I distinctly remember sending one of my friends a text message: This year in 1/24ths over. And over the next few months I recalled this text with her a few times and the fraction kept getting larger and larger.

And here we are in the middle of November. The year is 21/24ths over. 

I was washing the dishes today after we returned home from school. The groceries went into the fridge, the laundry went into the dryer, and the kids were playing by themselves. My son was already outside playing in the backyard and my daughter wanted to join him. She came up to me as I was washing and told me she wanted to go outside. I told her to put her sweater on and she ran off to do so. 

After a moment of quiet, I called out to see if she was still getting ready or if she'd already ran outside. She told me she was getting her shoes on and within seconds, I heard the door open and shut. She's only five years old, but it's already happening. In my mind, I was picturing a teenager grabbing her things to leave and drive herself somewhere. Honestly, the feeling as a mother is exactly the same. I just got a sample of what is to come. 

After finishing the dishes, I cleaned up our back hallway which becomes the dumping grounds for everything when we come inside. As I brought the kids schoolbags back to the table, I happened to glance at the window and noticed a tear in the curtain. 

And just like that, I was transported back to being the mother of young children who are totally oblivious and unaware of their surroundings at times. I could almost guess exactly how this curtain came to be ripped and why the kids didn't even notice.

They like to climb on the window sill and look outside for fun. We have a table placed against the wall adjacent to this window. A portion of the table overlaps the window. It is very likely as they were playing by the window and the curtain that the curtain got shoved up against the corner of the table and tore without them even knowing it.

I'm not actually mad about it. These were the first curtains I ever bought for the house when we first moved in. They're nothing special to me. It is inconvenient that they're now ripped in the middle, but I'm not even going to bother replacing them. We also have extras anyway from when we replaced the window treatments in my studio. 

In a way, it was a nice reminder I still have little children in my house. And part of me would like it to stay that way a little while longer. 🥰

New Traditions

I've reached a point in my life where I've started splurging on myself. I don't go overboard or spend excessively, but by my own standards, I've definitely loosened the purse strings from my former self. Back in August, I was randomly browsing a shoe store and came across these flats on the discounted rack. I'd never purchased anything from this designer before, but they spoke directly to the young teenage girl who still lived inside my now grown-up practical adult self. 

Very blinged out, extra, shoes. Who recognizes the designer? 😛

They were discounted to $56, and I had a coupon that could bring it down another $10. However, $46 + tax was not in my budget to buy these shoes. I even mentally told myself if I could find them for around $30, I would pay for it. 

Normally, I don't fall for things like this anymore because I understand the realities of how useful things are. Beautiful shoes like this don't have many chances to get worn unless I want to wear them to the grocery store, to pick up my kids from school, or to doctor's appointments. Although I could wear these shoes to any of the previously mentioned locations, it would just seem slightly overkill to do so. 

I didn't purchase the shoes that day. But a part of me couldn't shake the desire to buy these shoes. Why was I so fixated on them?

Because a part of me wanted to match my daughter. I had purchased new shoes for her to wear to her piano festivals, and she had picked out a very glittery, blinged-out pair herself. They were meant to be a replacement for the pair she was gifted from a friend which she'd now outgrown. It was an incentive for her to play in-person in front of a judge the traditional way instead of relegating to making videos and submitting them online like many of my students choose to do now. I didn't even tell her she had the option to record. Shhh don't tell her 😆 

Normally, I'm not one to focus on aesthetics or "trends". I never even bothered dressing my daughter up as a baby because it was easier to grab a onesie and some pants. But as she grows up and I get older, the hard truths sink in deeper: we are only as young as we are right now in this moment. And it would be legit cute to match her at music festivals. She would be dressed up to play, and I can wear my extra flats as a teacher volunteer. It could be our tradition to keep alive as long as she wanted to learn piano.

This is something I've always thought about as both a mother and a teacher. Growing up, I had terrible memories of my piano competitions. My mother didn't even go to many because it was easier for her to stay at home. The one I distinctly remember her being at was the spring of 1999. She wasn't sick yet. I had just finished second grade, and it was my second time competing. I played the third movement of a sonatina, and there was a small portion in the middle where I stumbled for a bit. I finished playing, left the room, and the next memory I remember is being in a practice room getting yelled at by my mom. And she wasn't even my teacher. 😓

These are the things that traumatize us. Our parents never intentionally do these things to hurt us, but that's how it comes out: it hurts us. As an adult and a mother, I understand she wanted the best for me. She knew I could play it without stumbling in the middle, and she wanted me to win because she knew I was talented and capable of winning. What memory is an 8-year-old left with? Getting yelled at in a practice room after performing.

I don't want that for my daughter. And I'm her teacher. I don't want her to remember getting yelled at for stumbling during a performance. I want her to remember how fun it was to dress up, to match her teacher, and play on a big, fancy piano at a big school. I want her to remember how fun it was to get dressed, to match her mommy, and play on a big, fancy piano at a big school. And years later, no matter if piano becomes a long lost memory or if she still plays regularly in 30 years, she'll look back fondly on these subtle things which made learning piano fun. 

So this is why I bought a pair of very extra, very glittery flats which I will probably wear 2-3x a year, and it will be worth every penny because of the memories.

You know what the second best part is? I found them for the price I wanted. 🥰

The Ultimate Miracle

We had the same initials before our marriages, and we had the same initials after we got married. Her husband and my husband have the same name. We taught together for a year. She gifted me a recipe book with hand-written recipes when I got married. I visited her when she was on her third maternity leave and held her five-week-old baby who shares the same name as me. We lived five minutes from each other. 

Although we weren't inseparable best friends, we lived a lot of life with each other through ten years of friendship.

I used to accompany my dad's choir which was made up of older men and women who got together socially to sing. About 4 years ago when I was pregnant with my second child, I remember having a conversation with one of the older ladies. She had said to me, "You young people get to go to weddings and celebrate births of babies. Us old people are attending each other's funerals." It was meant to be a joke, but it held a bit too much truth. 

Little did I know I'd be grieving for a "young person" far too soon. 

It's really easy to go through my days and feel normal. I take care of my kids. I cook food for my family. I have a job. But there is a part of me that succumnbs to this overpowering grief if I let it. Because her reality is a nightmare I've lived from the other side.

My heart sank when I read her first CaringBridge entry. It was the same disease my mother was diagnosed with. And she had five young children. My mother had two. October 1, 2023 forever changed their lives the way May 1, 2004 changed mine. My heart aches for the rest of their lives knowing they will walk the same path I did. It is not one I wanted or chose, but was forced to accept. I am heartbroken they must accept it as well. 

I couldn't bring myself to visit her because I didn't want to sob hysterically the whole time. I was already doing that behind closed doors in my own home. I didn't want to be a complete mess in front of her as one of our last visits. Instead, I wrote her a letter. I'm glad I wrote her, and I'm glad she was well enough to be able to read it. 

As a person of faith, I'm very frustrated with God right now. In my head, I know He is the Almighty. I know His plan is perfect. I know He knows what He's doing. But I'm sad for her husband. I'm sad for her children. And I'm sad for what she had to accept and come to terms with in leaving this life far too soon. 

Jesus himself prayed in Gethsemane, "My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will." He prayed this prayer three times, displaying the very human characteristic of fear, while at the same time, possessing the foresight of God knowing what had to be done. 

Our pastor recently preached that death is a miracle. It's a miracle that is oftentimes overlooked. We think of miraculous healings as miracles. Screenings where the cancer is suddenly gone are miracles. Yes, these are miracles, and yes, they do happen today. So when someone's sickness is not cured, we wonder. We question. Where is God? 

God's miracle in death is that we are healed from the pains of this world and have the gift of eternal life with Him. I have to remind myself she is no longer hurting. She is no longer suffering. And that is the bittersweet comfort we get in saying goodbye to a friend of faith. What I am sad for are the human experiences of sadness and loss. Yes, I am very sad. But I am not hopeless. 

I hope she gets to meet my mother. And I hope she can tell my mother about the adult version of me my mother never got to see herself. 

Goodbye for now, friend. 

Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. - Hebrews 11:1

All Four Bicycling

My mother didn't know how to ride a bike. I've known this about her, but for the last however many years, this fact has eluded my memory. Today as I was riding my bike next to my daughter, I remembered.

I occasionally glanced over to see my daughter riding her bike next to me. I thought about my old childhood memories riding my bike. It was always the three of us. My mother never came. I'm sure she had things to do around the house, or maybe she wanted quiet time away from us. But it may have been that she didn't know how to ride and could not come with us.

We went to Martha's Vineyard twice. The first summer we went, the boys rented bicycles and biked to the beach from the town. My mother and I took the bus and met them there. I remember feeling sad I didn't get to ride a bike with the rest of the kids. At the same time, I was too scared to ride on a rental bike (and I don't think any of them actually fit me.) The second summer we went, I rented a bike and rode to the beach with the boys. My mother rode the bus by herself. On the way back, we had to ride back through the crowded town streets. It was my first time riding a bicycle without back-pedaling brakes, and I wasn't completely comfortable with hand brakes. As we rode through the town, there was a downhill road, my bicycle picked up speed, I didn't know how to comfortably stop using my hand brakes, and I lost control and there was a minor collision of some sort. I was okay. 

This was the souvenir I'd picked out from one of the trips.
My mother wanted to buy things that would be practical with purpose.
I wanted something pretty. This...met both the the requirements.
Sort of. It's a business card holder. Little did I know at age 11-12,
I would have business cards for it a decade and a half later. :) 

My daughter finally got the courage to try and ride her bicycle again without training wheels. It helped to go riding a few times with our neighbor's kids. Watching them inspired her to ride again and try without the training wheels. I've known she's been ready for years now, but her own fear was holding her back. We started her on a balance bike and she was very comfortable with it around 2-3 years old. However, her fear of not having her feet touch the ground and the inconsistency of spending time outside practicing prevented her from learning how to ride a bicycle until now. It's still pretty early if you ask me. 

I don't have memories biking with my mother. That's an activity she got left out of because she didn't know how. I'm hoping my children's memories of biking will be able to include all four of us.

Candy is for Kids

We live by the local high school and every year they do a Homecoming Parade down the street a few streets behind us. One of my former students was on the student council and told me about the parade. That year, my husband rushed my kids out to go see it, but they were already reaching the high school. 

Last year, I somehow did not have classes to teach that evening, so our whole family went out to sit by the street and watch the parade. The kids had so much fun. It's a good thing we brought our wagon because we had no idea the sheer amount of candy and goodies my children would be showered with.

This year, nobody informed me what date the parade would be. But it just so happened I was driving by the park where the parade begins and saw a giant trailer being decorated with glittering banners and footballs. My brain started churning, and I remembered the Homecoming parade. I did a quick search online and confirmed the high school Homecoming parade was that evening. I didn't get to go but my husband took the kids in our trusty little wagon.

You bet they returned home with a wagon full of goodies. 

This is a filing box filled with candy...probably 5-6 pounds.

No, I will not let them eat all of this candy. Some of it will be given away to my students. Some of it will be given away at our church fall festival. And the rest will probably end up as Halloween candy set outside our porch because I end up working on Halloween evening. They're lucky if they get 5-10 pieces of the haul 😂. To be fair, they get candy everyday after school from their teachers, so they're already averaging one piece a day.

***

I used to be a sucker for candy. (pun intended.) One of the most comical memories of my childhood was opening the refrigerator as a young child of 4-5 and seeing a bag of Skittles in the snack drawer. You bet I pulled it out and wanted to open it immediately. My mother and I would drive to my brother's bus stop to pick him up after school. I had my skittles in a little plastic cup. I even remember them starting to melt together because of both the heat and my little-kid fingers reaching in and out every time I ate one. 

That evening, my dad returned home from work, and he excitedly told me, "I got a surprise for you!"

"She already found it and ate it all," was my mother's flat reply. I'm pretty sure my dad had a look of silly shock on his face, but maybe I'm just reconstructing this memory in my head. Either way, that definitely wasn't what he was expecting to hear.

***

I ate one fun size bag of Skittles from the pile the other day. Although I enjoyed the sweet treat, it doesn't hit the same as it used to when I was younger. I will not be sad to see it all leave our house. 

Garden Updates 2023

It was a hot summer. My garden did not fair very well after...the middle of June. I think I was able to eat maybe 2-2.5 pounds of tomatoes I grew myself and maybe 3-4 small bell peppers. My basil has been producing and thriving through the summer. I have more basil than I know what to do with. My bushes are still full and I feel like I've pruned them a lot. My freezer is full of pesto. My refrigerator is full of pesto. There's a lot of pesto. 

I turned all this basil into pesto. Two colanders turned into about 2 cups of pesto. 

It turned perfectly orange. Beautiful.

These I used green and turned them into a delicious stir-fry.

Some of my tomato harvest.

Now that fall is officially here (although yesterday's high was nearly triple digits again), the plants are beginning to thrive again. My pepper plants are about twice as tall as they were last year at this time. I attribute it to consistent and daily watering. My garden is on an automatic watering system and it waters the exact same amount at the same time every day. I love it. I do still walk around the corner to say hi to them in the mornings and do a quick visual inspection, but I'm not hand-watering the plants on that side. 

I use tomato cages for pepper plants. Works like a charm.
These are about 5 feet tall (including the raised bed height).

I pulled one of my three tomato plants because I'm pretty sure it was diseased. I left two of them because I wanted to see if I could get a fall harvest. I'm not entirely sure I will, but it doesn't hurt to try. One of my tomato plants is now coming back for the third time. Yes, you read that correctly, the THIRD time from being cut back twice.

This tomato plant has been pruned twice. It's on its third life. 

The first time was not on purpose. When I bought the tomato plant at the store, one of the larger stems was bent and hanging over. When I planted them into my garden, I cut off the bent stem and replanted it in another pot. Tomatoes propagate extremely easily and this stem grew nicely and became a great producer for me in early summer. About 4-6 weeks ago, I cut it way back again to let it restart for the fall. It's now got some blossoms on it along with growing new foliage. If I'm lucky I may get another 1-2 clusters of tomatoes. 

The best surprise I got was seeing monarch caterpillars on my milkweed plant. I inherited this plant from the neighbor behind us when they were moving. It died last winter in the freeze and started growing again this spring. When I went out in the morning for my daily watering and walkthrough, I saw caterpillars all over my milkweed - eleven to be exact. I opened out patio door and called my children to come out and look at them. 😂 I think they enjoyed it but weren't as impressed as I was.

How many can you find in this photo? 

These caterpillars are not to be confused with tomato hornworms. I have gotten rid of my fair share of hornworms this summer. Those little suckers are resilient. I threw one over the fence and it SURVIVED. And it was a 10 ft fall onto cement. What can I say...nature is pretty amazing, even if I'm not a fan of how they amaze. 

I don't know how much more gardening excitement the rest of the year will bring for me, but it's been a pretty fun journey this year since I started in April. 

2022 I started with peppers. 2023 I added basil and tomatoes.  2024 I may try beans! Stay tuned. 

Writing New Memories

My daughter is beginning to learn how to read and this week, she started putting together her own sentences. Cue the bad spelling, nonexistent spacing skills, and large letters! Honestly though, I love it. It's so much fun to watch her learn and grow in this way. And I can take....a decent amount of credit. But not all of it. 😁

I posted this picture with her first "sentence" on Facebook and asked others what they could interpret it, and reading all the responses was very entertaining. 

So this is what it is actually supposed to say: The phone [fon] is not working [wrcceen]? Yes.

Translation: The phone doesn't work and it's confirmed. Apparently this was a conversation she and her brother were having regarding an actual phone in our house. 

This is the phone they were referring to, and they are correct. It does not work. It has not worked in over 10 years. Instead, it's been a wonderful "toy" for my kids.

I purchased this phone 12 years ago from eBay. It was the first phone I bought with my own money. I was going through a tough life transition and felt the need for some change. So upgrading phones was something I'd thought to do. New phones without contracts in the models I wanted were $300+ at the time and I was an unemployed college student. So I purchased this used phone that seemed decent from the description for around $200 if I remember correctly. It arrived, I started using it, and everything seemed great. 

The phone lasted me all of about 7 months. One day, it randomly shut off and wouldn't turn on again. I tried restarting it and all the tricks I knew how or could get as advice from others. Nothing worked. My brother ended up giving me one of his old phones and that's what I used for the year and a half after. After that, I told myself I'd never buy a used phone again. And that's stayed true for the last 10 years. I was lucky enough to be able to use other people's used phones for free. 😆 Until last year.

Last year, I purchased my second phone with my own money. The one I was using suffered a fatal fall and the screen shattered and was completely unusable. Before that, I'd kept using phones with cracked screens. I even paid to repair a cracked screen, and the casualty last fall wasn't worth another repair.

For all these years I'd resented this phone because it was one of the first "large" purchases I'd made for myself as an emerging adult. And it turned out to be such a huge flop. Now, I get to add a happier memory to it because it will forever be the topic of my daughter's first written sentence. 😊

Savings

This summer, one of my favorite stores closed. With it, came store closing sales. I went multiple times in June. I probably would have gone more but I was dealing with health issues so I wasn't as active as I normally am. 

On a Saturday where I was feeling better than normal, we went as a whole family and perused the store for a while. During this trip, I spotted a dicing attachment for my food processor which I had been contemplating buying for a while. I hadn't expected to see it because I assumed it would be one of the more popular items which would have been snagged up sooner than later. Who knew it would still be there at 30% off!

We bought it and stored it away in the kitchen cabinet, and it stayed there for a few months. Each time I thought about using it, I just decided I'd dice my vegetables by hand and it would be fine. Yes, it's true, dicing my vegetables by hand is fine, but I had spent money on this attachment and it was non-refundable. 

One morning, I was cooking after picking up the kids from school. For this particular recipe, I needed to dice four carrots, four celery sticks, and one onion. I decided that I would pull out my dicing attachment and use it instead of cutting these vegetables by hand. 

Now this was my first time using this attachment, and I had actually never looked into how to use it. So I spent the first 20 minutes looking up videos online on how to attach the pieces together. This attachment came with two pieces. One had the grid which does the dicing. The other piece has a slicing disk that spins around. So I had to watch a video to figure out how to insert them properly into my food processor bowl. 

The two pieces to my dicing attachment.

Once I assembled the food processor and had everything set up, it was smooth sailing from there. I was able to dice my four carrots, four stalks of celery, and a whole onion in a few minutes. 

Not a bad dice for an automatic tool. 

I wouldn't pass a chef exam dicing like this, but hey,  I'll take it.

Normally, I don't buy attachments like this because they usually make for more work, however, I'm kind of torn on this one. These are completely my own thoughts. This is not a paid review. 

Pros:

1. It dices well. The pieces are mostly uniform. They're not perfect, but it is definitely faster than I could do by hand.

2. I can put in whole sticks. This makes it especially convenient for carrots and celery. Other vegetables such as onions or potatoes would need a preliminary cut in order to get the shape to fit right through the feed tube. 

3. It saves my fingers. Never once did I have to worry about cutting myself with a knife. And I've done that a lot. 

4. It's really convenient for large batches of vegetables.

Cons:

1. Food gets stuck in the grid the very last round because nothing else follows behind to push it out. They do provide a tool for you to use to push food out, but it takes quite a bit of effort.

2. Not good if you want your food to look pretty. There were definitely some misshapen pieces, especially at the ends of each stick of food pushed through.

As someone who cooks a lot, I think this attachment will come in handy for me with specific recipes I make. I would definitely have to plan ahead because clean up is not the simplest so it needs to be worth my time to pull it out. I'm glad I have it and I will use it in the future. However, knowing what I do now, I'm 50/50 on if I would buy it again. 

This is only my first use of this attachment so maybe over time, I might feel differently. But I will say after using it the first time, I felt very satisfied in my "efficiency" and didn't have any blisters on my hand from using the knife. That's probably a huge value in itself. 

Pivotal

So I have not been blogging as much as I want to because life has been crazy this summer. My kids have started school (I know, they're old enough. Can you believe it? I both can and can't at the same time.) And life has felt like it's gone into turbo mode with them in school. We are doing a hybrid-type program with school and parent-guided homework so I feel like I just got dumped extra work even though I have some time away from both my kids now. But life is busy and I can't complain about where we're at, but wow, it's picked up a pace I wasn't quite expecting to be honest. 

I've always liked to be an intentional person, but the older I get, the more I feel the need to be intentional. One of the things I like is to be able to tell people from my past about where I am now and how I appreciate them for being in that phase of my life. No, I'm not going around messaging every person I went to high school with. But there are specific people who stand out for one reason or another. 

I actually started doing this with poignant books I read, too. I write to the author. In the last year, I've written to two. I heard back from the manager of one author. I don't take it personally when I don't hear back because there's numerous reasons why they don't respond. But on my behalf, I wrote to them, and that's the most I can expect of myself to do. I have yet to write to an author that I've been wanting to write to since I was a child. Her book has meant a lot to me, and yes, I've written about it on the blog. If you know what book/which author I'm talking about without me linking the post, then you really know me well and keep up with the blog. 😊 The main reason I haven't gotten around to writing her is because she does not have an online contact form. I've got to write or type out a letter to her, stick it in an envelope and use a stamp to mail it to her. Can I do all this? Absolutely. But unfortunately, it's so much easier for me to do something on a computer, phone, or iPad, so anything that can't be done from these three technologies is usually put off or forgotten. 

Recently, I messaged an old friend on her website. Her name has popped into my head multiple times throughout the years. I don't expect a response from her because if I did, chances are, I would be disappointed. We went to middle school together for one year. We met through communication applications class, or better known as "speech class." Now this isn't speech class for those needing extra help in pronunciation and speaking English. This was the communications class on presenting speeches, poise, gestures, and everything public speaking. Why in the world did I choose this class? 

Because it's my weakness. And for some reason, 12-year-old me thought, why not pick an elective to work on something I'm not good at? How mature of me, right? Instead of choosing an art class or home economics to craft and cook, I chose to suffer through a semester of writing and giving speeches to a class full of people I don't remember except this one friend. 

At the end of the school year, she found out she was moving. Again. She was used to it, but it didn't make the move any easier. At the end of the school year, my mom died. Life would never look the same for me ever again. She wrote me a note for the last day of school, and put it into a pouch she made along with a friendship bracelet and her school picture. I kept them all these years in a little box at my dad's house. 

How many 8th graders know how to sew/put together a knit pouch like this today?

Yes, I'm sentimental. I'm actually less sentimental than I used to be, but still sentimental nonetheless. But it's these little building blocks of memories which have led me to where I am today. 

In a year neither of us knew would be so pivotal to our lives, we had each other. 

Dressed to the Nines

When I was a sophomore in college, a friend at another school asked me to be his date for a formal. I said yes, and of course I went shopping and bought a new dress. I found it on sale and paid a great price for it. A few weeks before the formal, he told me it was being postponed. I was slightly disappointed, but he said he'd let me know when it would be rescheduled and see if I could still go. 

The following spring, he told me the formal was scheduled for February. However, he had started dating someone, and so had I. He still asked me if I wanted to go to formal with him since we had originally planned to go together before it was rescheduled, but I declined as it wouldn't feel right to since we both had significant others. 

I purchased this dress nearly 13 years ago. And sadly, I never got the chance to wear it. When I graduated from college, I did an unofficial senior photoshoot wearing this dress. My friend who tagged along ended up taking some photos herself and snapped this photo of me. 

She ended up being our wedding photographer (we were her very first wedding!) and is a well-established photographer now.

I had a lot of fun at the photoshoot, and the pictures I did receive bring back fun memories, but the dress was never showcased or seen by anyone other than the two of them. 

When I graduated from college, the dress moved back home with me and stayed in my closet for a year while I lived overseas. It stayed in my childhood closet when I moved back home. It migrated to our apartment with me after I got married and moved out. And finally, it came to our master bedroom closet when we purchased our first house together where it's been since. 

Occasionally, I found myself pulling out the dress, admiring it, trying it on, and lamenting the fact I would probably never get a chance to wear it in my life. The dress was long, black, and formal. How many occasions would I have to wear a dress like that again? 

2023 was going to be the year. I was asked to play piano at a wedding, and the wedding dress code was cocktail formal. Miraculously, the dress still fit. This was going to be possibly the one and only time I would ever wear this dress. 

My husband and I enjoyed our time at this wedding. We didn't bring the kids with us as kids weren't allowed, but we had wonderful friends who kept them overnight for us so we didn't have to pick them up late and drive all the way home. So this was the first wedding in a long time where we could feed ourselves without needing to keep children quiet or prevent them from spilling/breaking/dropping anything they weren't supposed to. 

The outdoor area was beautiful although I'm so glad they
changed it to an indoor wedding. Best decision ever. The high was 102. 

I waited 13 years for a chance to wear this dress. I would never have thought so in college, but I'm glad I didn't have anywhere to wear this dress until now. My first (and potentially last) time wearing this dress will be with my husband. There's no event more special than one I get to attend with him by my side.

Happy nine years to the absolute best person I could have ever chosen to spend my life with. 🥰

Bye Bye, BBB

I’ve seen many stores go out of business over the years. I remember when Foley’s closed. My parents purchased many of my piano competition dresses from Foley’s back in the day. My in-laws bought two sets of dining tables and chairs during their closing sale. They gave us one table when we got married and it’s the table we eat off daily. I remember watching Super 1 Foods close as a child. It became Rainbow Foods for a while and then disappeared altogether. I remember when Service Merchandise disappeared. 

The red trim.

In the last 10 years, I remember watching Sears close. My daughter has actually been to a Sears before although she will never remember. I remember going to their store closing sale, pushing her in her stroller when she was less than a year old. We made the mistake of leaving the house without a diaper or wipes - it was one or both. And she happened to have a blow out. We laid a blanket under her bottom in the car seat and then strapped her in to go home and change. I’ve even commemorated this event in one of her baby photo albums. 

Another store is closing now. I’ve loved Bed Bath and Beyond since I was a child. My aunt was the person who introduced this store to me and she knew it was one of my favorites. When I was in high school, we visited my aunt and she took my cousins and my brother and me out shopping. She was going to Bed Bath and Beyond and the boys were going to Target next door to look at electronics and video games. She asked me if I wanted to go with her or the boys. Guess where I chose to go? 

Target. 

Now as an adult and a female, Target sounds very appealing to go wander for any amount of time. However, I didn’t have that appeal as a teenager. Target felt like a grocery store to me. (Yes, I distinguish the difference now, but this was nearly two decades ago.) So why didn’t I go with my aunt? 

I wanted to call a boy and I couldn’t do that next to my aunt. I could easily run away from my cousins and brother, and the truth was, they didn’t care. Alas, it ended up being a terrible decision because I had neither a pleasant phone conversation nor an enjoyable time with the boys. I recounted this whole experience in my first book, and as much as I cringe at my own memories, I am thankful some of them have been written down or else they would be lost in the abyss of history that is my past. 

When we got married, we registered at Bed Bath and Beyond. They were the quintessential wedding registry. We went in store and used the little scanner guns going around the store scanning items. We received a number of gift cards from friends and family which we’ve had no problems using in the last nine years. I hoarded the coupons every time they came in the mail. For the longest time, they let you use expired coupons. The most valuable ones were $5 off a $15 purchase or $10 off a $30 purchase. In my email, I even received coupons that were $20 off $75. There were coupons for all types of purchases, big or small. It was just playing the game of which coupon I had for which purchase I wanted to make. 

Buy Buy Baby was their sister company. I never stepped foot in one until I was pregnant with my first child. Did you guess it? I was hooked. It became my favorite store to walk in as a new parent to buy the random miscellaneous things I thought I needed to survive this new stage of life I was in. They also accepted Bed Bath and Beyond coupons for a while so I could save both and use them interchangeably at the stores. I’ll never forget the giant blown up pictures of babies they put up in their store foyer which were visible from the parking lot. My daughter aptly knew that store as the “baby store” because of those images. 

It definitely feels like the end of an era for me. I had an entire envelope of coupons saved up which I tossed out recently when they stopped accepting coupons. There will never be any more blue and white flyers arriving in my mailbox with a giant 20% on one side. My email inbox will be slightly cleaner due to less subscription emails coming through. Although the store hasn’t officially closed yet, I won’t be stepping foot in one anymore. I went last week for the last time when they bumped up their sale to 60-80% off everything. Most of the store was already cleared out. Only very miscellaneous type items are left in the sizes/styles that are least preferable. 

Bye Bye, BBB.

Summer Memory

My kids have been waking up the earliest in their entire life this summer. Most of it is due to waking up for school a few days a week, and part of it is just changing habits. So this week, on a non-school day, they woke up early and I took them to the nearby playground at 8:30 in the morning. For summer, this is great. We get an early start, it's not crowded, and we avoid some of the heat of the sun. 

I don't ever regret having two kids. Was it hard at first? Most definitely. Having a newborn at home during the rise of Covid and not having anyone help us, and both of us returning to work (from home) after six weeks was brutal. I don't remember how I managed to find time to cook. We did not clean the house for months at a time. But we survived. 

Nowadays I'm quite grateful I have two children. They play together, they help each other, they comfort each other, and they also cause each other some emotional distress at times. But for the most part, it's wonderful having two children. And watching them play on the playground together while I sit on a bench off to the side in the shade is quite nice, even if it only lasts for about five minutes. 

However, what I didn't expect while sitting on that bench was to be filled with a memory from over 20 years ago. Suddenly, I remembered a day when my mom, my brother, and I walked down the street to the nearby elementary school and played on the playground in the back of the school. 

My brother and I were walking on the structures and my mom was standing off to the side watching us. At some point, one or both of us asked her to join us and play. I remember her being reluctant to come up to the structure with us, but eventually, she did come up and go down the slide at least once. She had to be extra careful because she had a catheter attached to her left lung and a chest shunt by her collarbone. 

That's one of the last positive memories I remember sharing with my mother as everything else revolved around medical procedures or piano pressures. And watching my own two children play on the playground on a Tuesday morning managed to resurface this long lost memory. 

This is what grief looks like after two decades. It doesn't hinder my daily life, but it still peeks out occasionally alongside layers of new experiences and life, enough to make me break down, if just for five minutes. 

Happy Birthday, Mommy.

My Newest Student

I started a new student about six weeks ago. She was very excited to start learning with me. She'd done some previous beginner theory studies at home, but it was her first real time playing on a piano. I was nervous at first. I wasn't sure how our lessons were going to go. I didn't know if she could sit still during our lesson. Would she take them seriously or did she just want to play? 

Our first lesson was so much fun. I set myself a timer because it was earlier in the day than I normally taught. As she walked in, I went to greet her at the front door and walked her into my studio. I showed her the bathroom where she could wash her hands and which towel to use and where to put them after she dried her hands. 

The view from my "desk"

She did a great job curving her fingers and playing all the notes very carefully. I wrote her homework in a little notebook for her to have during the week and practice with at home. But the best part was watching her enjoy her piano lesson so much. I don't know if she enjoyed her lesson so much because she was playing piano or if she enjoyed having me as her teacher. Either way, it was a lot of fun for me, too. 

I hope she remembers this first piano lesson of hers. She might not, and chances are, she won't, but I hope to share these thoughts with her one day. This lesson reminded me of why I love teaching and why I love playing the piano myself. When our lesson was over, I handed her her books and told her I'd see her at our next lesson. She bounced off the bench and left my studio.

I tidied up my studio a bit and then walked over to the next room. I saw my daughter grinning at me, smiled back at her, and asked, "Did you have fun at your piano lesson with Mrs. Cathy?"

***

She calls me Mrs. Cathy just like all my other students. I only speak English with her during our lessons. And I remind myself not to have extra standards for her just because she is the child of a piano teacher. I intentionally do not practice with her during the week because these roles need to be clear and separate. So far, they are working out very nicely. I'm sure there will come a day when a lesson will be more stressful than it is productive. And I may need to readjust my perspective in order to keep my priorities straight. But these last two months have been filled with a lot of joy. I hope to keep it that way as long as I can. 

This last week, she was talking to one of my student's moms and sharing about how she was taking piano lessons with me. In her conversation, she told the mom, "My mommy is magic. In her studio she is Mrs. Cathy. And then when she walks out of her studio she's my mommy!"

💗