Musical Rehearsal

Sylvia and Caeden are both having tons of fun with musical rehearsals!

Rye Soloist Competition

This girl amazes me.  She decided in December that she wanted to learn a cello concerto for the BNYS Rye Solo Competition.  In January she and Dr. R chose the Hadyn cello concerto, and she learned it really quickly.  On Sunday she practiced for half an hour with her accompanist, and this evening she played her audition for the judges.  AND SHE WON!!!

On Sunday, May 10, she will play the Haydn cello concerto as the featured soloist accompanied by the Bloomington Normal Youth Symphony!

We went to Krispy Kreme to have a celebratory doughnut!

Snow Day

We had a snow day today.  

Caeden, on the couch, playing Fortnite at 10am

  Looking the same at 4:13 pm

Rivlins

I made some potato soup with rivlins tonight, like my mom used to make, and Sylvia and Caeden thought I was crazy.  Caeden actually took a rivel out of his soup and tried to bounce it on the table.  I thought the soup was really yummy.  It had lots of basil and anise and ground turkey, and it was yummy.  Since the kids didn't care for it and Jeremy doesn't love soup in general, I was able to visit our next door neighbors and share some with them and my friend Tracie who is a wonderful adventurous cook. 

Sylvia, Caeden, and I went to Goodwill this afternoon and she found this beautiful gown for $6!

Annah's home!

Annah decided Thursday night that she would come home for less than 24 hours with Ryan and Allison.  Jeremy was away with his state wrestlers the whole time she was here, but the rest of us enjoyed her being home!

Ryan brought her to the school at the end of the school day, then she came home with me and Sylvia and Caeden.

These 3 are so silly!

Annah worked on our new puzzle of candy, Caeden played Fortnite, and Sylvia chilled on the couch with them last evening.

Pretty much the same this afternoon.

Sending a thumbs-up to Bryce...

This was the first time Annah had been home since she went back to Greenville for her January Interterm!  She has been busy every weekend.  We were so glad to get to see and hug her even thought was a short time having her home.

She actually had a concert in Decatur Saturday evening.

And this morning, the GU Choir sang at a church in Pana, IL as well.  She is a busy girl, and she loves singing with this choir.

I got called in to sub in the art room this afternoon.  

I love seeing Annah's ceiling tile hanging up.  It sparked a good conversation about the Bible with a student who saw me snap this picture.

Lovedliness

Sylvia recently started a fashion blog, just for the fun of it.  She and her friend Alexis have done a couple photo shoots, and today I had the pleasure of doing some photos with Sylvia in the cold, wind, and rain.  It was pretty fun, actually. 

She styled a black turtleneck and an old pair of Caeden's jeans he grew out of several different ways for her posts this week.  

You can find her blog at

https://lovedliness.blogspot.com

Recent crochet

It's been a while since I've posted any crochet.  Here are a few things I've made over the past couple months.

I made these "Hello Darling Headbands" while working on a custom order for a lady who is growing her hair back after chemo.  She needed them smaller than usual.  The turquoise was for practice, and the purple/grey one turned out bigger than she needed with the color switching pattern I used.  The one with cream and greys turned out the right size.

I also made this Celtic Winters Ear Warmer in her custom size.

I made these "Stevie Mittens" for Sylvia after I made a pair in black for her to give one of her friends as a Christmas gift.  I found these on the floor after I asked Sylvia to try them on for me, so I can only assume she doesn't care to have them.  I will either sell them or wear them myself when my current mittens wear out.  I love the pattern and this soft cream yarn.

I made these little Personal Pouches, and I think they're really cute.  Handy for carrying in your purse  that doesn't have enough pockets to hold those loose random things you don't want falling out!  They're about 4" to 5" square.

 

I actually finished this early last fall, but never got a good photo of it.  This is the Tessera Bag by Outstanding Crochet, and it is my favorite item I've ever crocheted.  I don't even know how many hours I have in this, and I didn't do that great a job at it, but I really love it.  It is my Bible bag.

I made this Coffee Bean stitch slouchy beanie/mittens/infinity scarf set just because I like working with Scarfie yarn.

I saw the designer working up this Spindle Shell Beanie pattern in one of the Facebook crochet groups I'm in, and I was SO excited to make it.  I didn't get chosen to be a tester, but I bought the pattern the day it was released, and made one up quickly.  

This was not the right yarn to use, and it worked up pretty funky looking--and not a good kind of funky, according to my kids. 

I tried a second one in this yarn, and really don't love how the spindles turned out either.  I think this yarn is too soft.  I guess I will have to try a cheaper, rougher yarn. 

I still think it's a cool pattern, and it is fun to work on.

I've been carrying my grey Macie Bag that I made last year, and I get tons of compliments on it.  I decided to make up another in a random bulky yarn I had sitting around.  I think it will be cuter for summer in this color.  It's a fun pattern to do, and I really should make more.

Last week, I had the opportunity to help test a new pattern.  It was for the designer "beech twine," and it was her first ever pattern.  I really enjoyed the Instagram testers group chat we had going.  All the ladies were sweet and I think we helped get the Oaka Ear Warmer Pattern ready for launch!  I think it's a great pattern--really cute and easy to make too.

One of my favorite crochet designers, A Crocheted Simplicity, released this great pattern for her "My Love" design for free for it's first day.  The pattern includes a beanie, a slouchy hat, AND a messy bun hat version!  I made both the slouchy and the beanie for Annah, thinking she would choose one...but she wanted both!

Slouchy

Beanie

So, I'm not doing great with keeping up with my Etsy shop or my crochet social media, but I am always making several somethings!

Such a Sunday

What a wonderful sermon at church this morning; the whole series has been so good so far.  

We all really needed it.

Pastor Lisa had candy conversation hearts handed out to each person in a baggy.  Then we could go forward and smash our hard heart with a hammer and leave it there and pick up a soft [gummy] heart to leave with.  It was pretty therapeutic and really meaningful.

After church, Kamoni came with us, and we stopped for lunch at Culver's. The kids were singing the national anthem with Midnight Blues in Peoria at the Rivermen hockey game, and we got there quite early.  It was nice outside, so we walked around Peoria for an hour.

We went down to the riverfront, but didn't have enough time to go into the museum and check it out.  Caeden and Kamoni found this lookout point and decided to "emulate" the scene from the Titanic movie.  

They don't look much like Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslett, but they are funny.

We came upon the giant American Gothic sculpture and they decided to do "heart hands."  Oh boys.

They need their own suitcase and pitchfork, I think.

We came upon the Holocaust Memorial and were stunned.

We had noticed this sculpture on our way past the Civic Center at the beginning of our walk, and the boys stopped to read about it on our way back in.  It is called "Knockin' on Freedom's Door" by artist Preston Jackson, and it honors Peoria's role in the Underground Railroad.

We went into the Civic Center to wait for the rest of the Midnight Blues crew, and the boys just had to ride the escalator up and down.  I love that they enjoy the little things in life.

I enjoy watching the zamboni!

The Rivermen were playing the Evansville Thunderbolts today.

Midnight Blues and some Rivermen folks "backstage" before singing the anthem...

They did an excellent job singing!

Fun in the stands...

It was a really good game!

There were at least 6 intense fights, and the last one was pretty gruesome...One Peoria player had his head repeatedly bashed into the ice until it started bleeding profusely.  The Evansville player who did this was ejected from the game, and it took about 10 minutes to try to get the blood off/out of the ice. It was intense, and we hope the guy is ok--definitely concussed at minimum!  Yikes!

Peoria won the game, and we went back to Bloomington-Normal.  We were going to have supper at Avanti's but it was super busy, so we hit up Monical's instead--no disappointment to me!  Yum!

Kamoni was a little tired of having his picture taken, but he should be proud to have survived a whole day with us!  We loved having him around!