Category Archives: Random thoughts

Random thoughts, Teaching

Fall is the best time of year

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I love the change of seasons. I love when the cool weather comes, when the cold weather comes, when the flowers start peeking out again and it gets warmer, and when school is out. Every season has its good points.

Oh, and Happy Birthday to April!

April and I right before the pandemic!

It’s been busy, of course. As much as I talk the whole “ooh I want my weekends free” talk, I also enjoy making music and having more money! So I’ve taken some gigs of course, and then this weekend I ended up helping out a contractor by playing a last minute wedding as well, plus we attended another symphony concert. (We ended up going three weekends in a row due to wanting to see various concerts, but we don’t have anymore this month.)

We know the sound is better from the balcony, but you get more camaraderie and leg room on the main floor. It’s weird being with so many people, but they check vaccine cards at the door (or negative tests) and masks are worn pretty well.

I played on a real concert, real actual music with live performers and a masked/vaccinated audience. It was wonderful, and I had forgotten how performing feels so it was great to be back to that.

A picture of the rehearsal for said “real music” before I joined the stage.
A delicious weeknight meal: trout amandine, roasted carrots, and polenta. This was mostly courtesy of Trader Joe’s: polenta is a frozen meal, carrots from there, and frozen trout as well. Louie did the honors and it was delicious.

And now I’m into my week again, so much teaching, so many students, lots to do! I’m getting used to the schedule and making things work. I do a lot of planning: I use google calendar (which I sync with My Music Staff for private teaching) and have a few different calendars to plan personal things, time to work on various projects, catch up on business paperwork and things, exercising, appointments, etc. I enjoy seeing the various colors of my day (I also use different colors to keep track of which students are in person and which are online) and it helps me stay organized and make sure that things I need to get done each week get done. In addition to google calendar, I keep a few running to do lists on my phone (I just use the reminders app on my iphone) and anytime I have anything to do, I try to add it to the list (I will do this in the middle of a lesson, for instance) and then I check those lists often.

My running lists are: general to do list, which is pretty much anything I can do at home, Grocery list, food planning, gardening list (this one is being ignored as I just can’t do it all), and a curriculum to do list where I’ve been gradually solidifying my personal teaching philosophy and curriculum to really know exactly what it is I’m teaching my students and how to get them from beginning to advanced through all the steps they need. (That’s one of the projects I list above). I find the general to do list super useful for me because I don’t have strict boundaries between personal and business responsibilities, so when I have time at home, I will just work on that list, regardless. (The question of whether I should have strict boundaries is a different thought for a different day.)

A good portion of my day is spent petting various cats and such as well.

I also keep various documents for studio billing, financial planning and bill paying, travel planning, meal planning, etc, and work through those as needed. I use an app for keeping track of my expenses and mileage for tax purposes (Self-Employed through Intuit) which is a little more expensive than I prefer but I also find the app incredibly useful and I don’t use an accountant, so it probably works out in my benefit.

Anyway, this may be a boring blog post, I know, but I was just thinking about how I get things done. I’m not a paper planner person, though I do keep handwritten checking registers because I’m old fashioned in that way–I track my deposits, withdrawals, all payments for my checking accounts through my handwritten registers, but pretty much everything else is online. I’d been using handwritten teaching attendance books as well, but since I switched to My Music Staff this fall I may phase that out for next year as it’s redundant at this point. Some redundancy is good for record keeping, but too much is time consuming for no point.

Planning wise, I’m looking forward to doing some travel over the holidays (Thanksgiving and Christmas) and I’m planning to make homemade fruitcake this year, as well as a variety of cookies as usual. I will likely not go quite as over the top as last year, but there are still some things I really enjoy making as well as always trying a few new recipes. It’s October, which means it’s not too early to plan holiday baking, as well as the fact that making fruitcake is something you evidently do early so the fruitcake can “age.”

I just laugh so hard at this.

Anybody have any great ways they plan or get things done? For those who are self employed/work from home: how do you delineate time spent on work and time spent on personal things, or do you do like I do and blur the boundaries?

Random thoughts

Concerts

We are going to a concert tonight! It’s Kishi Bashi with the Symphony and we are excited. The Symphony is requiring either proof of vaccination or a negative test, so I feel like this is going to be okay. I believe they are at lower capacity and have spaced people apart, though we’ll see when we get there…

My fall schedule is shaping up really well. I managed to group my college students onto two different days, and I have most of my mornings free after my early classes which is great for doing work. I don’t have any days that are full from dawn to night, which is something I haven’t managed in the past. I miss seeing my students at Lindenwood, but something had to give, and that was my farthest drive. My early morning job is doing well so far, one week down, many more weeks to go, but I’m enjoying seeing and working with colleagues.

Our friend Jim is working on the back of our house, redoing an old wooden deck that needed serious replacement. I’m thrilled to be able to use the back door again safely when he is done. I’ll share pictures as well, then.

It’s been busy though, getting the year started, staying up on emails, billing, scheduling, etc. I have been trying to really limit my business work to during the week, though of course that’s impossible (well, it’s impossible for me, because if a student contacts me over the weekend and I can respond quickly, I usually do…why add it to a list of things to do later if I can do it right away?).

Anyway, just thought I’d pop in and do a quick check in. I’ve got some more things to do on the computer before setting off to teach college students again. Changing my system this fall will (I hope) save time and admin work in the long run, but until then it’s added a lot of work just getting it all set up. Every time I get something figured out, it seems like something new pops up.

Hopefully the weather turns out nice on Sunday as I’ve got the day off and would love to go for a hike somewhere. Right now the forecast looks good but it keeps changing.

Books, Random thoughts, Teaching

Time Marches On

I thought I’d just pop in so you all knew I remembered I had a blog. I know blogging is dead and all, yet I still read blogs and have a blog, so it’s probably sort of like classical music in that sense.

College started up, and I have several wonderful new students as well as my returning students. I absolutely adore some of the students I teach and I’m looking forward to a great semester. I’m sorry I had to leave some students at the other school I’d taught at for 4 1/2 years, but my schedule is much more manageable without that job…it’s hard to quit things, isn’t it? In any case, it was super weird and a bit emotional returning to my studio there for the first time since before the pandemic: I distinctly remember leaving and being excited for Spring Break and visiting my friend April in Atlanta, and then…never returning.

My early morning school job officially starts up next week, and while I’m a little nervous about the early mornings, especially as the days get shorter (it’s so hard to wake up and drive to work in the dark, for instance), I’m excited to get back to it. My overall schedule is easier than it was last year, even with actually commuting to my college job, and I think it’ll be a good semester.

Wednesday night: My parents stopped by overnight on their way home from a road trip. They were here for about 12 hours total as they wanted to get back on the road and get home. They ended up having some car trouble along the way home and the part their car needed might have been a year long wait or more, so they ended up buying a new car, which seems a bit crazy, yet, they didn’t have any better options at that point. We were able to admire their new car and chat a bit.

The weekend was fun: pizza and wine with friends on Friday night, and then most of the day Saturday and Sunday I spent at a Suzuki Workshop (Suzuki Principles in Action) in person at SIUE (in Edwardsville). It was a good learning opportunity, a course about HOW to teach, not what to teach, and I learned quite a bit. I have a follow-up assignment to do over the next two months, which involves recording myself as well as answering some questions/short essays. I’ve spent most of the pandemic trying to further improve and educate myself as a teacher, and it’s been really fun, learning. The more I know, the more confidence I have that I’m doing the best I can for my students.

Sunday night I cooked this: Skillet Shrimp and Orzo. I really liked it! I had been getting tired of cooking before I made it, but I think sometimes when I’m tired I just don’t want to cook, not that cooking is in itself tiring. I made myself put together a meal plan for the next two weeks.

And then yesterday was off, Labor Day! We were going to go for a hike, but ended up getting lazy and just hanging out around the house more. I sort of regret that I didn’t get out and about, but it was a bit hotter than originally predicted and I’m just so ready for fall weather. I think I was run down from the workshop in addition to just not wanting to deal with people or hot weather. It was a nice relaxing day and I didn’t work at all, other than a couple tiny things.

I do belong to two unions, and have mixed feelings about my union membership (one union is great, has gotten me raises, the other…not so much) but firmly believe that collective bargaining is on average, a good thing, and that workers make the world work and deserve way more than they and we actually get.

I haven’t mentioned books in awhile, so let me end with some books I’ve read recently:

Books I’ve loved: The Girl with the Louding Voice by Abi Daré, People We Meet on Vacation by Emily Henry, Golden Girl by Elin Hilderbrand, The Authenticity Project by Clare Pooley, The Jetsetters by Amanda Eyre Ward

Books I’ve liked: The Nobodies Album by Carolyn Parkhurst, The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave , Libertie by Kaitlyn Greenidge, House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune

Nonfiction I enjoyed/learned from: The Pandemic Century by Mark Honigsbaum, A Mighty Long Way: My Journey to Justice at Little Rock Central High School by Carlotta Walls Lanier

Random thoughts

Staycation isn’t what it’s cracked up to be

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I’ve taken this week off from teaching in order to rest and recuperate before school starts up next week and my new teaching schedules goes into order. In typical fashion, however, since Louie was still working and we couldn’t go anywhere, I ended up signing up for another online training course, which I thought was 3 hours a day (it is) but then had 8 hours of video observations on top of that. Between that, getting things ready for next week and a few other little things here and there, I don’t feel like I’ve had any sort of break! I suppose I never planned it to be a fun vacation week, simply a week off from my normal schedule.

I have had a break from teaching, which is nice, and means I’ll be happy to see everybody again next week. I hope the schedule works out well, and I’m especially excited to start my Creative Ability Development (Improvisation) Classes up again.

Unrelated, I have a few new potential students and some who have been wait-listed. I do turn students away as well, usually with a recommendation if possible. I realized that sometimes those students will find their way back: I’ll turn them away one year, and a few years later they will contact me again, and I don’t always remember until I am searching for their email for some reason and come across the original one! Then I wonder what if I could have fit them in a few years earlier, how would our relationship and their skill be different? I can’t take everybody though, there are only so many viable teaching hours in a day!

My early morning teaching job starts up again in early-mid-September and I am both looking forward to it (we’re in person, it’s back to normal which I’ve never taught in, masks ARE required) and dreading it (it’s really early, COVID fears, I don’t know what normal is so I’m a little nervous about it). I’m sure once it gets started it will be lovely: getting up so early has changed my wakeup time throughout the summer—7 to 7:30 am is now my normal, and while that’s still usually with an alarm, without an alarm I might wake up anywhere between 6:30 am and 8 am. The truth is it has also changed my normal bedtime, which is now around 10 pm, sometimes staying up reading after that, and I’ll have to bump that up a little if possible during the year. I don’t know how much of my sleeping pattern changes are due to aging, and how much are due to having to change, and I never will.

When I was in my 20’s people always told me once I had kids I wouldn’t be able to sleep in anymore. While I’m sure that was true, for me I never was able to sleep in again after the election of 2016…the stress got me up early for months after that and then I just couldn’t anymore. I do usually wake up much like I did as a kid, ready to go and get doing things, though sometimes things means checking email and doomscrolling a bit in between writing emails, and drinking coffee. Anyway, so people without kids will never know if they would have lost their ability to sleep in as they aged, or whether they would have enjoyed continuing to sleep well and long.

I’m rambling a bit, so maybe I’ll let you go now. Do you find yourself able to sleep more or less as you’ve gotten older? Do you get up the same time on non-work days as you do on work days? Do you get enough sleep on a regular basis?

Random thoughts, Teaching

Getting Ready

I’ve been working all week setting up my studio schedule for the fall. I’ve also been working on using a new website/program for my calendar…I have hesitated to use a program for organizing my lessons just because I already have my systems in place for invoices, tax prep, etc, and it seems like anything I add is trying to duplicate things I already use but not the way I want. I’ve decided to bite the bullet here though, and try it out for the year, and I’ve gotten 95 percent of the data uploaded.

I’ve changed the way I run my studio for the fall to a set monthly rate and by the semester, and it’s been a challenge getting that information out. I know parents get a lot of things to read, but when I send something with the subject line Very Important Please Read, it usually is, because otherwise my emails have subject lines like No Lessons Tuesday or Recital is November 17th or things like that. Yes, I tend to summarize the email in the subject so people know what it will be about.

It’s a busy time for new referrals, and I wish I had another day I could add students to and still have weekends, but that’s just not possible at this time. Anyway, I’m excited to make a bit more money this fall and streamline my operations! (And if you are a current student reading this, seriously, just at least skim my emails and mark your calendars, okay? I spend a lot of time crafting each one and it’s much easier if I don’t have to then go through and talk with 40 people individually…)

My sister and her kids visited last week, and we had a lot of fun. We went to the Aquarium one morning, and the kids loved it. I wouldn’t say it is a great Aquarium, but there were some nice exhibits and it was very well done and fun for young people.

We made shark hats. My coloring isn’t much better than hers…hers is definitely better for her age.

We went to Grant’s Farm another morning and it was a bit hot and crowded for us, but we still had a nice time. Not much mask wearing, even in the cramped quarters on the tram or in the Biergarten. They didn’t require it, but common sense should (and it should be required.)

Grant’s Farm is always trying to get more money out of your pockets. We paid them money to feed their goats, cows, llamas, birds, etc, and also shelled out for a camel ride for my niece.

Otherwise we just hung out, tried to stay out of the heat, had some nice meals, went to playgrounds, and such. It was exhausting but great to spend time with the kids, and of course my sister Leslie as well.

We had some bad storms the other night. We were fortunate that we didn’t lose power that night as many did, though we did lose power the next day for a few hours, likely while the power company was trying to restore power to others. We did have a chair get blown over.

I saw this the next day and texted Louie about how we had some storm damage. Before he got too worried, I sent that picture.

My nephew really liked sitting in the blue chair.

Louie went away for the weekend to visit some friends, but I have some stuff tomorrow so I stayed behind. I decided to make some jam and mustard today, so I made rhubarb strawberry with stuff from the freezer, a bourbon brown sugar mustard, and a swiss chard walnut pesto with swiss chard from the garden that we kept not using to cook with. The first two are canned and the pesto is in the freezer for the future. I also have a basil plant, so I might should make some traditional pesto this week as well!

I’m taking this upcoming week off from teaching to get ready for the fall. I think it’s important to have down time in order to recharge. We have a short airbnb trip planned for a couple nights, but otherwise I’m around, taking one more online course and catching up on things around the house.

Books, Random thoughts, Travel

Family Visit and such

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I was so busy telling you about our Arkansas Trip that I haven’t told you about our trip to visit family in Chautauqua, New York. My sister Leslie and her family own a house in Sherman, New York, which is near the Chautauqua Music Festival where her husband works in the summers. This is the third year in a row we’ve gone out to visit, and it was lovely.

I won’t do a play by play, but instead share some pictures and tell you a few things we did.

Walked around the grounds of the Chautauqua Institute–this is near the belltower.
Hiked down to the Chautauqua Gorge but it was too watery to go further, so we went back up and hiked along the Cusamano Trail instead for a few miles.

I believe this was at Long Point State Park, where we walked around a little bit.

Not pictured: Southern Tier Brewery Company–great place to have some beer and some food, nice patio.

Luca driving a wooden car around.

We didn’t go on the Chautauqua Belle, but maybe another time. We walked along the Lake aways from here, and then got ice cream nearby. We eat more ice cream while in Chautauqua than we do all year long!

The grounds of the Institute again, you can see the Bell Tower on the left.

Luca wearing cool sunglasses for the Fourth of July.

We walked around the Audubon Community Nature Center in Jamestown, NY and saw lots of birds and chipmunks.

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I taught Luca awhile back to show us his “bebo” or belly button and never tire of asking.

We also got ice cream at Bemus Point, had dinner at a place in Sherman called Pine Junction, lunch at Stedman Corners Cafe, and coffee and lunch at Crown Street Roasting Company. And we ate some delicious meals at “home” as well.

Leslie went above and beyond with this meal!

It was a week long trip, which was pretty long, but it was nice to spend time with the kids and just hang out and relax. There are always more things to do next time!

We stopped at Taco Johns on our way home!

Anyway, then we got back home to this…

What else have I been up to? We had our annual fireworks barbecue, which is a cookout we have the night of the Sublette Park/Hill fireworks. We weren’t sure if it was happening due to COVID, but it did, and it was small but fun. We’ve been eating out a bit more than before, though trying to keep cooking, so usually just once or twice a week. I’ve been keeping up on the garden and just pickled a whole bunch of green beans today, three jars from the garden! (I make dilly beans, which might be my favorite sort of pickle.)

I played an outdoor concert with Metropolitan Orchestra of St Louis, which was held in a parking lot…have I played a concert in a parking lot before? I want to say, yes, actually. I played a concert with my band as well, in a front yard as part of the Kingsbury Ensemble’s A Little Lawn Music.

That made for a busy weekend, so I was happy to have this weekend entirely off. I don’t have the energy I used to have…or the desire to run around as much. I have been trying to be mindful of that when accepting jobs for the fall, how much I teach now in addition to how much I do actually really enjoy having some downtime. I’m behind on gardening tasks anyway!

I’ve been doing a lot of reading of course, and thought I’d share some of what I’ve been reading lately for you to consider:

Books I really enjoyed: Caul Baby by Morgan Jerkins, Big Summer by Jennifer Weiner, American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins,, The Midnight Library by Matt Haig, The Red Lotus by Chris Bohjalian, These Tangled Vines by Julianne Maclean, Anxious People by Frederick Bachman, 28 Summers by Elin Hilderbrand, Nomadland by Jessica Bruder

Books I liked well enough: Ready Player Two by Ernest Cline, The Elephant of Belfast by S. Kirk Walsh, The Light in the Ruins by Chris Bohjalian, The Psychology of Time Travel by Kate Mascarenhas, Milk Fed by Melissa Broder, We Love You Charlie Freeman by Kaitlyn Greenidge

Cozy Mysteries I enjoyed: The Bennett Sisters Series by Lise McClendon

Nonfiction I found interesting: The Body, A Guide for Occupants by Bill Bryson, How to be a Victorian by Ruth Goodman

I know I didn’t give you any information about the books, but you can read a bit of them online 🙂

Anyway, we have some interesting plans coming up: biking tomorrow on the Katy Trail (at least that’s the plan), a camping trip to Hawn State Park, various family members visiting. We also bought tickets for Jazz and for the Symphony for the fall so that’s going to be different than this year! Work wise things are still pretty busy these next two weeks because I’m doing another online seminar (I am obsessed with learning right now) and teaching as well. I am taking a whole week off in August though, just to relax, and we are getting away for one more weekend before school starts up again. I don’t want to think about summer ending, but I know that life moves on…and I do love fall weather. I am hoping to get a better life-work balance going forward, though I know that is unlikely to happen while I have my early morning school job.

What have you been up to? Read any interesting books to share? Done any interesting things that you recommend to others?