Category Archives: Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving Break

November 29, 2020 hannahviolin

I still have the rest of today, but it has been a wonderful and refreshing Thanksgiving Break.

One week ago today I had an online recital for my students and they were awesome. I was so proud of them for continuing to rise to the occasion.

Then I took off private teaching all week, which was a fantastic decision. I had a few things to do work-wise but I got to have my afternoons and evenings free AND I got a break from hearing violin over the computer. It was absolutely the best thing for me.

I did a few new to me things over the week, one of which was taking a short online workshop on “self-care for creative types.” It was amazing. I had forgotten to think about what I actually enjoyed doing as I have been so focused on “getting through the pandemic” and “keeping my students happy and challenged”. So I spent Tuesday after the workshop doing some brainstorming and starting to work through a book I’d bought a few years ago but never used called “Your Best Year Yet!”.

Wednesday was lovely as I was able to sleep in a bit, exercise at my leisure, and spend some time cooking. For Thanksgiving I ended up making a cranberry-rhubarb sauce (which was delicious, absolutely delicious) with some rhubarb I had in the freezer, and Smitten Kitchen’s Corn Pudding, which was good but drier than I like (Louie absolutely adored it.) I picked up bread and rolls at Union Loafers and Louie picked up our dinner for the next day from Treehouse, a vegan restaurant we really like. (We decided not to eat a real turkey this Thanksgiving.) That night we went to the Garden Glow at the Botanical Gardens—it’s a light event they do every Thanksgiving through the New Year, and I’d thought of trying to go many years but we never did. This time the weather suddenly looked okay and I snapped up the last few tickets for the night. The crowds were capped at 25 percent of the original capacity, and it felt fine walking around with people wearing their masks and lots of space.

Thursday morning I made an egg and potato casserole to go with one of the breads and then we met up with some of Louie’s colleagues (when you work at a college, you end up being invited to do things on Thanksgiving day!) and we took a nice long (masked) walk in Forest Park.

After that we popped over to his mom’s house and visited on their porch for a bit and had some tea, before heading home to relax. We had some appetizers his mom had given up (prosecco, caviar and blinis!) and then after a few hours, started heating up our Thanksgiving dinner. Dinner was a delicious and we were pretty stuffed afterwards. We watched TV for a bit, and then managed some dessert as well.

Friday we went to Rockwoods Reservation and hiked the Lime Kiln Trail to another trail and then across the road to the Rock Quarry Trail for a little over 5 miles. It was the most crowded we had ever seen it there and that didn’t surprised me as it was a gorgeous day outside! Louie had some work to do after that so we went home. I got all of my holiday decorations out and started putting up the tree. The cats really loved having a tree inside to climb, and I guess I am just fine with that. At night we had Thanksgiving Take 2 and it was just as good as Take 1.

Saturday was an entire day spent at home, and it was glorious. I was able to again sleep in a bit, exercise, and finish decorating the tree—I ran out of hooks before I was done, so I’ll finish the rest in a few days after I get some more hooks. My trick with cats is to not put up my most breakable ornaments, and otherwise to shrug and laugh. The tree seems sturdy enough for them to climb up without it falling over. We put it in a slightly more central location than previous years since I won’t have any students coming and going, which meant I ended up being short on ornaments—I was used to having one side against the wall! I also went ahead and worked on Christmas cards and got those mostly done. I’m still collecting addresses and don’t plan to send them for another week or two. We had Thanksgiving for the third time for dinner and managed to finally finish off a few of the dishes. There’s still corn pudding, salad, and cranberry sauces left, but otherwise we did a good job.

And that brings us to now. I ended up waking up quite early, so I’ve already done quite a few things…I actually have realized it’s nice to be awake as the sun comes up since it sets so early (4:41 today, for instance). I thought having a teaching job where I had to get up so early would be a terrible thing, and while it’s awfully hard some mornings, it has been kind of fun. I’m trying to focus on the good things, and on some of the ideas that were brought up in the Best Year Yet book and the Self-Care workshop and between that and you know, a vacation, I’m feeling much more like myself than I had in awhile: more focused, relaxed, and enjoying life. This pandemic is still hard, and I believe some of the worst is yet to come, but we will (hopefully) weather the storm…

Back to work tomorrow for just over 3 weeks…

Performing, Thanksgiving

Nearly Thanksgiving Break

November 26, 2019 hannahviolin

You guys! It’s Tuesday, and I am nearly on vacation for three days. It will be glorious.

Well, it will be busy. I have some work to do around the house, getting some areas organized. This is a constant battle, mostly because when I moved into this house it could have been on hoarders…I say that will all due respect to Louie…and then I brought my stuff too. And both of us like to have our things, and Louie is one of those never throw something away because it might be useful people, and I enjoy saving paper things…and we both have a lot of books. I do try to cull and give things away, but the reality is: I can only give away my things and I can’t decide what of his things to give away, and this can cause issues, because there are areas of the house that are his things. I’m not trying to air our dirty laundry on the blog, but just to say: you can’t Kon Mari somebody else’s stuff. And when that person works full time and goes to grad school, time is a premium.

But I’m hopeful to get a few more things gotten rid of over the break. I have a list and a plan of attack. I’m also hoping to do some holiday baking (cookies and breads), get some good exercise and get outside, watch a few tv programs, and finish at least one of my cross stitch projects. Oh, and decorate for Christmas! This is likely too much to fit into three days, but I’ll try. Three days, you ask? Why, don’t you have 3 days, plus the weekend? HAHAHA you must be new here. I don’t have weekends off, I’m a musician! I work again starting Saturday noon, and then until Christmas. Not constantly, of course, as college is winding down and therefore I have much more time during some days than before. Oh, I love the holidays though…I love baking, and I love having a fat bank account from all the gigs. And I got all new wrapping paper this year: I’d forgotten until recently that some of my old wrapping paper got wet in the sewer backup in the spring and it was for the best—that stuff was too thin anyway. I splurged and got some thicker paper.

Last weekend was a lot of fun. I played two shows for Mannheim Steamroller on Saturday, really getting into the Christmas spirit. It’s a little early still, even though everybody is going crazy and decorating—for me the Christmas season officially starts after Thanksgiving and not before, though if I have to play some music before, fine. I just feel like if the festivities start taking up too much of the year, then it isn’t special enough when it does get here. This is not to say I haven’t spent the past few months planning for Christmas: planning and actually decorating/celebrating are entirely different.

Sunday Louie and I got up early to run the Hot Chocolate 5k in Forest Park. It was fun, but I was disappointed in my time. I will just have to keep at it and get faster! (I have been running more regularly only since May of this year, and one goal for next year is to keep at it.) I was annoyed by the crowds of walkers and those who enjoy walking in horizontal lines 3 or 4 across…even as we approached the finish line and the road was narrower!

After the race I didn’t have too much time to relax as then it was Studio Recital time. I had 18 students play on this one and it was a great success. I suppose I might try to hire a pianist for the next one, as some of the parents ask about that. Others are perfectly happy to have less to worry about, which is why I don’t bother! I play a lot of duets with them in the lessons, but for the recitals, with a few exceptions, I tend to let the kids stand alone. They were mostly Suzuki book 1 to 3 level, with a few in 4 and 5 (and a few O’Connor tunes) in case you are a teacher reading this. Oh, and I have one viola student, who played a book 5 level piece as well. I do have a few more advanced students, but I didn’t get any of my high schoolers on this recital…they are just too busy, and I don’t require recital attendance though I strongly recommend it.

And then yesterday I was at my one college all day, and had a string ensemble concert at night. I coach the string ensemble class there, and this semester has been challenging. They managed to pull off a decent performance, but it wasn’t what I’d hoped for the semester. It’s a small class, and when one student doesn’t pull their weight it brings everybody down, and we had some attendance issues. But nonetheless I was pleased, and they did something hard! To me this is the essence of performing when younger, to push yourself to do something hard that you might be dreading…it makes you so much stronger! As I get older the more I realize that such struggles as a younger person are so important…it’s a balance between pushing them to challenge themselves and setting them up for failure though. Oh and sometimes they enjoy performing and realize it can be fun, or they love the accolades after, and those are the ones that really get into music.

What are your Thanksgiving plans? Are you going to be Black Friday shopping?

Thanksgiving

End of Vacation

November 26, 2017 hannahviolin 2 Comments

Okay, so technically my vacation ended yesterday morning, when I went back to work. But I had off this afternoon and evening and I ran errands (target-Christmas décor, toiletries, etc), did some baking (morning glory muffins and pumpkin bread), some meal prep for the week ahead (pasta, quinoa), laundry, and oh…now I’m exhausted just reading about it all. I should have been like, reading and relaxing. Maybe I can do that next!

Tomorrow starts a two week stretch of what is looking to be somehow the busiest two weeks of the year. Let’s take my normal teaching schedule, stop it at 6:30 but move some people earlier, and then add a Broadway show every night and four on the weekend, plus two church services. And voila, you have a ridiculous schedule, BUT one that I’m really looking forward to. I had a blast playing a Broadway show last year, and I’m excited to be in the pit for the King and I. After that it’s only one more really busy week, one week finishing up, and then…TWO weeks of vacation. Two glorious weeks.

But my house looks awesome. I’m thrilled I got the place decorated for Christmas this year.

Thanksgiving went well. My two pies were a giant success, and I wish I could eat pie every day. Yes, my crusts are ugly. If I made pie more often I’m sure I’d be better at them, but I have enough problems with my weight!

Everybody seemed to love both pies though. Should I share the recipes? Is anybody reading?

Thanksgiving plate and a terrible picture of the table…

We went for a walk in the afternoon on Thanksgiving day—over to Forest Park and by the ice rink, where there was a giant snow pile.

Christmas decorations. I finally decorated with a tree for the first time since my divorce. I’d always had a tree since I graduated from school, but then the first year on my own I didn’t bother, and then Louie had never done one, so he didn’t care at all…and a few years went by. This year I got in the holiday spirit early with a Messiah gig and I said, you know what, I’m doing it. I got a new artificial tree (I actually love them, plus since I’m traveling over the actual holiday it’s just way easier to deal with) and found all my ornament and decoration boxes, and boom! The tree arrived Wed, and then I woke up Friday morning and decorated it, and now we (and all my students!) will enjoy it all month long.

It’s weird…for the first while after my divorce I felt like nothing in life was quite real or permanent, but now I feel grounded, like I know where my life is going, and I’m happy with it, and I’m busy working and loving it, and I have so much Christmas stuff happening, and I’m just really in the right mood. I feel happiest when I’m on the busier side, even though I cherish downtime…and being so busy just feels more festive somehow. It’s also been challenging working through everything with Louie and making our holiday traditions work together, and all of that baggage that comes with dating somebody who already had decades of life without you. It’s not easy, but it’s well worth it, and I’m so thankful for him. And though he doesn’t care as much about the tree, he thinks it’s fun and he sees that it brings me joy.

We’re giving this guy back tonight sometime. It’s been fun having an extra dog around.

Both are named Louie.

So there you have it, some serious thoughts, some fun thoughts. Oh, and I did this yesterday…so much fun!

It’s weird, being a freelance musician. You want to talk about work, but sometimes it feels weird or awkward. ESPECIALLY on social media, because you don’t want to be bragging or making people jealous, but I like to share what my life is like. So many people look down on freelance musicians, teachers, musicians in general, and I sometimes let that bother me, but the truth is, I kind of love what I do. My students are generally awesome people (and often hilarious), I work with other great musicians (especially with the quartet, but across the board), and I get to do all kinds of different things in my day to day life. It’s a struggle sometimes, the schedule, the sheer amount of things to do, keeping track of expenses and deductions and accounts, keeping up on practicing, BUT it’s worth it overall. At least I try to convince myself of that Winking smile

Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving

November 23, 2017 hannahviolin

I’m in between making pies right now—chocolate bourbon pecan is in the oven, and then I’ll make the old fashioned cream.

I’d offered to bring pie to Thanksgiving dinner at Louie’s mom’s, mostly because I love pie. I figured since Louie’s brother is vegan I’d try to make a vegan thing too, and picked out an amazing looking pumpkin cheesecake. I finished teaching last night around 6 and started working on it, because it was a bit involved—lots of food processing and blending of cashews, pecans, tofu, etc. We even made the marble effect, and then starting baking it. I’m not sure if my oven is a little cool—I usually think it is, but then I worry, so I didn’t turn it up. It seemed to need more time in the oven, so I kept checking it every 5 minutes, and gently jiggling it to check texture. I took it out another time…and somehow the bottom of the pan popped up and the whole thing fell out onto the oven door…

After quite a lot of tears and self loathing, Louie helped me clean it up, we tried a little bit (verdict, might have been better if cooked all the way) and then decided that one less dessert on Thanksgiving was okay.

So that’s how my vacation is going so far! I have today and tomorrow off work, and I swear I’m not going to answer work emails (the good thing is that on holidays you get less, but the bad thing is that I was already behind so there are a few burning holes in my email inbox), practice (except I agreed to play a gig Sunday morning that has two rather challenging pieces, somehow!) or even think about work (ha!, that was a joke).

Here’s a few snippets from the past week:

Had a really good quartet concert—played Mendelssohn and Onslow and it was great. The venue was really nice too, and we’re hoping to play again there (a local church, Bethel Lutheran).

I also had a few students play in the SLAMTA (music teacher’s association) playathon at the Galleria Mall. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but the kids had a great time and I always enjoy activities that build community and encourage practicing.

I got a review published in the American Music Teacher! And we are dogsitting for my friend Jen’s dog Louie. He’s a hilarious little guy, who was afraid to go downstairs, though last night he finally did, which was awesome. It’s important to know my kitchen is downstairs, and that’s where the dogs are fed, so we had to carry him down the stairs many times, and he hated this. (Never mind that when he got there he got food, he still hated it and was terrified.)

And yesterday we took both dogs on a little hike at Forest 44 Conservation area. It isn’t a terribly scenic place to hike but it’s easy to get to, not too crowded, and you still get into the woods and get fresh air away from the city, so it’s a favorite of ours.

So: coming up, playing for Mannheim Steamroller, playing two weeks of the King and I at the Fox Theatre, various Christmas gigs, lessons, juries, end of semester grading (I actually have papers to grade for one job!) and then it’ll be Christmas vacation. I’ll have two actual weeks off, well, almost, from December 25 to January 7, no work at all other than some practice, likely. That doesn’t count as work, even though it is, somehow.

I’d better check on my pie. Right now my dessert making is 0 for 1. Hoping to make it 2 for 3 by noon.

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope you have a wonderful time celebrating with your friends and family and loved ones, and I hope some of those categories overlap.

Thanksgiving, Travel

Thanksgiving Travels

November 29, 2015 hannahviolin 1 Comment

How was your Thanksgiving? Did you have a wonderful meal with friends and family?

Louie and I headed to visit my grandmother, my parents, and other various and sundry relatives in NW Ohio. It was about a 7 hour drive each way, and we stayed for two nights. We had Thanksgiving dinner and a birthday party in honor of my grandmother’s 90th birthday.

I often forget how beautiful it is where my family lives. My dad grew up there also…it’s farm land, small town, but very beautiful, especially on the land where my grandparents lived for years, because they worked hard to make it so.

Anyway, dinner was delicious. Salad and rolls to start, turkey, mashed potatoes/gravy, stuffing, corn, sweet potatoes, and baked apples. For dessert we had pumpkin, mincemeat, or pecan pie. I had mincemeat which is my favorite, and also some of Louie’s pumpkin, and a bite of pecan too. My relatives are great hosts!

The nice weather only lasted one day—the second day we were there it rained the entire time. Boo.

We took pictures of the cousins who were there, plus a picture with significant others.

I should have taken more pictures, but the rest that I had turned out pretty horrible! Lots of pictures with eyes shut or blurry. Maybe my mom got some better ones Smile

This was at breakfast in the hotel. We stayed at the Heritage Inn in Archbold, Ohio and one of the defining features is a giant fake tree in the breakfast area.

Anyway, today I’ve been puttering around the house, catching up on email and calendar scheduling (constant!), running various errands, and generally getting ready for the next few weeks. It’s been nice to have a day to get ready—I hate traveling and getting back at the last minute. I think that’s one of the things that made November hard was having a trip and not being able to have a day to recover. Or maybe I’m just a bit lame?

All my relatives seem to think I work too hard. I think people imagine violin teachers as people who teach a few hours a day, handing out candy while covered in cat hair. The reality is that if you want to make a decent income you have to really hustle and cram those students in! There is only so much time each day that people can come for lessons (unless they are home schooled, retired, or have flexible work schedules) so it means eating dinner late and working into the evenings. And I don’t think I work too hard…or if I do, at least Louie works hard too. We aren’t the sort of people to sit around, and I want to be making a difference in the world..and be making a decent living teaching violin!

I’m trying something new this week and scheduling some tasks that I normally do unscheduled. I’ve been reading Gretchen Rubin’s Better Than Before (I finished Happier at Home recently too) and got some ideas about how to improve my life. Sometimes I will sit down at the computer to send some emails and before I know it several hours have passed. I’m going to try to have specific wake up and get to work times, and really make sure I’m using my time wisely. The goal is to have free time where I am truly free rather than constantly working or feeling like I should. Self-employment is not for the faint of heart.

The other thing people always suggest is to check email less often. I did set my phone so that it only pulls email every hour. I wonder if looking at email less often truly does save time? Will people just call instead (this is absolutely what I don’t want, nothing takes more time than phone calls, or causes me more stress) if I don’t respond to emails quickly? I would probably prefer texts in some cases, but emails are often easier to keep track of. Anybody have thoughts?

I’m off to practice for a bit before dinner now. I read a friend’s facebook status recently that referred to his violin practice, and I’ve been thinking about that lately…practice as a constant, something you do, rather than practice as something result-oriented. I should go more into depth with that thought in a future blog post!

Food, Phoenix, Thanksgiving

Vacation Recap

December 2, 2013 hannahviolin 4 Comments

Oh hey there.

So, I’m back to work and all, after being gone for a lovely part of a week in Phoenix visiting my sister Leslie and her husband Peter.

If there’s a suitcase, it must be filled with cats.

They live next door to this big pile of dirt.

I went for a run and took a picture. I look like a sparkly vampire, don’t I. Note the palm tree in the background. I couldn’t find the beach though.

The first morning I woke up and this stuffed monkey was outside my door. I’m not sure whether it was a gift or a threat.

I need this print for my house too.

Peter and the cats hanging on the couch.

Albergo and Catalunya like to help each other clean and groom. It’s adorable.

Leslie made the crusts. I think she was possessed.

We did some serious baking. Chocolate Bourbon Pecan Pie.

Dutch Apple Pie and Pumpkin Gooey Butter Cake.

Martha Stewart’s Mac and Cheese. I stirred the bechamel sauce for over 20 minutes waiting for it to thicken. Tears were welling in my eyes, but it did finally thicken and tasted AMAZING.

We did some serious wine drinking. That giant bottle was a housewarming gift that they saved to serve at Thanksgiving. I can’t tell if the picture is blurry or if the effects of the wine have yet to wear off.

Lots of food was made, brought, and eaten. It was a wonderful day.

A few days before Thanksgiving we had lunch with the Boring Runner. It was delightful, and I’m glad I finally got to meet him after reading his blog for years.

Naturally we had to take photos. We all wore blue so we’d look good in the photos.

Why yes, my head IS bigger than everybody elses. And I was looking at a different camera, apparently.

This is my laugh or my “I’m poopin” face.

After our blogger lunch Leslie and I decided we had to get fro yo to really feel like bloggers. Then again she’s absolutely NOT a blogger, but I like to pretend I am. It’s weird that we sat outside to eat eggnog fro-yo in November, but that’s Phoenix for ya.