The end of the school year is always busy with performances and such. I’ve had juries at two schools (don’t even ask), festival, the studio recital, school recitals, school concerts, and this weekend is graduation for Louie and we have people coming into town.

I am ready for some downtime and vacation. I’m worn out and exhausted! The good news is that the house is doing well and we are mostly just living in it. There is still more to do: mostly putting stuff on the walls, but we are unpacked, we have all the furniture and rugs we wanted to get, and we are finding where things work best to store and use them. It’s a delight living in this house, and it’s a delight teaching in this house. There are many things in my life that haven’t turned out the way I wanted, or perhaps as well as I wanted, but Louie and I are very happy together in our beautiful home.

Every time I come home I am so happy to be there. I love how our rugs and furniture turned out and I am so excited that we picked them out ourselves…Louie and I learned quite a bit about what our personal styles were through the process, something we had never really done before. Muriel approves of the rugs as well.

My parents visited last weekend. I realized I didn’t take any pictures, but my dad took a nice photo on his bike ride.

We had dinner with Louie’s parents, took many walks, had dinner out, went to a biergarten and enjoyed the outdoor weather, and they watched me play a solo with the St Louis Classical Guitar Orchestra and assisted with my studio recital. It was a great visit and I’m glad they were able to make it up here.

Playing a short piece with the Guitar Orchestra. It was a lot of fun and they were really nice.

A lovely gift from a student. The studio recital was terrific. We held it in Tower Grove Park at a pavilion and had a little reception afterwards as well. It wasn’t too long but everybody did well and it is always nice to get everybody together in one place for a bit.

Sometimes Miles and Muriel share the hammock. They spend HOURS a day on the cat tree looking out the window. I would too if I were them.

Peonies blooming in our yard.

I have to say, I’m feeling much better about the progress we’ve made on our move after having people over. I tend to be pretty hard on myself, but I realized, we moved in less than two months ago and basically are done (except for the walls) so, that’s actually pretty good. I tend to compare myself too negatively to others and have been trying to focus more on the positive. I feel good about what’s going forward with my career and jobs, and I’m looking forward to a summer filled with family visits, vacation, events, and relaxing, as well as teaching.

It’s easy to see what other freelance musicians are doing and feel jealous of them: I don’t sub with the symphony, I am part time in my jobs, I don’t have any really fancy titles, I don’t have any summer festivals I go to, etc. But I have what I have and nobody can do everything, nor should they! I try to remind myself to count my own blessings (cheesy, I know) and to not compare my inside to other people’s outside!

I keep thinking I’ll write here more often. Perhaps I will going forward, now that things are settling down. How is May going for you?