Well that long break was really unintentional :) We have just been sooo busy busy busy!! Phil's been working hard with tuning pianos, working at WIS, lessons, etc. etc, and I have been busy getting recitals ready and organizing the house and such. hah! We are ready for our 3 week break here after next week!! AHhhh!!! yay.

About a month ago we did a mass-cooking day where we prepared 12 meals ahead of time. Here is what one of the meals looked like:

 

We freezed them all and then on busy lesson days I just throw one in the crock pot. That way it's ready whenever, since we often have our breaks at different times. I have been leaving the crock-pot on in the laundry room.......because then the smell isn't so strong for the students in the rest of the house!! haha. But this has really saved us a lot of time lately and it's good because then we still have something yummy and nutritious we can eat for supper. We will probably do the mass cooking thing again over Christmas break.
This was a favorite moment of mine in November:

PUMPKIN PIE AT KEWPEE!!!!!!!!!!!

And this was an emotionally straining day (Blaze of lights day):

But it turned out GREAT for Kaylah I think. It just felt like pulling teeth trying to make it happen.

We had a super amazing Thanksgiving with lots of yummy food and awesome family! Got to eat 3 yummy meals this year!! hehehee!!

Welp, gotta get back to making the Christmas goodie-bags for the music students. The goodie-bags look like this:

Each bag probably cost us .30! LOL. They will get 3 packs of gum, some starbursts, a Christmas pencil, and a gummy thing. And a "joy" ornament. Hopefully they like it!!!!!!!!

YEEOCH, coupon experiment, and gifts!

Today the big heavy window upstairs SMASHED my wrist on its way down as we were trying to get the AC unit out. YEEEOCH. Then Phil made me move my wrist to see if it was broken. I guess it's not because it moves when I had to move it. It is still sore and all cut up but OH WELL :)

Well last week I tried a little experiment at Meijer (Because appaently I have nothing better to do than to coupon) ((Phil was away last week remember?)) Before coupons the total was $108 (ish) and after coupons, $54. This is what I got:

2 Digiorno pizzas, 2 ice creams, 10 yogurts, 8 microwave meals,a cat toy, 2 things of cat treats, 2 scalloped potatoes, frozen lemon ice stuff, rice, 4 caisters of pillsbury rolls, 11 things of shampoo/hair stuff, 2 always, 6 air freshner things.

SO WAS IT WORTH IT????? I don't really know but I do know it was a lot of fun at the cash register watching my total go down, down, down. haha! So I will probably try it again sometime. So I made myself this awesome coupon binder:

*Disclaimer to family members* I am not in dire need financially to use coupons, just kind of did this as a personal challenge :) *

Here's what one of our awesome piano families gave me last week since they knew I was going to be home all by myself (well and the cats to keep me company):

Yes that is a giant tub of Edy's ice cream. THEY ARE AWESOME!!! And must know me pretty well :)

Some improvements from this week

I am so happy...Phil put up a 2nd rod for our curtains!!

So now you can move the curtains in front separately from the one in the back...Phew! much easier.

 

He also put up a nice little hook-thing for my purses. That's much better now (they were just on the floor of the closet)

 

He also got the bathroom drain fixed. WOW!

And I organized drawers.

 

WOW exciting huh??!? 

 

Be Merry! Merry, I say! Aye, anon, and alas (and all that good stuff)!

Dost thou comprehend mien ancient discourse? Art thou agog towards my conversation? How beist it so, that to render the conscience unravelled, doth it?

(whew.... I think they have to keep phrasebooks with them to keep that up.)

It's Phil this tme. We went to the Renaissance Festival which was not too far from Cedarville, and that was quite the enjoyable experience!

There were many people dressed in costume for the occasion, and sometimes we got to hear people talk in Ye Olde Englishe as they would have. The picture there only gives a small glimpe of what the whole thing looked like -- It was remarkably larger than I expected! Many castle or cottage- themed buildings all around with vendors of all types, including a plethora of clothing-- er, "vestments," jewelry, accessories, staffs and other magical walking sticks, and (of course) armories. Yes, swords, battle axes, knives, etc. (pretty sure I saw a mace there as well.)

There were some live shows that we saw, one of them being a comedy/stunt pair which did tricks like standing on stacked chairs, whips, hula hoops, and fire. lots of fire. Also included audience participation, and it wasn't just "here hold this" but it made you a little nervous! I think a good show like that should make you a little nervous - keeps it exciting.


They had some good eats there too. One we tried was a caramel apple with a green apple bathed -- nay, drenched-- in caramel. She claims it to be the absolute best caramel in her experience! Then, there was the famous turkey leg. This thing was as big as it looks.

MMMMMMMm, love that red meat!

The village has been doing severl different themes from week to week, and the theme when we went was Irish-Scottish themed, complete with bagpipes and kilts. Aye ye lads and lasses, ne'er was there such a manly sight as a pair of strengthly legs in that noblest of garments, the kilt!

 
Behind her (I didn't get a good shot of it) is an old fashioned thrill ride; a manually powered dragon swing in the fashion of Cedar Point's pirate ship thingie that swings back and forth really high. Except without powered aceleration, good ol' fashioned elbow grease is what powers that ride.







After chowing our turkey leg and wandering through the rest of the village, we declared it a successful and enjoyable visit, coming full circle towards the entrance. The parking kinda was like Cedar Point - lots and lots of cars. (But no Snoopy characters on light poles to help you out.)

We enjoyed a scenic drive both to and from the fair, taking in the fall colors of early October. We drove to Cedarville to hang out and have dinner with Joel! He's so famous. Everyone says hi to him.

Cedarville dining was very nice - I'm sure I could enjoy having it for four years! We asked each other if we had the chance to get another degree, what would we get. Joel answered that he would get a teaching degree. I said I'd enjoy getting a degree in composition & music technolgy. (we can't remember what Krysti wanted to do because she has too many interests to narrow them down to just 4 years!)

The last thing we did before coming home was going to a nature trail which led to an ancient Native American mound. It was rather tall, most of the way up th surrounding trees. Joel said he's played really intense King of the Hill in winter there, which would be incredibly difficult with snow and that steep uphill climb. It was fun, but the sun likes to go to sleep so we decided we should go home and do the same.

A good day. And good night! (or rather, "Good Eve', sirs and madams!")

Dig it up!

This week we decided to try tackling the weed jungle in back of the garage. We already lopped off some big trees that were growing up and now we're just trying to get everything else out of there. We've been burning up some of it in our campfire and just trashing the rest. We have a long way to go but here's a little clear patch of hope!

Now what should we do with it once it's all just dirt?? 

In the process of digging, so far Phil has found a couple flagstone pieces, a broken plastic toy gun, and some sort of pottery/ceramic 'thingy'. What else will we find?!??!

Awwwwweee...isn't my kitty CUTE....

Good-nite!!!!purrrrr

Annnnd, we're off!

We have had a busy and exciting start to the school year! With students coming back for lessons our schedule is full and we are starting to get into the routine of lessons. I (Krysti here) teach Mon-Thurs. 3:30 till 8:30 or 9ish, Wednesday starts earlier at 12:30, Thursday I have morning students, and Friday is just 3:15-6:15ish. Saturday a.m. 8:30-11. How many hours is that total..I don't want to think about it. Besides that I have been trying to organize our studio "systems". Getting everybody's birthday date figured out, putting it into excel. Putting September birthday's gifts together. Getting everybody's picture and putting them on our wall. Double checking everybody's on our email list who is supposed to be. Making sure everybody reads, signs, and returns our updated studio policy. Trying to make payments as easy and clear as possible. Trying to make everybody happy, happy, happy, happy. Replying to emails, calling new student inquiries. Playing new music books. Ordering new music. Keeping track of who bought music. Sending out invoices to people who have overdue payments. Scheduling Christmas recital dates, times, and venues. Researching student's pieces. Getting prize week ready. Fielding calls from people asking about where they can find a piano bench and can you tell me about my fiddle, and will you buy my organ? Coordinating rooms with the other teachers. Attempting to finalize the master schedule. Trying not to roll my eyes when a student who has been taking lessons for nearly 2 years JUST got a keyboard a couple weeks ago but does not have it set up yet. (REALLY??!??!). LOL. However, I am now going to attempt to take this teacher's sentiment about this type of family coming to lessons.

Phil has been busy as well with "WIS". I think I have been having more fun than him actually, organizing 'everything'. He's beeen tuning, teaching, stubsta-tooting, etc. etc. etc. BuSy BeAvErS!

In other news, I don't understand how anybody couldn't love cats. They are just so adorable. They purrrrrr and make biscuits on your legs and cuddle by you to keep you company. And they eat beef jerky, pumpkin, and pineapple. Or at least Whitney does. And Everett talks to me. Or rather, cat-er-walls at me.

This is what happens when you leave a drawer open in our house and it's sunny there.

purrrrrrr

Waiting Room Renovations

Today I thought I would show you our exciting waiting room renovation project.
Here are the before pictures, which shows kind of just a conglomeration of what we had already:

 

 

- (*just tilt your head to the left.-*( notice brownish yellow foor

 For the floors, we picked out a remnant carpet that they had uptown, and picked out the bathroom flooring. Then of course the paint....

 

Then we had to do some demolition. Cody helped with that.

 

And then the place REALLY looked...intresting...

 

but then we started painting, the flooring went in the next day, I painted some chairs, Phil painted some cabinets, we painted the doors, and voila!

The updated waiting room:

Thanks Joel for the help with the records!!

And the bathroom update:

 

 And Just for fun a before and after pic together....

 

Ahhh....I think it's better...what do you think???