Soaring and Stillness: Life with the Chickadees

My Little Joy feels music deeply. As a baby she would often sing what she was saying instead of actually speaking it. When we purchased a piano for the chicks and began lessons two years ago, little did we know where music would transport her. Our Grace Girl plays because it is required. She enjoys the keys and fingering and sound. But ...she would rather be twirling. For Little Bit, it's an entirely different ball game. Yes, she adores and chases in her leaping sister's footsteps, but her heart is equally attached to the ivories. Two weeks ago she picked up "Fur Elise" and played it perfectly in her first sitting. No joke . I recorded it for posterity and for her teacher. She's since memorized it and has added some of her own flair.

"A dream doesn't become reality through magic; it takes sweat, determination and hard work." -Colin Powell We've always taught the chicks that anything worth going after takes effort.  Sweat Determination Hard Work We spend hours a day schooling and just as many dancing. We believe that education comes second to faith and family, and the girls know that we expect the same effort in school that they put forth on the wooden floors. We're not the homeschoolers who do a little school and a whole lot of everything else. It's college prep curriculum in the nest. Both girls are incredibly high achievers who excel in their studies and work above grade level. We don't twirl until the equations are finished and the Latin is memorized. I loved  to learn. I still do.  I want them to hunger for it in the same way and work to instill it in those sweet little bodies. Our Little Bit fully embraces this philosophy. She wakes early and eagerly...

In the days before Little Bit joined our world, I was the queen  of moment capturing, printing, dating and filing. The pre-digital camera days were full of snapping shots on 800 speed film with our 35mm Minolta from every angle.  As soon as the last image was taken I'd rush out to the Exchange  we were military during those years  and immediately have the film developed. When it returned, I'd promptly pick it up and meticulously caption and date the back of each picture, which would then be lovingly and immediately put into the next slot in the book.  If I had a title for those years, it would be, "I dreamed of scrapping"...mostly because I planned on creating masterpieces with the images as soon as my Grace Girl went to school for a few hours a day. Ha Ha Ha....this is me laughing at my decade ago self. I had such big dreams. In late 2003 all of the organizational photo beauty ended. It mimicked those scenes in the movies where the main chara...

Hi Friends, I've switched up the comments to Disqus in an effort to answer you all more quickly.  Blogger was good enough to save the originals. Yet, for the life of me, I've yet to figure out how to answer them from the dashboard. Sigh. With all of that said, is there anything special you'd like to see here on the blog that I can tweak with design? I would like to make this more user friendly for you, so comments are appreciated and will be taken under advisement. Oh, and for someone who is tech savy, could you tell me how to post a blog to twitter so it shows up as a bit  or something of the like? My skills lie in teaching intranstive verb forms and trichotomy these days (for our 7th grader) along with latin and long division (for our sweet 3rd grader). The joys of homeschooling are that you recall the learning of your youth without moving forward into tech savy-ness. Off to finish piano theory with my little...we're studying transposition!

It was my intention to do a wordless Wednesday, but the computer got wacky and wouldn't process. ARGH. After a night off, it seems as if things are moving in the processor department again. Here's Little Bit's memory verse for the week...I'm taking it to heart as well. So thankful we don't walk this road alone.