What a week this has been. We really don't have any big news to report but it seems like Christmas was so long ago that I felt like we needed a new entry.
Caitlin left on Wednesday to head back to Logan. It was very sad to see her go but she felt like it was time. She enjoyed being here seeing family and friends but as she said she has her life there now too. She has spent the last few days hanging out with friends and today she is getting ready for the first day of the new semester. She thinks her hardest class will be an English Language Learners class which is a 400 level class. It is 2 1/2 hrs. long and she is a little concerned being a freshman in a sr level class but she has had enough spanish that it really shouldn't be too bad - at least that is what we are hoping.
Not much going on with the boys. Anthony started with a new guitar teacher this past week. I think he will be a better teacher (one who doesn't spend 1/2 the lesson playing his own music), however Anthony is a little frustrated because this teacher wants him to hold the pick differently. I guess it feels unnatural. This teacher goes more out of the book and doesn't want to see Anthony writing the name of the chord above the notes. Which is the way it should be but hard when that isn't the way he has been doing it for the last 4 months.
We got Adrian a new bed today. He was deteremined to put it together on his own. Gary did have to help him get started but otherwise he did a lot of the work. It looks really nice in his room and I think he is pleased with it. The problem was that the memory foam pad he got for Christmas made his bed to tall. We took the box springs off the frame he had and it helped but I didn't want the box springs laying under his bed for who knows how many years. With this new bed we can have both mattresses and his new pad and there is still plenty of room on the headboard.
Gary is still hanging in there with work. It is a day by day thing - some days are better than others. He spent part of this afternoon putting a windshield wiper that he got for Christmas on the boat. I think it is more for looks than anything. We don't usually tend to be on the lake when rain comes in because the water gets to rough. I'm sure the boys will be more than willing to throw some water at the windshield to make sure the wiper works.
I am still trying to recover from this pneumonia. It seems to be taking FOREVER! I figured the other day I have had 4 dr. visits, 2 antibiotics, an inhaler, a chest xray, and now I am on muscle relaxants and anti-inflamatory drugs. I was feeling much better after I started the muscle relaxants but then I went shopping yesterday and didn't take anyting till I got home (they tend to make me pretty tired & loopy) and my chest has been bothering me again every since. I feel like if I do anything other than sit on my hind end I can't catch a break. Plus if the pain comes back I will need to go in for a chest cat scan to make sure I dont' have a clot. I really don't want to do that. It all has been very frustrating this time around. I am really thinking I need to get the pneumonia & flu shot this year but the problem is even then it is still no guarantee.
Anyhow that is enough about our lives. I hope everyone is doing well and is healthy!
1 comment:
Here's an idea for Anthony to try remembering chords (it'll take some committment at home to do): He looks at the notes that make up a chord on the sheet music, and figures out what chord it is. Then he looks up and to the right and visualizes the notes with the chord name written above it. Then he looks up and to the left and visuallizes the same thing. He keeps repeating until the visualization is as clear on the left as it is on the right. Then he moves onto the next chord he wants to memorize the note position for. What this does is puts the notes and chord name directly into his memory, so that when he looks at the notes, the chord name for that sequence of notes is stored in his brain. Looking to the right accesses the part of the brain that constucts images and thoughts, and looking to the left accesses the part of the brain that stores memory, so it's a really quick way to learn and memorize. I took a class from a phsycologist who specializes in self improvement the last two days, and this was an exercise he had us do to improve memory. He told us a story of using this exact exercise helping an opera singer memorize the music and words for an entire opera in two days. It worked really quickly to memorize lines of text in the class during the exercises we did. If he's interested in it and my explanation isn't clear he can call me and I'll explain it to him better. Hope you start feeling better soon.
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