Busy, Busy, Busy!

I'm super pumped that this time next week I'll be back in Atlanta and will have been to Columbia, SC for the first time since late July! Also I'll get to be home for my mom's birthday!

Last weekend, Andrew and I went to Fargo-Moorehead for Concordia College Flute Day. It was a really great masterclass with Emily Butterfield who is the flute professor at Central Oklahoma which is not too far from where we will be next year. I really enjoyed her teaching style, also she knew Jennifer, my flute teacher from USC. It was great to make contact with her and next year I'll try to get a few lessons with her and I want to be involved in the Oklahoma Flute Society since we'll be pretty close.

After the masterclass we went to J.L. Beers for lunch which is one of those Fargo places people say you should go. It was delish! It's a tiny place with table seating for like 12 and then bar seating. They specialize in beers and burgers. They even had root beer on tap! I dislike root beer but Andrew had some and really enjoyed it. The burgers were excellent. Highly recommend.

Next, we went to the Fargo theater to see the Grand Budapest Hotel which was excellent! We both really enjoyed it. We love the Fargo theater. They usually have something we'd like to see on their main screen and it's just fun to go to the art house movie places. We really miss the Nick in Columbia.

For dinner we tried the Vinyl Taco (conveniently right next to J.L. Beers) and it was excellent! I'm a sangria fan and they always have it so that was enjoyable. The concept of the Vinyl Taco is they play vinyl records behind the bar and have upscale tacos. The tacos were awesome! Also so was the queso. Liquid cheese is kind of my jam.

So while we were in Fargo we noticed that the wind was really picking up. Like we had some trouble walking into the Caribou for our trip home caffeine because the wind was so high up. It was like 45 miles per hour. Ridiculous.

Well, the wind was bringing in our Monday blizzard. We've had blizzards since we've been here but not with the snow. Technically when the wind reaches a certain speed it counts as a blizzard. Anyways, it was kind of frustrating for a few reasons: it was March 31 (so seriously?), the snow had all melted previously and I was becoming familiar with the ground again, and it messed up all of the schedules for the rest of the week. It was supposed to start snowing on Sunday night but it didn't really come until Monday morning and it's a good thing Andrew just didn't go in because by 10:30 the visibility was way down. By noon we had a hard time seeing the house across the street. It's just strange when the snow is blowing up and falling all at the same time.

Tuesday we both had a delay so they could work on clearing the snow and I'm glad La Fawnduh still has her snow tires! Then Thursday it snowed all day. April 3rd. Snow all day. I was depressed, but not really because I had my second program on April 3!

My Kindergarten, First, and Second grade program was originally supposed to be on April 1st but about two weeks ago we learned the circus was going to be in town on that day so we moved it. I'm glad too, more time to work with them and with the blizzard the day before some of the kids who live out of town may not have made it!

The kids were super cute and did a great job! It ended up being longer than I thought... We did Alphabop, a John Jacobson creation, and there is a song for each letter of the Alphabet plus and opening song so there were 27 songs. Each was short, but still. The kids were troopers. Each grade didn't sing them all together but they did good with like sitting still and such. I only had a few kindergarteners leave to go to the bathroom and at the end one little boy just sat down on the floor and took his socks and shoes off. I mean, when you're over it, you're over it. It happens. I'm super proud of them and thankful their teachers (and student teachers) are extremely helpful because I couldn't corral those kids on my own! Also, the kindergarten teacher decorated the cart my computer sat on during the program and gave me some beautiful flowers! It was just so thoughtful. I'm quite lucky to have been able to start here at Washington School.

This week the kindergarten classes I teach at Roosevelt will be performing in Hats! on Monday evening with the first graders. They will be super presh and I can't get the songs out of my head, so catchy! Then Tuesday the classes I help with at Lincoln have their program, Baby Beluga, it's all Raffy songs and also adorable. I can't stop hearing Baby Beluga either. I just kind of sing it constantly. The whales are after me.

So right now Andrew and I are busy, busy, busy but soon we can relax a little and enjoy our last few months in Jamestown!