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Monday, June 9, 2008

Surviving the Piano Recital


Emma, Sarah (their teacher), and Braeden

The hardest part of tonight’s recital, of course, was the preparation. I’m not talking about the piano practicing. That was arduous…and sometimes painful…but getting ready tonight just about killed us all.

Emma couldn’t find white tights. She has four million pairs of white tights (give or take) and she couldn’t find one of them. I was frantically making dinner and arguing with her brothers about getting ready and the dispute involving whether or not the thick cotton cream colored tights matched her lightweight blue and white dress was too much. You’ll just have to wear no tights! She was shocked and horrified but finally accepting.

The sock theme carried over to Braeden. He had on khaki pants, his brown leather church shoes and white socks. He wore them to church yesterday too (hopefully not the same ones!) which is another story altogether and a side-effect of my 8:30 Sunday morning meeting and not being home to help get everyone ready for church. We volleyed back and forth about the suitability of white socks. I said, “You look like PeeWee Herman!” Since he didn’t know who PeeWee Herman was and thinks I’m mostly wrong about everything anyway, it took him awhile to ditch the white socks.

What is wrong with these people and why won’t they believe me? Didn’t their mother teach them anything? Oh, wait…

Then Mark was wearing shorts. Since he wasn’t actually participating in the recital, I decided not to die on that hill. Wear the shorts, Mark. I have to conserve my resources for the hair battle.

Emma wanted her hair just left alone (read unkempt). I lured her into a ponytail by letting her wear one of my barrettes. She was actually compliant about it (finally).

Braeden liked his hair the way it was. “Don’t I have a right to an opinion?” Not really. The pitch of my voice was getting sharper and sharper with each of these discussions and I was banging around the dishes in the kitchen with more and more enthusiasm. Braeden decided to cut his losses and let me attempt to tame his mop.

As soon as I was done he ran his fingers through it.

Next was Mark. I tackled his mangled thatch of red curls with a vengeance and he cried and stamped his feet. Sorry Mark. I’m going to subdue that hair if it’s the last thing I do.

As soon as I was done he ran his fingers through it.

Adam came home then. I asked him if he wanted to fight about his clothes or hair. He suggested we just eat. Sounded good to me.

So we made it to the recital. We looked more or less presentable (Adam even convinced Mark to put some jeans on). Braeden and Emma played their pieces well (and now we can have a little hiatus from hearing them, YES!) and we celebrated by going to The Spotted Cow for ice cream…Grandma and Grandpa’s treat. All’s well that ends well, right?

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