What's your point? Wednesday

I am working on the second installment of my Thoughts on Homeschooling but it has an actual point, so I guess I'll post it another day.

Hudson still really loves the drumming. I have some pretty impressive video of the husband showing him some fairly complicated rudiments and Hudson gets them the first time. He also enjoys drumming while singing and his lyrics are still a little difficult to decipher, but yesterday I jotted down some snippets:

An original composition
by Hudson

And God is Santa
Um la la um la
I will celebrate
Because I don't know why
Ah ah ah OHHHHHH
Basketball
He says
Uh huh ah ah OH.

I feel like if we had Anna Maria Mozart's journals, we'd find something similar jotted down therein.

Speaking of Mozart, the other morning we came in from outside and I was feeling grumpy and wondering why I am not better at getting stuff done and keeping everyone from bickering with everyone else and I was comparing myself to other people who just seem to do it all better, and the radio was on the classical station and it was something lovely that I didn't recognize but I thought it might be Mozart. Only when it was over the announcer came on and said it was something by Antonio Salieri, who is the composer who basically went crazy comparing himself to Mozart and never measuring up. Funny, huh?

Helena has begun some naughtiness. She partakes of the naughtiness (pushing buttons she ought not, pushing small babies she ought not..) then she says, "Laida Jane in trouble. Call Daddy?" smiling the entire time. If it is the Daddy who is doing the direct admonishing, she nods her head over and over and has very big eyes and, sometimes, a down-turned mouth. Last week, a tiny little fellow, newly walking, toddled into her path and stared at her, entranced, when we were on our way out of the Children's Museum. She was in the stroller and she gazed at his sweet little face, while his parents cooed just behind him. She then lifted up her Crocs-encased feet, placed them firmly on his teeny little chest, and pushed with all her might, like she was doing a thigh press at the gym. It was very touching. I apologized profusely and told the parents they might want to try the Tot Spot, because hopefully he would fare better amongst the other wee people. Plus shoes aren't allowed.

Harper and I have taken a hiatus from the Little House books. I remembered that the next one in the series, By the Shores of Silver Lake, is the one in which Jack the dog dies. It's also when Mary goes blind AND, Mrs. S reminded me at the park today, there is a MURDER. So, I'm not sure how long it will be before I am emotionally ready to deal with all of that, but it's going to be awhile. We have instead retreated to the world of animals who act like people only without the dying and the blindness and the MURDER. We started Wind in the Willows a few days ago. We're also going back through Beatrix Potter now that attention spans are much longer. I think we'll read the Pooh books in their entirety next. We've read them in bits and pieces, but never all at once. Do you know what never happens in the Hundred Acre Wood? Murder, that's what. I can manage to read aloud about a balloon getting accidentally popped by a small pig and not get emotional one bit.

Speaking of getting emotional, I am. Emotional. I admit it. I have tried to deny it, vehemently at times, but I do cry, and frequently, and sometimes over not much at all. The latest example was Sunday afternoon. We went to an Astros game after church and I was on my way to find some delicious ballpark fare for my lunch (everyone else had a sensible lunch at home before we left). I realized the National Anthem was about to be sung so I stopped in my food quest and looked down at the singers. It was a group of young sisters (there were 5 of them, I think) and the harmonies were sublime and I always cry when I hear the National Anthem anyway(I didn't used to--I think living in a former Soviet bloc country for two years is what did it) even if it's poorly sung, so this beauty just did me right in. I'm standing there wiping my crumpled face and I'm sure the people around me were wondering what in the world is wrong with the crying lady. Then I quickly recovered after the "brave" floated up and away (a note which was held exceptionally well by the littlest sister) and went on to eat my hamburger with french fries and a vanilla shake made with real Blue Bell ice cream. The novelty of the game wore off fairly quickly and we left at the top of the 6th.

Harper and Hudson had a wedding in the backyard on Monday. She wore her tap costume and just before the processional Hudson said, "Wait! I need some chapstick!" so he ran in and got some and came back, all ready to wed.

That is the end.