Grieg and Gardening

Last Friday night was my studio recital with my piano students. They all did such a fabulous job. I stand at the back of the recital hall and get all nervous for them and hope they can feel calm enough about playing in front of everyone to have a good experience. Well, they all gave a smashing performance. I added duets this year and instead of me playing with the students I had them play with each other -- much harder. I worried over partners being equally prepared and equally paired, but everyone worked hard (some down to the last minute!) and they turned out so fun. I encouraged each pair to find some kind of a prop or costume piece to wear for their duets to make them be a little playful and fun. One pair was playing a baseball themed piece, so they wore big baseball shirts over their dresses and one wore her baseball cap. Another pair both wore white tops, dark skirts and big red silk roses in their hair because they were playing a Hungarian folk dance. My two youngest students -- seven-year-old boys weren't too keen on wearing actual silk bluebirds on their shoulders for "Bluebird on My Shoulder," but they were quite happy to wear blue shirts and ties with their dark suits. They were so cute! Another boy pair played a pirate duet and they untucked their white shirts and tied red bandanas on their heads -- pirate-style. They were great. I was so proud of all of my students and I think everyone had a great time.

On Saturday I was the gardening queen, if I do say so myself. I got my two apple trees planted that I had purchased on Monday and I also built three planter boxes: two that are 6'x3' and one that is 4'x2'. That's what you can get out of three 16' lengths of 2x6 pressure-treated lumber. Had to make one run to the hardware store (what's a project without a mid-way run to the hardware store for something?) for shorter screws since the ones I already had at home were going through to the outside of the boxes. Bad news for anyone kneeling next to them for weeding! Tomorrow I will post a picture of my success. Now I just have to get top soil and compost into the beds so I can plant stuff...sigh. Maybe I gave myself too big a project for this year. Not like I've never done that before! (Think building my own chicken coop from scratch based on an internet site sketched blueprint -- a scanned picture of somebody's graph paper design...The dang thing took me four days to build. I had naively thought, "Oh, two days, tops." Insert maniacal laughter sound track here).

The kitchen greenhouse is practically a riot of sprouts. I think I have seen at least one sprout from everything I have planted except for the 2004 sweet pea seeds, the bat plant seeds (but they have another month or so before I can expect anything) and the newest crop of sweet peas that I want to put in planters. I have even seen a couple of sprouts from some columbine seeds harvested wild from up in Star Valley, Wyoming from my husband's grandfather's ranch. I hope they will grow. I love columbine. I'll post a picture tomorrow of the plants taking over my kitchen.