Something I did right...

You do know that in addition to being your child's Kindermusik teacher, I am a mom of 3 children...but not so little anymore (sigh...)

I remember my first born (Evan) going off to his first day of Kindergarten and discovering that he had a different teacher than we had interviewed with at the spring preview. (She turned out to be the woman who has inspired much of my classroom style, by the way. Here's a shout out to Mrs Lerbekmo!)

I remember going to the first parent/teacher interview of my second born (Colson) and saying "Don't you just LOVE him?" (and they did!)

I was just talking with a friend of mine the other day about dropping our last born daughters off to grade one and having a celebratory breakfast that day (big smile).

They do grow up so fast. Now Evan is in second year university. Colson is in grade 12, and my baby, Olivia (or "Liv", as I call her) is in grade 10. When your kids are little and you are trying to imagine what their lives are going to look like when they are older, part of you just hopes that you are making the right decisions now,when they are younger...

no regrets...and wondering if that's even possible.

I'm sure it's no surprise that my 3 grew up in a musical home. We have always played lots of music, danced at home, sang in the van, gone to concerts, and promoted music lessons. No...promoted is not the right word...enforced is probably better. They all started out with a lot of enthusiasm, but the spark did dwindle for piano practise over time.

One of my favorite things to talk about in class is how music training is beneficial for your child. Reasons too many to go into here, but I will say that I determined as a young mother that I was not going to have my children regretting a decision to quit music lessons. Quitting was "off the table" of discussion.

All 3 of my kids play the piano - and play really well. They have all taken a different course of training, but all read music, all can play multiple styles, and all have a different reason to play. One of the best moments of anyday is when I hear my children playing the piano for pleasure, or preparing for a school concert or church function. They have gotten past the hurdle of "I don't want to practise!!" and the complaints of "none of my friends has to take lessons, why do I?!!"

There were lots of nights of helping them practise...years of listening to songs we had heard many times before. Managing the hours of practise that happened nightly by having a piano upstairs and a keyboard downstairs so that more than one could practise at a time. But there were also proud moments at recitals, and whispered encouragements at night of how amazing I thought they sounded.

Now they have opportunities that many others don't...and they love what music has done for them! They all moved on to playing instruments in the band (french horn, trumpet, bass clarinet) and have all done extensive extra-curricular music, as well. And all that being their choice and joy.

Moms get a lot of bad press. Moms get blamed for a lot. But tonight...this mom is taking some credit for doing the music thing right.