The Banana and I needed to take a quick trip to the retail district last night to pick up a couple of items needed for this weekend.  We took Mr. TOF with us.  Our second stop needed to be extra quick because we only had about 20 minutes before we…

Sometimes they are just wild and crazy:  jazz piano music with muppet motions, while one sibling creates a new hairstyle and two others whirl around dancing like deranged monsters (not shown on this particular frame).  Sometimes it’s best just to snap the picture and leave the room.

The Saturday before Easter is Egg Drop Day here.  Highly anticipated as always, this event is a big deal because the stakes are high!  If your egg survives the drop you do not have to do any evening work, and these kids really, really hate family chores.  This year the…

Easter morning.  If we aren’t traveling for the Easter holiday, we often first visit a beautiful church in our community that has an amazing organ, a big choir, handbells, and a brass ensemble to start our day of worship, and then we attend the latest service at our normal church.…

Last week Mr. TOF and I read one of my current favorite picture books, Nanette’s Baguette by Mo Willems.  I love the words in this book.  Mr. TOF was captivated by the picture on the book jacket where the author talks a bit about his process of illustrating the book.…

We’ve been saying that we should visit the Minnesota History Center and the James J. Hill House for years, but we don’t get to St. Paul very often.  We just aren’t city people.  When we decided that we would be mostly staying home for spring break from school, we thought…

  It’s spring break for our school district.  We definitely did not plan any extravagant family vacations.  In fact, the general consensus of all kidlets was, “Let’s stay home.”  However, I suspected that the kidlets might be a little stir crazy by midweek, and Dr. Peds had a little time…

So, our dishwasher broke about two weeks ago.  But, luckily for me, I have FOUR kids capable of extensive dishwashing!  And I don’t feel a bit bad about making them do a lot of dishes because I spent all of my late childhood and teenage years doing dishes at home…

I’m continuing to learn to read tenor clef.  I even play little games on the iPad to get better, but really in the end it comes down to knowing a few guide notes and then employing some reading skills.  It’s HARD.  For me,  But I’m learning how to better teach…