Whew!

  It's been a busy couple of days.  we've been to Salt Lake this past weekend, and I went with the boys to Price yesterday--I feel like I've just been hopping from one place to the next!  Not necessarily a bad thing...
  So yesterday John brought home the mail and I got a letter with no return address and my name cleverly disguised as if an older person or a child wrote it.  I thought it was a little odd and opened it up.  Inside was a sheet of paper that had the words Thank You!!! printed on it with a $50.00 bill folded up inside.  Nothing else.  I am wracking my brain trying to think of who may have sent it and what I may have done to deserve it.  $50.00 is a lot of money in my little checkbook.  I feel very humbled that someone felt so inclined to send this to me.  I'm still kind of in shock over it.  So if it was you, thank you so very much, I really mean that.  I don't feel like I've done anything out of the ordinary lately that would permit such a thing. 
  Today was kind of a whirlwind of a day.  It was laundry day (I do all my laundry in one day like my mom did--can't stand to do it a little at a time--I like to check it off my list--I like the feeling of accomplishment--I know, I'm weird like that.) So on top of laundry, I went visiting teaching and we caught two of the three sisters we go to.  We had good visits, and Mom and Dad Hughes watched the boys.  They had fun playing outside and going for a ride to the dumpster in Grandpa's truck.  After I picked them up, we came home and ate lunch (in like 15 minutes) then it was off to pick up the kids from school.  They had a 1/2 day today because it was parent teacher conferences.  I had a 1:00 appointment with Zander's teacher, and a 2:00 appointment with Ian's teacher and an open house sometime between 12:30 and 3:00 for Morgan's teacher who has been having cancer treatments, so no appointments there, just show up sometime.  Ian's teacher (bless his little soul) saw me walk by to get the kids from John's room and came and asked if I wanted to do his conference now so I wouldn't have to stay so long. What a blessing!  We did Ian's conference, and then went to Morgan's open house and met with her teacher, and it was almost time for Zander's appointment so we went down to Kindergarten to wait, and she wasn't busy, so we did his conference and had them all done by 1:00!  I was able to come home and put Eli down for a nap so I could get my group piano stuff together.  By the way, the kids are all doing well in school and their teachers had much praise for them, which is always nice to hear.
  Today was my first group piano lesson.  Trying something new this year to try and help a few of my struggling piano students, and make piano even more fun for them all.  (My piano teacher did piano group with us when I was taking lessons, and I loved it!  Thanks Cyndie!)  I think it went really well.  The kids all seemed to enjoy it.  I have 9 piano students, 5 Eementary School aged (who are my first piano group) and 4 Jr. High/High School aged (my second group).  We played memory with the elementary kids with my flash cards, and the high school kids had to shout out what the symbols were and then got to keep that card--most cards/matches wins.  Then we talked about the correct way to sit at the piano, how to approach the piano at a recital, how to introduce our piece, and lastly how to bow when finished playing.  We had some fun with it and then they played a peice for eachother using all the steps we talked about.  Then we played the bug game.  My bugs had rhythms on them, and I would clap a rhythm, and the kids had fly swatters and would have to "squish" the bug with the correct rhythm.  Whoever's swatter was on the bottom got the bug.  We palyed this several times in each group, and it was a huge hit.  I already have some halloween games in mind for next month--I'm excited!
  Because of my busy day, the laundry was washed, but nothing was folded, so I had a mountain to fold on my bed this evening after dinner.  Not kidding--it was a mountain--and it only took an hour--not too bad!
  We got the kids in bed after scriptures and prayers, so now we're enjoying some quiet time...better get off of here so I can go spend some of it with my husband--I don't see enough of him these days either. :)