Suzuki Christmas Recital December 3, 2015

Morgan had her winter violin recital on Thursday night.

Morgan and our friend Sonja - we are missing our friends Simon and Elsa Ruth this year while they are away

This year was songs from world traditions. Morgan's group played a Swedish fiddle tune called Engelska Fran Smaland. This was super cool for me since my family heritage is from Smaland! Morgan was chosen for this song to play the harmony - this was exciting because Miss Sarah picked her and the three others as they are the top of their group and were able to focus on the harmony while the rest of group 3 as well as 1 and 2 played the melody and open notes.

Her group also played Jolly Old St Nicholas. Morgan played the melody on this tune.

All groups 1 - 5 (kids ages 3 - 16) played Mozart's Alleluia Canon, Silent Night and Ode to Joy.

I created a movie with all the songs - it is close to 9 minutes long.

Butterfly Diaries - Introduction

So for the foreseeable future Morgan's blog will be dedicated to our venture and adventure in creating a butterfly garden and coming to the decision that we need to rear butterflies inside.

In the beginning I thought - "Easy - plant some milkweed, have pollinators (cone flower, thistle) and voile...Monarchs!

Our Swamp Milkweed is taller than Morgan!

 Yeah...not that easy.

I now find myself learning at an exponential rate and teaching Morgan just as fast. We have been introduced to the concept that many University-based projects like The Monarch Lab (http://monarchlab.org/) 

and Monarch Joint Venture (http://monarchjointventure.org/)

out of Minneapolis call Citizen Scientists. We are learning through research based organizations how to provide a Monarch friendly environment, how to find eggs and caterpillars and now how to rear them indoors.

Stay tuned for our updates

Raised Bed for Butterflies

Morgan got to undertake her first woodworking project! Two, reclaimed cedar wood, raised bed planters. Russel Ford Dunker was her Master teacher!

Cleaning off the boards before going through the planer

cleaning

catching the planks as they come through the planer

beginning construction

learning to use the driver

drivin' like a pro

even Momma gets in the action

showing Morgan how to drill pilot holes

getting a little support with holding the driver (heavy battery) up high

Adding the seat planks

Finished product with Russell!

Gymnastics Update

Morgan passed from G1 to G2 this spring.

In G1, her final skills were cartwheel, running cartwheel and Handstand-forward-roll. She passed her running cartwheel in May and was allowed to move up to G2 with a friend to work on her handstand. By the end of the first summer session G2 she passed her handstand-forward-roll.

G1 Bar work - she was the only kid in her class that could back-flip up onto the bars with no help.

She is also working on a handstand on the high beam. In G1 they work on a lowered beam with a wide, soft pad to help learn the positioning. Morgan can do a somersault on the lower beam with the pad. The handstand will be long time coming....

In G2 she is starting to learn how to rotate on the bar. The skill in broken down into two parts - work on the high bar (independently) and on the low bar with the instructor. On the high bar she needs to practice her kick-outs and release with straight arms and falling straight on her back into the pit 12 feet below.  On the low bar she is learning about her own centrifugal force and she spins around.

G2 beam work has increased in difficulty hugely! She is taught the skill on a low beam, but then practices independently on a competition height beam. In the video clip she is starting to learn how to do 'pike-jumps'.
She will continue to work on cartwheels and handstands - the difficulty level has increased in that she now needs to do a running cartwheel, sache (sah-shay), cartwheel across the floor, all in a straight line; she needs to perform a one-handed cartwheel and a handstand to bridge then back-walk-over and stand again. In the video clip she does her first back-walkover!

2015 Spring Violin Recital

Morgan played Allegro for this spring's recital