It's still the most wonderful time of the year.
The holiday season for music teachers is pretty crazy. For Josey and I, it was our first time picking music for and rehearsing students for a holiday concert. We stressed out about song selections for weeks - what could our students learn and be able to play/sing in the short 5 weeks between Halloween and the concert, with the big break of Thanksgiving right in the middle. It is an insanely short period of time to get a lot of learning in.
We rehearsed our students hard and put on awesome concerts. Josey's school concert was on Monday, the 14th, and I played piano for his choirs. It was a ton of fun, and we decorated the stage with lights and giant paper snowflakes, (thanks for the idea, Heidi!) The next night was my concert, and we had a blast. The students knew their stuff, and I got the staff and the audience involved. Seriously, concerts like that make me so happy, remind me why I love my job so much. Watching kids and adults enjoy music just makes my heart full.
Something else that makes me happy is our home. Josey put lights up on the house just before Thanksgiving, and we want to leave them up for a while longer yet. He did all of the outside decorations without me... I came out of the school after teaching piano lessons one night and the house looked like this:
Josey and I took the train for the first time together and we loved it! We hopped on in Malta, MT on the 23rd and took it all the way to Pasco, WA. It was the most relaxing form of travel I have experienced. I love the smoothness of plane rides, but despise the stress of missing connecting flights. I like car rides, but only on divided highway... in the summer. The train was so peaceful. The chairs were big, the leg room was spacious, and when we could score a spot in "lounge" car, the big windows really made the train an awesome place to be. It took close to 19 hours on the train, but when it's a relaxing environment and much of the ride is at night it really isn't all that bad.
This year was the first time Josey and I actually spent Christmas together. In years past I have just gone home to my family and him to his, especially since his birthday is December 25th. We decided to go to Tri Cities since it takes so long to get there and there aren't many opportunities for us to get there during the school year. It was so awesome to finally be together for a Christmas and for his birthday! Let me tell you, a Christmas birthday is not the easiest one to celebrate, but hey, at least he didn't have to work on his special day.
We spent time with my family over break and saw where my brother goes to school. We shopped, although not as much as I would have liked since we had limited luggage space on the train. I was determined to do some of the things that we can't do in Saco, so we went to the trampoline park and to the ice rink, and to the movies and the mall. We thought we would want to do a whole lot more than that since we were there for almost a week, but after our crazy concert week and three pep band gigs in the month of December we were ready for some quality time OFF.
The train ride back to Saco absolutely flew by, and now I want to take it somewhere else for fun. Chicago? I think so.
Even though I am writing this post on New Years Eve, I'm saving the 2015 recap for a "Christmas Letter" of sorts, and I don't feel like writing about my 2016 goals. Instead, I have made a list of things that make me happy. I was inspired to do this because of something I heard something on the radio recently. The segment talked about a "happy jar," where you write down all of the things that make you happy on slips of paper and put them in a jar. When you are feeling down, you just reach in and pull out a slip of paper and do exactly what the slip says. I don't have a jar handy, but here is my happy "list."
16 Happy Things To Do in 2016
1. Hold Panther
2. Paint/Color
3. Play the piano for fun
4. Take a picture of something
5. Make someone else feel good
6. Hug Josey
7. Shower
8. Light a candle
9. Look through old pictures
11. Text/Chat with family members
10. Connect with a friend
12. Start a new art project
13. Edit photos
14. Sing along to pop music
15. Clean
16. Exercise
What makes you happy? Write those things down, and then do them. If you're like me and don't want to make New Years Resolutions, (since at least by my track history they don't really work,) make a plan for a happier you in 2016. The only resolution I've made is to keep God in mind and put myself second, as often as I can.
That's all for now, Josey and I are going to cozy up in our holiday house and prepare for what's ahead - basketball/pep band season in full force, festivals, spring concerts/recitals, and who knows what else!
Love,
Chelsea (& Josey)
We rehearsed our students hard and put on awesome concerts. Josey's school concert was on Monday, the 14th, and I played piano for his choirs. It was a ton of fun, and we decorated the stage with lights and giant paper snowflakes, (thanks for the idea, Heidi!) The next night was my concert, and we had a blast. The students knew their stuff, and I got the staff and the audience involved. Seriously, concerts like that make me so happy, remind me why I love my job so much. Watching kids and adults enjoy music just makes my heart full.
Something else that makes me happy is our home. Josey put lights up on the house just before Thanksgiving, and we want to leave them up for a while longer yet. He did all of the outside decorations without me... I came out of the school after teaching piano lessons one night and the house looked like this:
We have been collecting Christmas lights and decorations at after Christmas sales for the last couple of years, all in preparation for the year when we get our own home to decorate. Of course, I would have preferred to have a house that was a little better color coordinated, but instead of changing anything outside I just claimed the rights to decorate the INSIDE of the house.
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| Josey has a hand-made nativity made by his Grandmother when he was a baby. So happy to have it in our house now! Panther especially likes to take the animals and hide them around the house. |
Here's our 9 ft fake tree we bought on super sale last year after Christmas. Panther likes to bat the ornaments off the lower branches and chase them around the house. Only two broke this year, but he climbs the tree and all of the lower branches get bent down and out of shape. It looked really good for the first week or so, but then I got tired of fixing the branches over and over so unfortunately it looked pretty sad on the bottom half most of the time.
(Side note: Before we left for my family's house for the holidays, we put the Christmas trees in the music room and shut the door, thinking Panther wouldn't be able to destroy them that way. Well, he managed to push the door open and got to the trees anyways. Ah well.)
(Side note: Before we left for my family's house for the holidays, we put the Christmas trees in the music room and shut the door, thinking Panther wouldn't be able to destroy them that way. Well, he managed to push the door open and got to the trees anyways. Ah well.)
 |
| Partially destroyed "hidden" trees. |
This year was the first time Josey and I actually spent Christmas together. In years past I have just gone home to my family and him to his, especially since his birthday is December 25th. We decided to go to Tri Cities since it takes so long to get there and there aren't many opportunities for us to get there during the school year. It was so awesome to finally be together for a Christmas and for his birthday! Let me tell you, a Christmas birthday is not the easiest one to celebrate, but hey, at least he didn't have to work on his special day.
We spent time with my family over break and saw where my brother goes to school. We shopped, although not as much as I would have liked since we had limited luggage space on the train. I was determined to do some of the things that we can't do in Saco, so we went to the trampoline park and to the ice rink, and to the movies and the mall. We thought we would want to do a whole lot more than that since we were there for almost a week, but after our crazy concert week and three pep band gigs in the month of December we were ready for some quality time OFF.
The train ride back to Saco absolutely flew by, and now I want to take it somewhere else for fun. Chicago? I think so.
16 Happy Things To Do in 2016
1. Hold Panther
2. Paint/Color
3. Play the piano for fun
4. Take a picture of something
5. Make someone else feel good
6. Hug Josey
7. Shower
8. Light a candle
9. Look through old pictures
11. Text/Chat with family members
10. Connect with a friend
12. Start a new art project
13. Edit photos
14. Sing along to pop music
15. Clean
16. Exercise
What makes you happy? Write those things down, and then do them. If you're like me and don't want to make New Years Resolutions, (since at least by my track history they don't really work,) make a plan for a happier you in 2016. The only resolution I've made is to keep God in mind and put myself second, as often as I can.
That's all for now, Josey and I are going to cozy up in our holiday house and prepare for what's ahead - basketball/pep band season in full force, festivals, spring concerts/recitals, and who knows what else!
Love,
Chelsea (& Josey)
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