2008 quick facts.

I can't necessarily say it's back by popular demand - since I don't know how many (but I have an idea of how few) people read this blog.  But I liked recapping the year in this way:

Piano lessons taught: 922

Piano Recitals: 2, plus one company-wide concert

Album of the Year: Asking for Flowers by Kathleen Edwards

     Runner Up: The Stand Ins by Okkervil River

Favorite band I discovered: Glen Hansard/The Frames

     Runner Up: The Shout Out Louds

Best Song:  All the World (I Tell Myself) by Correatown

     Runner Up: The Cheapest Key by Kathleen Edwards

Favorite Movie in a Theater: Wall-E

     Runner Up: Sex in the City (that's right!)

Favorite Movie from Netflix: The Assassination of Jesse James . . . 

     Runner Up: Anne of Green Gables trilogy

Favorite Play: Our Town, performed by David Cromer and the Hypocrites

Best Concert: Kathleen Edwards at the Metro

Best TV Show: Mad Men

Favorite Book: Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

     Runner Up: Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld

Favorite Game: Apples to Apples

Cubs Games Attended: 13 (including one post-season)

     Number of those games they won: 11

New City I visited: Milwaukee, WI

Best thing I did there (other than go to a Cubs Game): the free tour of the Miller Brewery!

Holiday Parties

I have been taking quite a break from blogging, it is true.  But let's see if I can redeem myself.  Last weekend was a big one:  my holiday party (carol singing and gift exchanging) Saturday night, followed by my piano recital Sunday afternoon.  My lucky friend Jessica was in town for the weekend, staying with me, and got to attend both.  I'm sure she's looking forward to moving to Chicago, and getting to go home in between events in the future!  She did help out by frosting cookies with me, and she was official taste-tester of cookies, some dips, and the punch, which did need some tweaking.  

The 3rd Annual Holiday party was a great success.  By my count, we had almost 30 people in attendance, and everyone was ready to spread holiday cheer.  Meatballs were consumed, many gifts of alcohol and useless but cute bits of this and that were exchanged, and carols were sung heartily.  By many standards, I have a sizeable home, but we were definitely pushing it when we packed everyone into the living room to exchange gifts.  I'm already looking forward to the party next year, but first I have a Hannumas party next weekend, and of course New Year's!

Christmas in November and Brain Farts

One of my little teaching secrets - which I'm not sure I can call a secret, since it's on the internet and free to all - is this guy's website.  Over the past few years, I have come to know the selection of music at this site very well and it's a great place to find easy pieces to use as supplements to my usual method books.  Perhaps I rely a little too much on this website . . . 

         This past weekend, I taught some extra lessons to make up for lessons we'll miss at Thanksgiving and Christmas, and to help prepare for the recital.  One student, who is taking off a few weeks around Thanksgiving, had an extra-long lessons, so I decided it was a good time to learn a Christmas carol, since I won't be seeing her as much in early December, when I would normally teach carols.  I brought her Deck the Halls and she learned it in record time; I almost ran out of things to teach to fill up the hour lesson.  

        When I came back for our regular lesson this week, her mom said to me, "Deck the Halls, yeah, she learned that last year."  I had printed out the same exact song, from my favorite website, and taught it to her last year.  No wonder it was so easy for her to learn!  So I said to my student,  "I'll bring you a new Christmas song next week," which she took to mean,  "you're not allowed to play this one anymore."  

        Not to worry, Claire, you may still play Deck the Halls - and it sounds so good when you play it!  But there's no rule about how many Christmas songs you're allowed to play.  I probably play 50 different Carols, so I think you can manage 2 this year.

The Sopranos hits a little too close to home

Nate and I have recently been on a kick to "discover" our "new" neighborhood.  "New" as in, we've been living here more than a year and we haven't really checked out any nearby street but one.  Two weekends ago, we went out on a saturday afternoon walk and discovered a new favorite bookstore, burger joint, and cupcake shop.  (we could have been buying books, eating burgers and cupcakes for more than  year now?  pshaw!)

This past Saturday we decided to try out a little Italian restaurant that we had walked by many times and always thought "that place looks so cute."

It was a nice dinner; definitely good food, and about half full on a Saturday night, which made for a pretty quiet dinner.  Yesterday morning, I read online that our new restaurant, Lucca's, about 4 blocks from our house, was the site of a murder late Tuesday night (3 days after we had eaten dinner there!)  A body had been discovered in the basement, seemingly beaten and shot, though details have of course been withheld.  The victim is assumed to be the 47 year old restaurant manager, who I believe may be the man who was behind the bar all night.  Like 10 feet away from us.  In all the Italian restaurants in the city, who'd have thought something this juicy would happen at one we had been to, and in such a quiet neighborhood.  Small world, big city.  

If I could turn back time . . .

A friend of mine on facebook has a whole album of photos he made from this website, yearbook yourself.  It's slightly difficult to get your photo centered and an appropriate size, but if you have the time to invest in it, (as of course I do) it's well worth the effort.  This is what I would have looked like, if I had been hip in '66:

Actually, it's worth noting that the clothes I wore in high school and college probably would have been cooler in the '60s than they were in the 90's and 00's. 

And if I had invested this much time on my hair each morning, I would have looked this awesome in '94:

theme parties

are totally awesome. . . when the theme is filling yourself past comfort level with yummy food and then sitting around and watching almost an entire season of How I Met Your Mother.  Some friends and I recently decided to indulge all of our basest desires and sit around for the better part of a day watching one of our favorite shows.  The first get together was relatively tame - a pot luck lasagna night and each of the 8 participants picked their favorite episode from the first 2 seasons.  

This second get-together was a heartier and hardier affair.  The dish of choice was Texas beef brisket chili, from last month's bon appetit - Nate has been wanting to make it since the day the magazine arrived in the mail - and a deliciously easy beer bread.  I made 2 loaves of the bread, one with Sam Adams Oktoberfest beer, which was yummy but a little crumbly, and the other with Miller Lite, which stuck together quite nicely.  I'm considering using less butter next time - I think it could have been adequately delicious without the 1/2 stick of butter on each loaf.   Thanks to Ruthie, who again brought cupcakes from the Alliance bakery (see picture in previous post).  The red velvet cakes are not to be missed!

And we watched more than 2/3 of the entire third season.  Sandcastles in the Sand, you're up next.  One thing's for sure: if we have another one in November, it'll be the best Slapsgiving ever.