A "First"

On Monday afternoon, Noah began a new adventure.

Now on Monday afternoons, I will not only take Elisabeth to piano practice...Noah gets to go also!



When I told him a few weeks ago that Mrs. Cindy had an open space for him this year...he was not happy about this news.

As it turns out, Noah was horrified at the idea of getting up and performing in a recital, like he's seen Elisabeth do a couple times now.  I reassured him (as will Mrs. Cindy) that he does **not** have to participate in the recital if he doesn't want to.  This may go against textbook-parenting-advice,  I don't know, but there is no way I think we should force him to do this.  Not this little/big guy.  I would have felt the exact same way when I was Noah's age (WOW, even today the idea of performing in front of an audience makes me want to break out in hives just thinking about it!), and I don't want the idea of a recital hanging over his head and causing him not to want to learn piano at all.

AND, the second reason Noah didn't want to take lessons is because my little perfectionist (I SO get Noah) was upset because he's not good at the piano and "doesn't know how to play!"  Ummmm, that's why you are taking lessons, Noah...you aren't supposed to know how to play yet!  

After talking through all of this...Noah began to actually look forward to the lessons.  And he came away Monday afternoon saying that he "loved it!"

Noah and Elisabeth could not be in better hands.  Words cannot explain how much I love Cindy and how precious of a woman she is.  I first got to know Cindy as we played handbells next to each other at church (I was C-D, she was E-F), before I had children.  She was excited with me as we waited for our referral for Elisabeth and her sweet face is visible in a couple of the pictures of our airport "welcoming committee" in this post.  We marveled on Monday how that seems like just yesterday, and her she is teaching Elisabeth and Noah piano lessons now!