byufan.net » Emily

2009 Winter Recitals

Brian — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 21:27:44 +0000

December was recital time. Emily, Anne, and Caroline’s recital was at the piano teacher’s house. Sam’s recital was at the West Jordan Library.

Emily played Petite Russian Rhapsody by John Thompson and I Dreamed A Dream from Les Miserables by Claude-Michel Schönberg:

Anne played the Raindrop Prelude by Chopin and the Minute Waltz by Chopin:

Caroline played Hogwarts Hymn by Patrick Doyle and Can You Feel The Love Tonight by Elton John:

Samuel played Chocolate Cake by Bastien:

Emily’s Birthday

Brian — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 01:50:52 +0000

Emily turned 14 this month. It’s interesting how you approach birthday parties as you get older. Where Emily used to want presents like Barbie dolls, she now wants presents like gift cards and money and cellphones. Gift cards are in the realm of possibilities but cellphones are not. I know, I know – I’m a mean Dad and behind the times and everyone her age has a cell phone now. Well, all those things may be true but I simply don’t see any reason for a 14 year old to have a cell phone and engage in incessant insipid texting.

14 years old

Emily is beyond the age of getting “friend” parties so she got a small family party. Although being 14 is an awkward age, it’s still always fun to blow out candles and open presents. At least it is until you hit age 40. At that age, it’s not quite so fun to blow out candles.

Happy Birthday Emily!

An Excellent Young Woman

Brian — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 04:19:12 +0000

Tonight was Young Womens in Excellence award night. The theme was “A Night at the Oscars” and included dinner, a movie starring the young women, and a red carpet that they walked down to receive their awards. When I got there they were having technical difficulties with the laptop that was supposed to play the movie (it was a Mac). Fortunately, I happened to have my trusty old Dell laptop with me so I whipped it out it and it worked flawlessly.

The cutest Young Woman in the world (right) with the cutest YW mom in the world (left)

Emily won an award for her “individual worth” project which was playing in a piano recital. Other Young Women won awards for pictures they took or crafts they did or service projects they helped out on. Our ward’s YW leadership does a really great job with all the Young Women and Emily really enjoys going.

Contgratulations Emily – we’re proud of you!

Spring Recital

Brian — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 04:07:37 +0000

Last week we went to the girls spring piano recital. Grandpa Kent and Grandma Connie were in town and able to come and the kids were excited to have them there. Texas was up first. She played Colors of the Wind by Menken and Stuck on C by Vandall

Texas

I generally like what their teacher does with the exception of recitals. The teacher let’s them play pieces in their recital that they haven’t fully learned. I really wish the teacher would require them to memorize their pieces and not let them play pieces that they haven’t fully prepared. I also wish the teacher would teach them to bow afterwards.

Next was Emily. She played Witch’s Dance by Hill and Song For a Princess by Miller.

Emily

I think Emily has improved significantly since the last recital. Because she’s not fond of counting, she typically does better on the types of flowing songs where a rigid rhythm isn’t as important. She’s also learning to play hymns and plays for the Young Women organization in church occasionally. I have no dreams of my kids making it to Carnegie Hall. In fact, I’ve always thought that if my kids learn well enough to play hymns in church, the lessons will have been worth it. It looks like Emily is well on her way to achieving that standard. Now I just have to figure out how to get her to memorize her songs.

Anne followed Emily and played Fur Elise by Beethoven and Dorothy by Smith.

Anne

Anne probably enjoys playing the most out of the kids and I think it shows in her progress. She does a good job of memorizing her songs. She also delights in the fact that her pieces are becoming more difficult for me to simply sight read without mistakes. Although not a child prodigy, I think she did a pretty decent job for a 10 year old.

After the recital Grandpa Kent and Grandma Connie were gracious in enduring the chatter of our excited kids as they took us out for an ice cream celebration. It was a great way to top off a fun evening.

New Braces

Nancy — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 02:22:54 +0000

Today was the day that Emily got her braces put in. She was definitely apprehensive about getting braces put in in the first place. She thinks she looks funny. The thing is, most of the girls in her class at school and at church have braces too. I think she looks really cute in her new braces and I hope that she will brush and take care of her teeth so they will look good when the braces finally come out.

This is when the technician was showing Emily the proper way to floss with braces

I had Emily give me a big smile as we were leaving the orthodontist

Science Fair

Brian — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 04:53:40 +0000

We finally finished up both Emily and Anne’s science fair projects tonight. Anne did all her researcch and experimentation a few weeks ago and made her display a couple of days ago so she wasn’t rushed at the end. I forced Emily to change projects relatively late in the game so she needed every last day to finish her report and display. That being said, she has been working on the research for the last couple of weeks now so putting the final report and display together tonight wasn’t too big of a project.

Anne’s project was the same old paper towel project that we’ve done for the past two years. After the third year in a row of that project I put my foot down and said that nobody can do paper towels again. No surprising results in this project. While it probably won’t win an award it is certainly worth a good grade.

Anne’s Display

Emily’s project was “Effects of Soft Water on a Seed”. I was actually interested in doing this project with Emily to determine if watering seeds with soft water would hurt them. Emily’s project produced surprising results in that the seeds watered with soft water sprouted faster and grew faster than the hard water seeds. We were expecting soft water seeds to do worse because soft water is reputedly bad for plants due to the high salt content.

Emily’s Display

One thing that might have produced unexpected results was that the water temperature of soft water is warmer than that of hard water. This is due to the fact that soft water goes through the indoor water softener first while hard water comes in directly from outside. I think I’ll try the experiment again when I start my garden seedlings in a month or two and see if better controlling the water temperature produces a different outcome.

Overall I thought the girls both did a good job on their projects and I’m glad that we’re done for this year. Next year Emily will be in Middle School where science fair isn’t a requirement and Texas will be in 3rd grade where it is also not a requirement. Thus, we’ll only have Anne’s project next year…

…Horselers.

Houston, We Have A Young Woman

Brian — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 03:26:23 +0000

Emily’s really looked forward to her 12th birthday because she finally would graduate from Primary and join the Young Women’s organization. It’s been quite interesting thinking about her being in Young Women’s. She definitely isn’t a little girl any more. She had her interview with the Bishop and worked on Faith in God tasks right up until the last minute but was able to complete everything in time. I’m a bit disappointed in the Faith in God program for Primary girls – not the program itself but the fact that there really is no award at the end. Just a signature by the Bishop and Primary President in the back of the booklet – not even a certificate or anything else to hang on the wall. The cub scouts get beads and badges and I even had that cool looking torch where you could stick a little button on each article of faith you memorized. But the girls get nothing. Just an “atta girl” and that’s all. Nancy thinks chapels should be built with a Priesthood Room because they all have Relief Society rooms. I think primary girls should get some type of little trinket or something when they complete their Faith in God.

Emily’s birthday party was just a low-key family affair and with the YW presidency coming over to visit, and meeith with the Bishop, and getting ready for Young Women’s, I don’t think Emily minded a bit that she didn’t have a friend party. Happy Birthday to Emily and here’s hoping that the soon-to-be-upon-us teenage years can go relatively smoothly.

Blee’s first sewing project

Nancy — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 06:18:19 +0000

I have been helping Emily finish her faith in God award for Primary. One of the things she had to do was to make something and display it. So I helped her make an apron for her first ever foray into sewing. She did a great job for her first try.

Guess Who’s Twelve?

Nancy — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 05:56:55 +0000

I have always told my girls that they had to wait until they are twelve before they could get their ears pierced. Even though Emily won’t be twelve for a few more days, Saturday is the best day to go because there is no school and Anne can stay home and babysit. Earlier in the week I searched on the internet for places to get your ears pierced. I was definitely not going to go to a shady place in SLC so I decided on a store in the mall. So we were off to Claire’s, but what I didn’t realize was that it would be really busy because of all the Christmas shoppers. There was only one clerk in the store so we had to wait a little while until another showed up. Finally the time came to get it done. Emily was slightly nervous, but she did a great job,she only flinched a little bit when the earrings went in.

Emily is happy but nervous

Emily is happy and grateful it’s over.

Piano Recital

Brian — Fri, 15 Jun 2007 05:41:28 +0000

Emily and Anne had their piano recital this evening. One thing I like about this teacher is that she makes the kids memorize the pieces and she makes them bow. Both Emily and Anne did a pretty good job (a few mistakes here and there). I think they’re progressing fairly well. Now if I can only get Caroline to make progress.

Anne playing “Jericho”

NOTE: This is the first time I’ve uploaded video to the internet so we’ll see how it goes. I’m using YouTube for now so that their bandwidth is consumed and not my own; however, Nancy is fussing over the fact that the video is on YouTube – she has some fear that people will use it for nefarious purposes. We’ll see how it goes…

NOTE 2: The knocking sound is an artifact of when I transferred the video from the camera to the computer. I’ll have to mess with my video transfer settings and figure out why that is occuring.

Emily playing a sonatina

In past recitals, Grandma or Grandpa has been there and have taken the kids out for a treat afterwards. I didn’t really want to go out for a treat this time but I was the only one (I could tell Nancy was campaigning to not have to go home and make dinner) so I got outvoted. Nancy chose the place: Iceberg Drive Inn. (Yes, it’s really spelled that way). Not my favorite place but Nancy sure likes it.

I think her favorite thing about Iceberg is the the shakes. The big shake in the picture is called a “mini-shake”. I would hate to see what the large size looks like…