Violin & Volleyball

Have I mentioned to y'all that I am learning to play the violin? Yes, another instrument. But it is my first string (not counting the guitar). I started at the end on January and I have recently mastered Old McDonald well enough that my five year old foster kiddo can sing along and she actually asked me to play it again. And Patrick told me that it is almost starting to sound like music. Go me! I will upload a video soon so you all cane share in my musical stylings.

Patrick is playing rec league Volleyball and he had his first practice this weekend. He, ofcourse, is the star, but I'm not sure about the rest of his group. Lets all cross our fingers that his team doesn't get slaughtered next week in their first game.

Last Weekend

My mom was supposed to come for the weekend, but she was scared away by the rain. SO, Patrick and were left with her theater tickets to see Cybil Sheppard in a one-woman show in the city. She was funny, but as usual Patrick and I were the youngest people in the audience. Granted, the show was about a woman in her late 50s starting to internet date, but WHERE are you, young cultured couples? She was hilarious and graphic. Patrick picked to go out for Indian food after, so we ran down the street in the pouring rain until we found a cheesy looking place. The food was great and I had a particularly good mango Lassi. (Cheryll would have hated it! She's anti curry.) On the way back to the car, we got trapped behind the Chinese New Year Parade. My camera is still in Sac so photos coming soon.

Family Massage

So in my emergency foster care group meeting we had a speaker teaching and talking about the power of touch. She taught about how to do infant and child massage. I am not sure how I feel about all this touching people business, but she did have a little research about the brain and learning through touch. She shared this one study about Sweden, I think. Apparently the whole country is doing massage in the schools from k-12 grade. And one benefit was that children's self drawings started out just heads and bodies, but after about a month of hand and foot massage, their drawings sprouted limbs and digits. Interesting. What do y'all think?

Dead Presidents

Patrick had Monday off! Shocking, I know! We went to Sacto to see the family and let me say how adorable Owen is now. He is talking, playing and walking a few steps. We were gonna try to get to Tahoe again, but Patrick slept instead. C'est la vie. We saw some movies and otherwise just hung out. Patrick also got me a new phone and I tried to take pictures of everyone with it so that when they call, their faces will pop up on the phone. Such a good toy.

Valentines

Patrick is trying to sabatoge me! I have been so fabulous about working and not eating junk (I have to get sexy for Jambo's wedding pictures.) and he brings home this giant box of fancy chocolates. And it gets worse. Never in my life have I eaten an entire box of candy myself...........until now. I have no explanation for this lapse in self-control. For days, I meant to bring these gourmet goodies to work to share, but somehow forgot until the whole thing was gone. Curses! I will be eating nothing but plain salad for the next month.

On Saturday, we went out to dinner at Meritage or Martini Oyster Bar and Grill (yes, it has two names and I have no idea why). When we walked in, the front host ignored us and continued to work on her seating charts for ten minutes as if we weren't standing there. HEllllO, customers waiting, so rude! We had moderately tasty salad, but my entree was bland, tasteless fish with overcooked sides of soggy veggies and dry potato wedges. I was gearing up for a repeat of Josefs, but this time the waiter notice my distaste and offer to get me something else as well as take the offensive item off our bill. So decided to give them another chance and ordered a cheese plate to accompany my apple tart. Shock and awe is how we felt when the next course came out and we tasted it. I don't know who the pastry chef is, but he needs to take over the entire old school kitchen and teach the chef and thing or two. Patrick claimed that his creme brulee (in a cookie shell, not the boring old ramekin) was the best he had ever tasted. Even the dessert dishes were more interesting than the dinner plates. Perhaps the Meritage part of the name belongs to the desserts. 2.5 stars

Afterwards, we attended a Billy Holiday tribute show. The woman told about the singer's life in between performing songs. In turns out that she was really scandalous. She was a prostitute at age 13, she couldn't read or write music and she was a civil rights activist. Now, I like her even more than I did before.

Hope you all had a lovely Valentine's Day as well.

Tahoe Cancelled

So about two weeks ago on Friday, we were all packed and ready to go to the snow. Patrick was all stoked to try some new skis and I was gearing up for yet more snowboarding lesson and ............... Surprise, we got another call about a kiddo. She is five years old and just as sweet as can be. We don't think she'll be with us long due to her large extended family, but she is the reason we have been Blogger MIA. Needless to say we never made it to the snow, but stayed home to get her settled.