Music Lessons and Mattresses

Okay, so first of all, this week, we got a new mattress. Hooray! When I was in Vermont I slept on a mattress as hard as a brick. Seriously. I have pretty messed up hips and lower back from pregnancy that are not getting better and sleeping at home has sometimes been excruciatingly painful, no matter how many pillows I put between my legs or behind my back etc, etc,. I can judge how bad my hips are based on how easy it is to pop them and how loud the pop.

In Vermont, my hips barely hurt at all during the night, thanks to the rock hard mattress. I was shocked. I had no idea a mattress could make such a difference. Then I came home and it was right back to excruciating hip pain during the night. I felt how my ten-year old, never very good in the first place, mattress sagged in all the wrong places, didn't support me at all, etc., etc.

So we got a new one! And it is so much better! It's not as rock hard as the Vermont one (for Sam's sake) so I can't sleep on my stomach, but I can sleep on my side without pain.

I highly recommend new mattresses. We got the cheapest one we could through Costco, and it will be just fine (although the fancy memory foam ones were very tempting)

Now, to Music Lessons:

If you ever want to learn about your children's personalities, have them take Suzuki music lessons and become their parent teacher.

Mary learning the viola: Rushing, fast, not methodical in how she learns songs, very artistic, has a beautiful sound, does dynamics on her own, easy to calm down, fairly patient with herself (as long as a friend isn't waiting to play), seems to enjoy playing for the most part.

Lucy learning cello: Also fast, but very methodical about learning the notes. She can hear the music and pick things out very quickly. She has cruised through her books and is surpassing everyone she started with. She is not patient. At all. If she doesn't get something, she loses her temper immediately and stomps around with her giant cello saying how stupid everything is. She doesn't seem to enjoy the musical aspect of cello so much as learning the songs (never puts dynamics in on her own, has a hard time making things sound more beautiful). Very structured in her practicing.

Calvin learning cello: Patient. Very patient. So patient I have to tell him all the time to pick up the speed. Not stressed. Not methodical, but he seems to enjoy what he does. Doesn't ever really want to practice, but doesn't resist too much. Everything is sort of a big game to him, a challenge. He likes to be funny while he practices and purposefully do the wrong thing.

I could take cello and music out of these paragraphs (along with a few other changes) and give you my children's approach to everything.

So if you ever want to learn how to understand your children better, teach them music!

(or sports, or probably anything else, I would guess!)

I will try to post some pictures if I can find the camera battery charger. Tee hee hee