Big 10,000

We've reached 10,000! Woohoo!

An Early End of Year Concert

Today was the big End of Year Concert at the music school I teach at. It's not really the end of the year as there is still Term Four to go, but because of renovations to the school hall and the November elections, it was decided to bring it forward to the end of Term Three.

I've been preparing my students for the past three weeks, trying to get them ready and so I was probably more nervous than they were before the concert! 

I asked them all to get to the school half an hour before the concert as I wanted to have a run through with them. The recorders would be the first to perform, then the flutes and then the violins. 

I got half of them to practise with Aonghas on the keyboard while I practised with the other half of them just to save time. 

We only just had enough time to have a group photo before the concert started!

My first year students started off the concert, performing Easter Bunny, Playing in Parts and Two Birds Together. I was a little worried about them as one of them went camping and so missed last week's lesson. The most pleasant surprise was that they played very well!

My first second year class then performed Puff the Magic Dragon, Triplet Round and Little Brown Jug with Aonghas on keyboard. They also did very well which made me very proud, as they must've practised heaps over the past week!

My next second year class performed Donna Nobis Pacem, I Like the Flowers and When Johnny Comes Marching Home with Aonghas on keyboard.

My last second year class (who I've taught the treble recorder to) performed Scarborough Fair, Putta Nera Ballo Furlano and The World in Union (to get in the Rugby World Cup spirit!). The tunes involving all four of the different recorders sounded really neat!

To finish off the recorder section of the concert, I got all my students to come up to perform It's a Small World. Even though I had practised the song with everyone only once earlier this morning before the concert, they managed to pull it off! I was so proud of my students!

After the recorders were done, the flute students performed. Rebecca, Joylynn and Nadine who go to the same church as me all performed, and I also saw some of my ex-students which was really cool!

The violins finished off the concert. Nadine also learns violin so she performed with her class, and our class performed last.

It was really good to see all the students performing today and I was so proud of my recorder students! I had a lot of positive comments from parents and other teachers so I can relax a bit now, and just hope I don't lose too many students to other instruments next year!

Cake Does the Trick

Tomorrow is the pharmacist manager at our pharmacy Aula's birthday, so the rest of us thought we'd surprise her with a birthday cake! Jenny, one of the pharmacy technicians bought a cake and we all shared the cost.

I think it made our pharmacist happy, because she offered to buy me a coffee or hot chocolate in the morning! 

It made for a very easy-going day at work! 

Happy Birthday Aula for tomorrow!

Joyboy's Birthday

We had church service today and it was Joylynn's birthday, so I rushed to buy a cake for her in the morning before the service (OK well maybe just as it started!) and then returned to church. Fortunately I didn't miss too much.

When I got there though the hall was full and a certain someone was supposed to reserve a seat for me but didn't, so I ended up sitting by myself!

 After service though we found Joylynn and were about to surprise her with the cake, but her dad (who's our church's pastor as well!) had also brought little cupcakes for her too! It looks like she was going to have a big feed today!

Catching the RWC Fever

On our way home after dropping Aonghas off at work in the city, we thought we'd stop by one of those discount stores and join in on the fun by buying a couple flags for our car! 

We originally got just one silver fern flag but then our dad, who initially thought the whole idea was a waste of money, asked if there were any Scotland flags! We've got Scottish roots on his side of the family, you see.

Hopefully Scotland beat England tonight, so we can continue to fly the Scottish flag!

It's amazing just how many people are getting into the Rugby World Cup! We passed a KFC that has been decked out in black...

When we visited Geoff's Emporium which is full of costumes, it was really busy! I'm guessing everyone was preparing for the game tonight! I met up with Janey, an old Dessert Club Committee friend who is going to the game. Hopefully the weather holds up!