Not our swan song

Yesterday was the last season concert of the Kamuela Philharmonic. We performed Mozart Symphony No. 39 in Eb Major, Vaughan Williams Tuba Concerto in f minor, and Bizet's Symphony No. 1 in C. A Tuba sandwich, as our maestra called it.

Hawaii Preparatory Academy is undergoing several changes. And one unfortunate change might include the departure of our beloved conductor. We are hoping for the best and maybe everything will turn out just fine. I cannot imagine no longer playing with the symphony. The entire orchestra members have donated our time for five years simply because of what music means to us and what it provides for the community. 

I would have held it together better when we stood up to bow and thank and acknowledge our conductor, but when I saw sweet old Joel (a violinist in second violin who reminds me of my fiddler grandfather Beebop) crying, that just did me in. 

On a happier note, tomorrow I am picking up my PARENTS from the airport for a nice long visit! My dad hasn't been here since we got married in Hawaii almost four years ago! Today's mission is to clean the house! So I better get sweepin!

The One (wo)Man Band

            A students mom made beautiful hair pieces for us teachers at the auction
I am a little behind schedule in blogging current events, but last Saturday I was the one (wo)man band for my school's annual fund raiser auction. I serenaded at the door's entrance and greeted our guests. Then after the auction I played my steel pan while folks paid for the auction items they won during bidding. 

I was the evenings final auction item: Miss Jessica and her music classes at Waimea Country school. I had my Level 4 students play 4 little ditties on their fiddles. Then I got up and made the following speech:

"The experience and opportunity to learn to play and care for an instrument; playing amongst a group of your peers; and performing together in the community JUST like you saw this evening is absolutely priceless. It builds self esteem, discipline, confidence, talent, character and simply opens so many doors in the future. As a musician who has walked through these doors, I want to give to my students now what was given to me as a student: A positive life long experience with music. Please keep me, and music, alive and thriving at Waimea County School. Mahalo".

Bidding started at $1,000 and tapered down by hundred dollar increments. People raised their paddles while my principal wrote down their bidding numbers. I strolled around the room playing cheerful fiddle music. In the end, I raised $5,000 for the music program next year! So Waimea Country school can employ me for another wonderful school year and I can invest in more violins and stringed instruments for the students. 

Particular Lenticular Clouds

                     A Lenticular UFO cloud above Mauna Kea as seen from my porch
                           And her sister ship to the left of Mauna Kea
                                 Lenticular clouds will ONLY form above mountains
          NOT my photo, but a super cool Lenticular Cloud above Mauna Kea at sunset
My #2 favorite type of cloud formation. I took a great picture once but can't seem to locate it!
My #3 favorite type of cloud formation. Strange that I seem to love only ultra high cloud formation types! 
  We see the "thunder cloud" quite often here in Hawaii. I love watching them build up like giant towers. 

Should I get my head out of the clouds? I just love them! One of the many interesting and strange things to be seen in Hawaii. Another bizarre viewing experience here are the night rainbows. On misty rainy evenings with a full moon, a night rainbow will form. It looks just like a rainbow, only it's a silver arc. I've seen two since living here. Once with my brother Kristopher and once with Alex. 

Alexsphere

And in current events for Alex, he passed the LEED exam on Wednesday. So now he is LEED AP. He said it was the hardest test he has ever taken his whole life (including college). After taking and passing the test, he said suddenly the world looked differently. Colors were brighter. Birds chirped more merrily. 

Also, he launched his website! Click HERE to see the Woodbury Green Building homepage. 

Made the paper today!

Click HERE to read an article in the newspaper today. This Saturday I am playing violin with my Level 4 string class to raise money to keep music at Waimea Country School next year! Above is a picture of my collection of newspapers and magazines from 2008-2009 I have been featured in! A busy year! 

(If you double click the photo it will enlarge and you can read the headlines. In the picture of the Philharmonic, I'm the 3rd stand in the first violin on the outside wearing black boots! (Not a good day to try out a risque outfit!)

Handy Gal Jessie's 6 simple steps to installing a hose bib

                             1. Place a "saddle" over your irrigation pipe line
                     2. Tighten nuts and bolts on each side of the saddle
3. Drill a hole in the center ring of the saddle.
4. Apply teflon tape to the bottom of the hose bib
5. Twist the hose bib into the hole of the saddle
     6. Attach the hole to the faucet and Voila! You've got yourself a working hose!

OK this isn't the most exciting St. Patrick's Day. Alex is currently on Oahu studying to take his LEED exam tomorrow. I forgot to wear green today and was subsequently pinched by all my little green munchkin students. I told them I don't have to wear green. I have some actual Irish blood running through my veins, thanks to Great Grandmother Isobel Greene! See, there is even Greene is my family name! Today is Alex's Grandma Ruth's wedding anniversary. I wanted to honor them and marry my 100% Irish husband (OK he's a little bit Welch too) on St. Patty's day in '05, but it was a horrible time for relatives to come out for a Hawaii visit. Summer deemed a more suitable time and worked out splendidly. 

I wish all my readers a very lucky St. Patrick's Day! 

A Princess and her Toad

I love taking a chore and making it a game. (this love of mine will come in handy when we have children one day!) When we are doing yard work and Alex wants me to put the giant Hapu Fern Prawns in the compost, rather than carry them away like a normal person, I love to take 2 of them under each arm and flap around the yard like a giant bird. This evening, he wanted me to carry a tarp and cover a pile of sand left over from the rock wall. But rather than carry it away like a normal person, I chose to pretend to be a Queen with a long train trailing behind me. And wouldn't you know! The Frog Prince chose to hop out into the street right when I was walking by! I already have 2 Princes (Alex and Moki) so I didn't feel the need to kiss this frog and turn him into a handsome prince. And don't worry, no frogs were harmed in the making of my film!

I see you readers!

Behold ladies and gentlemen,

If you scroll down to the very very bottom of my blog screen you will see a new yellow box with a number in it. That is how many people have viewed my blog as of March 14th! For those of you with blogspot.com blogs, simply click my yellow box and it will automatically bring you to StatCounter. If you click "Register now" it is free, quick, simply, and automatically gives you step by step instructions on how to put a ticker on your blog! 

Today I repotted 35 baby trees that I have propagated from seeds. I went on a baby tree scavenger hunt today and crawled under some of our big Koa trees looking for her babies. I always love finding baby trees under a big thriving brambly mother tree (and I hope her apples don't fall far from the tree because my theory is healthy beautiful trees should produce healthy beautiful baby trees right?!) And to my glee a beautiful Koa tree out front had 4 thriving baby trees growing underneath her motherly limbs!

A daily dose of music

The conductor posted a video of one of our concerts last season on youtube. Click HERE to see the Kamuela  Philharmonic orchestra playing Dvorak Symphony No. 9 from the New World. I am sitting 3rd stand in the first violin section. I was incredibly sick but luckily the cough syrup I was downing during intermission kicked in during the Largo movement. I dreaded the thought of having a coughing fit during such slow, quiet music! We have our spring concert coming up on March 28th. 

The Mysterious Mist and Mutant Carrots

    A Tripod Carrot. We got the little mutant from the farmers market.
              Where did the lot go?
      The stack of Eucalyptus trees hidden in the super thick fog
                         The real Gorilla in the Mist

I will admit I am getting soft after living in Hawaii for six years. But living in the Pacific North Wet we gardened in the rain. We exercised in the rain. We played frisbee with the dog in the rain. We walked to classes in the rain. We trick or treated in the rain. And we never seemed to notice it or complain. So our neighbors think we are nuts when Alex and I do those exact same things on rainy Hawaii days. And when I say I'm getting soft, I DO sometimes find myself feeling cold when it's anything below 70. I complain when it's cloudy. When it is incredibly rainy I think "School has GOT to be cancelled today right?! Nobody can teach in weather like this!" 

In this blog entry you will hear my notorious monkey call. I haven't made that sound in about 5 years so it's a little rusty. I prefer to make this silly noise in the privacy of my own house and not in public where neighbors and children can hear and  become confused or scared. Although, the last time I publicly made my chimpanzee noise we were all in the underground parking garage of the movie theatre after seeing Planet of the Apes. I made my chimp sound and it echoed throughout the parking lot so all the other people who had just seen the Ape movie could hear. Alex was a little embarrassed at first, but then admitted "Wow, that was actually pretty perfect!" 

And finally, I wanted to tell a little story for my Grandpa John, who loves my blog. I was asked to be a guest speaker on Thursday for the rotary club. It was held at a nice restaurant in town, so I also played my violin while people ate. Then I stood behind the podium and talked about my teaching philosophy and what music education has meant to me. Normally I find public speaking to be very painful for me. But I felt very comfortable and confident talking about music education. Alex was there (as a member of the rotary) and said I did a great job. I thought of my grandpa John and my grandpa Pop Pop the whole time because I know how much they both love the rotary and would be so proud of me!

Jessie lays some pipe

                                  A Monkey holding her wrench!
Oh yes, it was super fun trying to uncoil 500 feet of thick pipe! It was like wrestling with a giant snake spring!
Alex taught me that you have to put a plastic PVC pipe sleeve over the steel rod so that copper and steel don't touch and produce "electro galvanic corrosion". This type of corrosion occurs when any 2 dissimilar metals touch each other. 

Jessie rides the Dingo with the fence hole driller attachment!

Oh man! Another productive weekend on the Woodbury Lot. We laid 500 feet of pipe in 2 days installing an irrigational system on the lot. It would have cost close to 10 grand to hire this work out, so it was well worth the sore muscles today! I think Alex forgets I'm not a man though. He certainly uses me like I'm a man capable of lifting, hauling, trenching, shoveling, and wrenching! Saturday the weather was raining, windy, and in the high 30's!!! Can you believe that?! HAWAII! We were soaked to the bone freezing cold. I don't ever remember being so cold even in Bellingham in the winter. Sunday had better weather and we were able to get much more done. I told Alex last night that I think we spend 95% of every weekend entirely outside. We usually start the outdoor gardening/work at about 9am and don't come inside again till 8pm. This weekend we also started the fencing project. We used the Dingo to drill holes and we have eucalyptus and ohia fence posts ready to be put in the holes. Yep, it's always something!