this girl ...

...just got voted "most musical," by her 8th grade class.

The beginning of quarantine was tough for her.  Everyday she'd come into my office:

"We should be performing in Simi today..."
"What are we doing today?"
"We would be having our dance today."
"We'd be on Spring Tour today."
"Can we go to the beach tomorrow?"

She was pretty mad about her social life being put on indefinite hold.

Two months later it's down to:

"What are we doing today"
"Can we go to the beach tomorrow?"

She's definitely less angry which is nice.

I get it, no music trip, no Washington D.C. trip, no 8th grade dance, no 8th grade promotion event (which has been rescheduled as a "drive through" event -- that will be interesting) and probably 6+ music performances cancelled.  It really isn't fair.  I keep telling her, at least she's not a high school senior.

She has been doing a lot of solo music.  She has started composing using software which I for one think is pretty impressive (yes, I'm her mom, but still).

All in all we've settled into quarantine life pretty nicely.  The girls and I have found our weekday rhythm and I have to admit -- it's not terrible.

The Sounds of a Pandemic

Oddly enough the COVID-19 pandemic has not changed my schedule exceedingly.  If anything I have more time as I no longer have to drive people to school and then pick up and drive around to various practices after school.  No joke, this probably gives me anywhere between 2-3 hours more a day.

But, the tradeoff is I am no longer alone in my office (house).  The number of interruptions in my work day is countless.  Questions about their school work, how to email an image to a group when they have email accounts that are limiting, how to crop an image for an assignment, how to change a document into a .pdf, questions about how to get answers from a counselor, etc.  

I guess I should be happy they are cute little faces popping in ...  

But, clearly as the image shows those regular interruptions are also accompanied by quite a bit of noise.  

And, yes that is a saxophone.  Katie convinced her music teacher to loan it to her before school let out.  

The sounds of guitar, ukulele, clarinet and now saxophone fill the air at all hours of the day and night in house of the Little Wickies.

Katie has started composing, which can be frustrating for her as in her words "I can't get what's in my head into this program!"  And, she really has no one to help her as this is way out of my league.  A snippet of the intro she has been working on:

Mo has been teaching her "sisters" Lani and Keera to play uke. They made "The Coronavirus Song."  If you listen, make sure to have the Closed Captions (CC) on so you can see the lyrics.

I am so happy they have music in their lives ... but, man it's loud around here these days!

The Rolling Who?

Katie:  Kaleo is going to play in LA can we go?

Me:  When, where?

Katie:  They are opening for the Rolling Stones

Right, we are going to buy tickets to see the Rolling Stones ... so we can see their opener.

Good band, but we'll have to wait to see them when they come back on their own tour.

In the meantime here is Katie singing "No Good" by Kaleo at Rockshop Academy.

See other videos of her playing here.

the state of things

Summer can be hard when you work from home and kids have to stay busy (and quiet) while mom writes and conducts phone calls.  This is especially difficult for my non-homebody KT who itches to get out and "do something."  The days she is not in a camp/clinic during the day is seemingly torture for her.  She is always sure to let me know about her agonizing state -- repeatedly.

But, she sure is cute.

Mo on the other hand is fairly content playing with slime and watching YouTube slime videos in between doing her mom-mandated-stop-your-brain-from-going-to-mush curriculum.

Part of this "curriculum" is doing music daily.  For KT, I never had to employ any type of requirement so I was a little worried about doing so for Mo this summer.  To my relief she has taken to it beautifully -- and, has progressed immensely as a result.  I can't tell you how much I love hearing  both of them play and sing...

Dog, and dog-cat have been well, lazy as usual, mostly in part because it has been hot!

If not sleeping, this guy just looks at me with sad eyes throughout the day. 

Dog-cat sleeps in his perch in Mo's room through most of the morning, and then sneaks onto dog's bed in the afternoon for some rays.

Have to say though, would way rather be with these characters than in an office any day.

These American Girls are Heartbroken

RIP Tom Petty.

getting exposed

to Queen.

Watched a couple Queen videos with the girls tonight.

KT:  Is that a girl singing?

Mo:  Their hair is poofy.

KT:  That one looks like Sally Ride.

Mo:  He wears weird clothes.

KT:  He's really sweaty.  He looks like daddy after basketball.

Mo:  I think he just bit the microphone!

the hills/car/bathroom/backyard are alive

You know how Maria in the Sound of Music can't help but sing even though she's not supposed to sing as a wanna-be future nun?

That's kinda like KT (minus the nun-to-be part).  She's always singing.

self-portrait with her iPod

This summer she was belting out Adele in the car with her earbuds on a long road trip.  It was so fantastic, but we had to stop ourselves from laughing out loud because she would be none. too. happy.

1977

That's when Tom Petty released the song "American Girl."

KT covered last night in her school talent show, and while it seemed to play a little more to the grown ups in the crowd, I think she did great (but I am her mom).

It was so dark I wasn't able to video it -- we are getting a video later apparently.

In the meantime, here she is at the dress rehearsal.  KT singing Tom Petty's "American Girl" on her uke...


Note:  YouTube has different screen dimensions than what I recorded it in, and I have no idea how to compensate for that, so excuse her head getting cut off from time to time!

the band

Katie and her friend Parker have been talking about starting their band for awhile now.

They've discussed playlists, literally drawn out who will be playing what instruments and where they will stand.  A litany of friends will hypothetically be "in" the band in any given discussion.

They've done just about everything except actually play together.

The other night they test-drove some instruments at Parker's house.

"I think I should still play the ukulele and Parker play the piano though," Katie told me later.

Can't wait for the first time they "play out."

In the meantime, here are some "performances" for you fans (a.k.a. uncles, aunts and grandparents) out there.

Father's Day song.



Video from her school's variety show.

performances galore

This year has been filled with a number of stage performances.  (This post will probably be most appreciated by the grandparents).

Most recently Katie played Annie (again) in a talent show.

Unfortunately she didn't wear the wig during the performance (she thought people would laugh at her).



In a milestone performance Katie actually talked her sister into performing with her which was huge as Maddie seems to shy away from the stage.

Here is their rendition of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" from the Lion King.



I also realized I hadn't posted her talent show performance from earlier this year for those of you following Katie's career closely...

uke school

Halmoni was gracious enough to give us some spending money for our vacation last month.

With her permission we decided to buy ukuleles -- one for Katie and one for me and Papa Wickie.

Ironically, we bought our ukes from this guy (below middle) whose picture we saw at the nearby Kaliua music store.

Later we bought his album which is pretty good!

We purchased a soprano uke for Katie and a concert uke for the grown ups.

We have been having a ball with them.  We've been trying to get Katie to strum with her pointer finger, but she's intent on doing it her way for now.

Our friend Will has promised to give us some actual lessons soon which we are looking forward to immensely.  But until then...

snippets of xmas

Lots going on in the land of the Little Wickies.

Katie taught Mo about her mantra "more is better" when decorating our gingerbread house.

Because even in Candyland, there are hoarders...

Katie sang at the Christmas Eve service.

Mo slept through the Christmas Eve service.

We visited huge Christmas light displays.

In the midst of the melee of the weekend, Katie lost her second tooth.

And, then there was Christmas day itself.

There was the inevitable chaos of kids ripping into presents

And, smiling faces.

And of course, there were the surprise "big hit" gifts like the voice enhancers that no one seemed to be able to put down.

Hope you and your family had a Merry one!

it's loud in hear right now

While I do enjoy thrifting, flea markets and the sort, garage sales usually aren't my thing because -- well, to be frank I'm not a morning person.

Last weekend we somehow ended up at a garage sale and on a whim, bought a piano.

Now, while the purchase was definitely a spur-of-the-moment thing, a handful of conversations had taken place about getting one. We knew exactly where we'd put it, etc.

We had been thinking about how to incorporate music in a fun way into our house. All the stars aligned that morning: Papa was with us, the price was right, it's perfect size for our tiny house, the guy selling it had a truck and was uber-willing to bring it over.

I need to get it tuned, but so far I really like having it. I've been fingering out old sonatas that have been lingering in my mind for years.

I put little post-its on the keys so Katie can finger out some tunes.

But I can't seem to play without ending up with sticky notes all over my fingers. I don't want to put actual stickers on the keys, so I may have to brainstorm another solution.

Needless to say the Little Wickies love it.

Would love to hear any tips you might have regarding how you incorporate music into your family's lives, if you teach your kids music yourselves, etc.