Another Semester, Another Family Music Night

I have mentioned before, I am sure, that we have been taking our daughter to a music class regularly for a while now. It's done by semester, and we just wrapped up our fifth semester of the class. For each semester you get a CD of songs that will be sung throughout the term, each CD focusing on a different instrument. This semester the focus was bongos. It's a ton of fun, and Baby Girl seems to love it. The class we attend is actually also taught by a dear friend, so that makes it even better. At the end of each fall and spring semester, there is a Family Music Night, which is an extended session that all of the teachers and students in the program attend. They get a live band to perform the songs from the semester as well as a few other fun tunes, and everyone basically parties down. Family Music Night for this semester was this past Wednesday, so I have a new crop of photos and videos of Baby Girl being super cute and getting her groove on.

Here she is dancing it up with her shaker eggs:

She loves to see the band. So much so that she tried to sneak up on to the stage with them:

Here she is dancing with her daddy:

Here are some more moments of awesomeness for you:

Eggs?

I'll be honest, I have no idea, but so cute!

Oh, hello there.

She really dug the ceiling fixtures.

Dancing with Daddy.

Um, I may have closed the egg in the car door,
purely on accident, mind you.

Whee!

Shake shake shake!

I love maracas!

I must organize them all...

...just right!

Time to climb on Mommy!

Stealing Daddy's hat now.

What?

Family shot!

Playing with her new frog guiro, spoils of the evening.

This frog is awesome!

It was raining like nuts, which is why we are all a bit bedraggled, but it was still oodles of fun. They had an instrument "petting zoo" set up too, where you could peruse various types of bongos and chimes and other such percussion instruments. We checked it out afterwards (since we arrived a little late due to said rain) and ended up getting Baby Girl a really cool wooden guiro carved in the shape of a frog. This is awesome because she loves frogs and because we bought it at TCU.

If you are wondering about the poor mutilated shaker egg, I had it in an outside pocket of my purse and when I was getting Baby Girl out of the car, it fell out unbeknownst to me and landed just inside the door frame. So when I went to shut the door...oops. The dent doesn't really seem to be hindering its performance at all, so there's that.

Anyhoo, that's another semester of fun music and memories wrapped up. We start back up in January. I think this semester the instrument of choice is bells. I'll be curious to see what the musical selections are. I do love the CDs we get with the class--you get two copies of each album so you can play one in the home and keep one in the car, which is kind of neat. They always include a great mixture of old folk songs from lots of different cultures, as well as the "Hello" and "Goodbye" songs that we sing at the beginning of each class.

If you've got little ones and are looking for a fun developmental course to do with them, I highly recommend this one. Our class is mixed ages from zero to four years, and the program we use (Music Together), which is phenomenal, has programs designed for up to seven years old. We take ours at TCU, as I mentioned, through their Music Preparatory Division.

Bragging on My Kid

So, I may or may not have mentioned this, but ever since this summer, we've been taking my daughter to a weekly music class.  It's a mixed ages (0 to 4 years) class using the Music Together curriculum and it is being offered at the college my husband and I both attended.  We absolutely love this class, as does Baby Girl.  Each semester the songs chosen focus around a particular instrument.  For the summer it was the tambourine and this past semester it has been the flutes.  The basic idea is to get your kid exposed to a variety of songs and to get them to sing and dance along and learn some of the underlying principles of music without sitting them through a lecture or anything.  Also, it gives them a chance to socialize with other kids in a decently sized group (our summer class had three kids total, this semester has ranged from six to twelve).

Last Friday was the last regular class of the semester, but last night was Family Music Night.  Held in the TCU ballroom, it was a whole big event--all of the kids from every class, along with their parents (and other family) were invited.  All of the teachers were there, and they even hired a band to play a lot of the songs from class, as well as a few holiday tunes (and Twist and Shout).  It was a wonderful kind of organized chaos.  Usually in class, Baby Girl hangs out in the middle of the circle dancing the whole time, periodically playing with the other kids or the teachers.  Last night I think she was a bit overwhelmed, but she did still seem to have fun.  Mostly she just wandered around holding a pair of rhythm sticks or her shaker.  Though she did swoop in and pick up a few shaker eggs that less attentive kids had dropped.  (Something tells me she is going to enjoy a few of the items in her Christmas stocking!)

Here are a few quick videos of the event (I don't think I am singing on either of these, but if I am, I totally apologize to your ears):

(This kid knows an iPhone when she sees one.)

Here are a few still photos as well:

She's still not quite awake here (woke up early from nap time).

I have no idea why they are both making faces, but I love it.

It's always go go go with this one.

Hubby, Baby Girl, and me.

After the music class, we went out to dinner.  We got my daughter the kid's cheeseburger meal (with a mini-cheeseburger) and since I was getting fries with my dinner, I figured I could share them with her and ordered her broccoli for her side.  I mentioned the other day that we got lucky with this kid.  Here is a prime example of why.  She totally ignored her cheeseburger until after I had removed all the bread (she really is not digging bread) and just gave her some bits of hamburger.  Instead, she dived right into the broccoli and ate it with gusto.

I have photographic evidence of this, if you don't believe me.

Broccoli!

Yum, yum.

I'll take that, please, Daddy.

She is getting pretty good at using a fork.  You might notice in those pictures that she has a tortilla chip in her hand (Hubby and I got spinach artichoke dip for an appetizer).  She won't eat bread but she loves her some tortilla chips.  She also recently noticed that when we eat them, we tend to dip them in stuff and wanted to try it out on her own.  So last night when we gave her a chip, she looked around for the salsa, and when we produced it, she went straight for it.

Observe:

Seriously, there is no way her father or I could ever say she's not our kid.  It's a good thing we've decided to keep her, I guess.

Anyhoo, that's it for today.  I just wanted to share the awesomeness that is my child.  Also, I want to get it on the record that she likes veggies now, in case (when) she changes her mind later.

Starting tomorrow I have a special holiday countdown series I am going to be doing for you guys.  I am really super excited about it and hope you will enjoy it!  Until then, I hope you have a fantastic today!