First post of the year?!! Sheesh.

I am so bad about updating this thing. I can't believe that the last time I updated this was right after Ben's 1st birthday. Whoa.

He's now nearly 19 months, which is such a fun age. He is extremely mobile, increasingly interactive (to the dismay of our three cats), and very smart. Certain things about his behavior continue to amaze and interest me. For example, when I was little I loved to color with crayons and would do so for hours. Ben, however, is more interested in getting them out of the box and then putting them back in, getting them back out again, nibbling on the ends, and shoving them in the spiral of the sketch book he occasionally stabs violently with these poor crayons. Maybe it's a guy thing.

It's also fascinating how he prefers certain books (Diggers, Trucks, Things That Go, Planes, Goodnight Moon, Goodnight Gorilla, A to Z, Old MacDonald) and chooses them repeatedly, often 2-3x in one sitting. Or how he can eat an entire egg for breakfast along with fruit and cheese, or how he is smart enough to make the connection between the fire truck coming down the parkway from the fire station up the road and the picture of one in his book.

I am officially 40 weeks, due Saturday (!!), with Ben's little sister, and it's now going wonderfully thanks to an incredible OBGYN who has given me excellent care and guidance throughout this pregnancy. He has a gentle, upbeat, encouraging bedside manner which seems to gel perfectly with my personality (I am much too hard on myself; my previous doc used to yell at me with no concrete advice, which only prompted shame and subsequent inaction). And seeing a specialist has made all the difference. I just saw a family practice doctor for Ben's pregnancy. This isn't always bad, but some family docs don't know (or won't admit) what they don't know, and won't refer you when necessary.

This was definitely the case with my previous doc, who didn't know, for example, that a misleadingly high blood pressure reading late in pregnancy may be the result of abdominal pressure on the vena cava (main vein in the pelvic area), which is easily remedied by lying on one's left side for a few minutes before taking the reading. Considering that Ben was induced 2 weeks early because of a high blood pressure reading taken without this in mind, this is substantial.

Ben now sees a pediatrician, and I am seeing an internist (someone who specializes in adult internal medicine). This specialist thing is just too important.

Things are really calm and relaxed now, and that's so nice. The baby's room is totally ready for her, my hospital bag is packed, the neighbor is ready to come over and watch Ben at any time, and I am emotionally ready to welcome our new little bundle of joy into the world. Before Ben I had no idea how I would react to motherhood or if I would even like it. But now, knowing the immense, sustained, completely real and fulfilling joy it brings...I can't wait. :)

Of course I am not looking forward to the labor part. If I get that far. (I'm going to try to go non-surgically this time; my OB is all for it and is rooting for me to do a VBAC.) But I am definitely looking forward to not being pregnant anymore. ;) The low back/sciatic/pelvic discomforts are getting old, and so is the impaired mobility and fatigue. But this too shall pass. It's temporary, totally normal, and totally worth it. :)

So that's what's up in this corner of the world. Hope you all are enjoying your summer. I'll try to post more frequently in the future!

Enjoying it all..."while I still can"! (smirk)

Hello there, festive and faithful friends and family!

No news here, which I suppose is good news as my due date isn't officially until 12/27. I went on maternity leave last week and am loving it. For several days I went crazy, running all the last errands and buying all the remaining baby things for the nursery and layette and my hospital bag.

Since then, however, my doctor has told me to take it easy and rest, because during the final weeks it's easy for blood pressure to escalate and mine showed minor signs of doing just that at my last appointment (which was the morning after a doozie of a major errand/shopping/nesting/exertion marathon day, followed unsurprisingly by a bad night's sleep). I was relieved to hear from her, doctor's orders, that I should no longer push past my exhaustion and discomfort in my anxiety to prepare for the baby's arrival. I am now feeling much better; even my ankles and feet, which were looking like a cabbage patch kid's, look normal and unswollen after periods of rest.

So now I'm just enjoying the last gasps of free time, sleep, recreational activities, and time to myself, all of which, according to all of the Harbingers of Doom who love to give advice, is all going straight to hell in a handbasket once we have this child. Our lives as we know them, according to these gloombots, are simply going to end. As the neverending "Get your sleep while you can!"s and "Just you wait!"s continue to pour in, I am honing my Academy Award winning smile and practicing my starring line: "I'll keep that in mind, thanks" as though this is actually somehow helpful (not depressing or insulting) advice that I am thankful to have received. After 6 months of this, I figure I deserve at least 7 Oscars at this point.

Despite the initial dread and anxiety that all of this naysayer feedback aggravated, I really think I've crossed over to the other side. I'm actually really excited now, and I can laugh at all of those Eeyore types who love to tell you all the bad things but who couldn't come close to describing to you the joy of holding your own child in your arms. Of course it helps that we finally have all of the nursery furniture assembled. David did a marvelous job, and the crib and dresser/changing table look absolutely beautiful, despite the fact that the instructions appeared to have been badly translated from Sanskrit and illustrated by M.C. Escher. He has been wonderful helping around the house, carrying things and shoveling the piles of snow here in the upper midwest. He must have shoveled 3 times a day on some days this past week. We now have well over 12 inches on the ground, and the piles along our driveway are at least 3 or 4 feet tall.

Meanwhile, I have been doing loads of baby laundry, intently studying the minute differences between receiving blankets, baby blankets, cloth diapers, burp cloths, lap pads, and washcloths in an effort recognize and categorize them as I fold and organize them in the baby's closet. (Does anyone know what a lap pad is or what you use it for? I asked my brother, also a new parent, and he didn't think he had any of those and had no idea.)

In the spirit of enjoying my life as I know it "while I still can", I have been indulging my reading itch as well as my Netflix account. I finished Jodi Picoult's Salem Falls, which was quite possibly the best book of hers I've ever read. I haven't read a book that riveting in quite a while. I give it 4 out of 5 stars. I was sad when I finished it, because it was such a great escape.

My most recent read was definitely out of my usual genre rotation. It was a debauched romp through the dirty world of Hollywood fame and fortune, following the often tragic and broken life of a stunningly beautiful and brilliant woman on her rise to success. I'm not quite sure what possessed me to buy this book (and don't remember where I was or what I was thinking when I did), but I did find it moderately entertaining - sort of like my guilty pleasure of occasionally buying and reading gossip rags. I wouldn't necessarily recommend Tilly Bagshawe's Adored to anyone who didn't avidly read Cosmo and People on a regular basis, but it was okay. I give it 3 out of 5 stars.

I've watched a few great movies lately too, thanks to having finally found the last Netflix movie that had come months ago but had gotten lost in a mound of paperwork. Beauty Shop was a hilarious movie with Queen Latifah as a hairstylist who quits her fancy and tedious salon job (where she is bullied by Kevin Bacon, of all people, who plays a flaming and pompous European salon owner) to open her own in a questionable part of town. I think seeing Kevin with long heavily-styled locks and speaking with a queenish Euro-affected accent was one of the biggest highlights of the movie. Not the best movie on the planet, but definitely fun. I give it 3.5 stars out of 5.

Then, upon the recommendation of my brother, who along with me is a huge Will Ferrell fan, I watched Elf. Oh my GOD. If you want to laugh so hard you cry, you need to see this movie. The plot was okay and a little bit schmaltzy in the Christmas movie genre tradition, but Ferrell completely makes the movie. His schtick is just sidesplitting. A perfect Christmas comedy to rent around this time of year. I highly recommend it! I give it 5 stars, all of them going straight to Will.

That's all for now...back to folding baby clothes!! Stay warm and safe, and have a lovely week ahead of you.

Do you hear what I hear?

This week we're doing Beethoven's 9th Symphony. This represents my last full week before going on maternity leave. I'll be off until April 1st, at which point I'll come back to play Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. I'm looking forward to being off, but I'm also apprehensive. Will I go insane without the structure and fulfillment of my work, which I generally really enjoy? Yes yes, I know I'm going to be busy; I'm not a flaming idiot who thinks taking care of a newborn is going to be a cinch.

Ah well, no matter what, at least I can look forward to coming back in April. And I'm not taking all of the leave entitled to me, so if I do need more, I can take it. To tell you the truth, I'm not at all sure about anything that's about to happen to us once our son enters our lives, so I'm not really expecting to feel anything until it happens! (Very Zen of me, isn't it? Those Buddhist study and meditation group meetings at my church are coming in handy! **grin**)

So back to the Beethoven. I am thoroughly enjoying it. The soloists - Erika Sunnegardh, Gigi Mitchell-Velasco, Stuart Neill, and Andrea Silvestrelli, are incredible. They're all strong, but they also blend. I often dread that spot in the last movement when all four of them are singing at the tops of their lungs, because sometimes it sounds like four opera divas/divos seeing who can win the game of Survival of the Loudest and Widest Vibrato. Not these soloists. Man. The blend and balance was amazing and shook the entire house last night. I was particularly impressed with the bass, Andrea Silvestrelli, who we had actually heard sing one of the dragons (Fasolt) in the Lyric Opera of Chicago's Ring Cycle back in 2005. I don't think I've ever heard a more powerful voice. And of course the MSO Chorus sounds incredible, powerful, and perfectly in tune. I absolutely love performing with them. They're such a fun, energized, passionate group of people. We have two more performances, tonight and tomorrow afternoon.

Anyway, so I was sitting on stage last night, thinking about how many times I've played the 9th. A lot. But somehow it stays fresh. I think as a musician, you bring your most recent life experiences to any performance, no matter how many times you've done the piece before. This time, I'm 9 months pregnant. That, let me tell you, puts an entirely different spin on things, knowing that you're not the only pair of ears in your immediate vicinity listening to all the thunderous beauty happening on stage! I was overcome with happiness thinking about how amazing it was that our little guy was listening to one of the most magnificent, majestic, spectacular pieces ever written, along with his mom who was lucky enough to be a part of it.

And then, I began thinking about all of the great pieces he's been able to hear multiple performances of since his ears were fully developed in his 4th month. That goes all the way back to my summer festival in Breckenridge! I thought it would be really neat to go back and make a list of all the performances of big orchestral pieces he's been able to hear since then:

In Breckenridge:
Copland, Fanfare for the Common Man
Stravinsky, Rite of Spring
Walton, Crown Imperial March
Liszt, Mephisto Waltz
Mozart, Sinfonia Concertante (with mommy as soloist!)
Shostakovitch Cello Concerto No. 1
Mahler, Des Knaben Wunderhorn
Shostakovitch, Symphony No. 7
Dvorak, Czech Suite
Bizet, Toreador March from Carmen
Dvorak, American Suite
Verdi, Triumphal March from Aida
Saint-Saens, Concerto for Piano
Stravinsky, Scherzo a la Russe
Debussy, Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun
Bernstein, Divertimento for Orchestra
Hummel, Trumpet Concerto
Britten, Variations on a Theme by Purcell (Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra)

(There was also a whole slew of great chamber music we did, way too much to list here.)

In Milwaukee: Since we came back to work this fall at the MSO, our little guy has been treated to multiple on-stage experiences of:

Barber, Symphony No. 1
Rachmaninoff, Piano Concerto No. 2
Mahler, Symphony No. 5
Williams, Nimbus 2000 from "Harry Potter"
Rossini, Allegro Finale from "William Tell Overture"
Grofe, "On The Trail" from Grand Canyon Suite
Copland, John Henry
Mussorgsky, Promenade (1st mvmt) from "Pictures at an Exhibition"
Williams, E.T. Flying Theme
Berlioz, Roman Carnival Overture
Tchaikovsky, Symphony No. 5 (he heard this one a lot because we took it on tour)
Beethoven, Symphony No. 2
Higdon, Percussion Concerto
Tchaikovsky, Symphony No. 4
Beethoven, Symphony No. 4
Waxman, Carmen Fantasie for Violin solo
Hanson, Symphony No. 2
Dvorak, Symphony No. 9 "New World"
Bizet, Suite No. 1 from L'Arlesienne
Ravel, "La Valse"
Lehar, "The Merry Widow" (his first opera, which he slept through along with his mom)
Sibelius, Symphony No. 2
Beethoven, Symphony No. 9
Strauss, Don Juan (which we're reading next week - the last piece I'll play before I go on leave for nearly 4 months!)

Isn't that cool? Some day, I'll be able to look back at this blog's archives and show our guy why he loves (or hates) Tchaikovsky so much. **grin** Hope you're all having a great weekend so far. It's snowing here, and the weather is supposed to get completely nasty later today - more snow, wind, falling temperatures, sleet, hurricanes, tornados, earthquakes...ha ha, just kidding. Anyway, I'm glad my commute to work is just 10 minutes! :)

Hope all is well where you are! Stay warm and safe.

It's all Completely Normal!

So has everyone finally emerged from their post-Thanksgiving tryptophan-induced comas?

We had a lovely celebration with symphony friends who take "orphans" (those without family in the vicinity) into their festive home for major holidays. Because El Bambino is now taking up a significant portion of the room previously reserved for my vital organs, I was immediately stuffed, despite the fact that I had had barely anything else to eat prior to the Big Afternoon Meal (appropriately BAM, for short). Call the multi-gazillion dollar diet industry: who needs bariatric surgery when you have what's probably at this point a 7 pound kid sitting on your entire digestive tract?

I brought a sweet potato casserole and a creamed spinach dip, and David made his famed caramel pecan sticky buns (a holiday tradition in his family) and a very impressive-looking apple pie. We had a great time.

We finally finished painting the nursery! I love the yellow we picked. It's a very nice buttery, mellow yellow, warm and inviting. We did two yellow walls and two white ones, all semi-gloss which the paint guru at Lowe's assured me was the easiest to maintain and clean, therefore ideal for a small child's room. We have our crib, which was delivered last week and is still in the box. Which means we still have to put it together. According to some of the people in our class, this is about as much fun (and as easy) as going through a revolving door with 3 pairs of skis over your shoulder. I am not looking forward to it.

We also finished our childbirth education class series. We got a fancy graduation certificate with the hospital's seal and everything. We were so proud. Graduates! We did it! So apparently now, we are fully licensed and allowed to give birth. Does this make me feel better? A little. Am I still scared to death of the complete lack of control and utter pain I'm going to have to go through during delivery? You bet your 36 weeks pregnant bachache I am.

My mother wonders how she ever had kids without taking those classes; they weren't around for me or my sister, but she and my dad took one when my brother came along in the late 70's. At the end of the class she looked at my dad and said, "how in the world did we ever have the first two?!"

I have to admit, the classes were really great. Our teacher, who looked to be about my age but has already had 6 children, was excellent, and I would say that at least 95% of what we learned was completely new to me. David was there for all of the classes and even attended one I couldn't make because I was out of town. The reality of impending parenthood is still daunting, especially now that it's so close and coming straight at me head-on like a speeding freight train. I have never been around a newborn child in my life, and that is nothing short of terrifying. Truth be told, until fairly recently (4 years ago when my adorable little niece Jenna came along), babies looked like little bald aliens to me. Their sheer fragility and utter dependency really freaked me out. Everyone tells you it's different when it's your own child, and hopefully that's true. I sure hope there's some powerful parenting instinct or reflex that kicks in once the kid is out, because aside from taking care of our relatively independent cats, I have absolutely no frame of reference whatsoever for what is about to happen to us.

Which is why the classes, for me, were so helpful.

Anyway, other than that, things here are fine. The discomforts of pregnancy late in the 3rd trimester (only 4 more weeks until D-Day!) are intensifying, but, like every unpleasant, disgusting, exhausting, or bizarre thing that can happen to a pregnant woman at any time, I am learning from our many pregnancy and delivery reference tomes that it's all Completely Normal. Some of us were joking in our childbirth classes that we could make a lot of money writing a book containing every possible bizarre, horrifying, or otherwise disturbing symptom we could imagine, reassuring pregnant women that whatever they were experiencing was Completely Normal. "Oh, so your lower back is throbbing in 5/8 time, while your baby is simultaneously kicking your bladder in 3/4 time, resulting in a stimulating Stravinsky-esque counterrhythm that is keeping you up all hours of the night? And your stretch marks have changed color from simple red stripes to a lovely pattern of army green and fuschia paisley? Oh, well, of course. That amalgamation of symptoms is completely normal at 36.5 weeks pregnancy. Don't you feel so much better now, knowing that your complete discomfort and total lack of control over what's happening to your body is Completely Normal?"

We could make a lot of money.

Work is thankfully relatively low key and a wonderful distraction from the physical and emotional realities of impending motherhood. This is such a blessing. We did one of my favorite pieces of all time last week, Sibelius's 2nd Symphony. It was so blissful. I just adore Sibelius. I used to listen to my favorite recording of it, one of my favorite CD's in my collection, all the time purely for recreational purposes: Yoel Levi and The Cleveland Orchestra, Telarc label. The first movement is enough to just turn you into a big happy pile of goo; about 7 minutes into it or so, the rest of the orchestra drops out and the immense warmth of the entire brass section playing a lush chorale sweeps over you. You can almost feel the clouds opening up and basking you in sunlight.

This week we're doing 3 performances of Beethoven's 9th, and next week I have two reading sessions before I go on maternity leave. Then I'm done and don't go back to work until April 1st. Time to nest, prepare, clean, organize, do mountains of laundry, and otherwise prepare for our little guy's arrival into our home!

Happy holiday season to you all, and may the season be peaceful and joyous for you. XOXO

P.S. Because of the due date being smack dab in the middle of Christmas and New Years, we decided to not send out holiday cards, but will be mailing our annual holiday letter in the same envelope with the birth announcements in January. This will conserve tons of paper, to say nothing of immeasurable amounts of new-parent energy/sanity. :D

33 weeks and counting...

So I'm in the home stretch (not to be confused with stretch marks, which, thanks to the luxurious Body Shop Cocoa Butter Body Butter my awesome sister gave me, have been kept at bay) of my pregnancy! Thank god. Because things are getting uncomfortable.

Oh, it's all normal. I had an appt. with my doc yesterday and she said that the discomfort, shortness of breath, fatigue, and puffiness are all within the scope of an otherwise healthy pregnancy. My belly is sticking out so far now, I can no longer walk without looking like an idiot. I have to waddle like a duck. It's no joke (though I'm sure I look funny). It's just impossible to walk normally and maintain a good sense of balance when your center of gravity is so weird with the baby weight so high up in your belly. And slow...I'm sooo slow these days. That's frustrating, but I keep reminding myself that I have to take it easy.

I blew through my latest James Patterson thriller, which was great (The Fifth Horseman), and have started a delightful - and entirely appropriate! - quality chick-lit romp called Little Earthquakes by Jennifer Weiner. It's a sort of "Sex & The City"-esque portrayal of 4 women living in Philadelphia; except that all 4 women are all married and in the last trimesters of their pregnancies! The timing of my reading this couldn't be more perfect - the stories of their backgrounds, deliveries, prenatal yoga, the challenges of taking care of a newborn, and hilarious stories of the mother in law from hell (who buys her new granddaughter a sequined tank top that says "Hottie"!! Eeew!) etc. are so engrossing and I am just eating it up. I adore this author; she is one of my favorites!

Speaking of entertainment, did any of you see the Bionic Woman this week on NBC? Man, that show is phenomenal!

The baby is doing very well and so am I, despite the routine discomforts. My blood pressure is still normal - 122/74 - for which I am eternally grateful (thanks, mom, for the good genes!). And the baby, bless his sweet little heart, still kicks and nudges and flutters often. He's started to do these somersaults that make me feel like I have a chicken rotisserie going on in my stomach. It's truly a bizarre sensation. Yesterday the doctor said his growth rate, heartbeat, and movements all sound perfectly healthy and normal, and that's what really matters.

I'll close this post with a hilarious story of recently going through airport security. I had my horn with me, of course, and it was going through the conveyor belt to get checked out. I always watch the airport staff when this is going on. This guy stops the conveyor, squints his eyes, backs up the conveyer belt again and stops it again, and looks more closely at the monitor. He looks over to his colleague, and says, "hey John, c'mere." John walks over. The guy points at the monitor. "What the hell is that?"

At which point I lose it laughing. John looks at me and asks, "is it a trumpet?" I am impressed that he even knows that it's a musical instrument and tell him it's a french horn. (It's really just called a horn in the orchestral world but most people don't know that, so you have to say "french" to make sure they know which horn specifically.) The guy behind me in line is cracking up and gives me the thumbs up and with a huge smile on his face, says, "Awesome!"

Anyway, I hope this blog post finds you all happy and healthy and enjoying a gorgeous fall day. The weather here is chilly but sunny, and the leaves are still gorgeous shades of gingery-turmeric gold and other shades of wine, burgundy, and tangerine. Just beautiful. Write back and tell me what you have planned for the weekend!

Ballerinas vs. Sumo Wrestlers

I think it's telling that my last post to this public blog was all the way back in August, for crying out loud. I have been writing a ton in my private blog, but somehow knowing that the entire googleable population could find and read this blog online was really cramping my style.

So I changed the name of this blog and its website url, which is now http://lacornistefolle.blogspot.com/ (french for "The crazy horn player"), and removed my name from the information on the blog. So now it no longer shows up on google under my name, and I think this will help me feel like I can write just a little bit more in this blog. Perhaps you will feel more comfortable posting comments on it now, too! :) Something about every ex I've ever had (and given my relatively "rich" past, there are a few real zingers out there) reading about my pregnancy and other life details wasn't very appealing and was definitely stunting my creativity! So, a few substantial privacy/security changes to this blog, and....phew! I feel better already. :)

I am currently in week 32 of my pregnancy. The third is is definitely my least favorite trimester, though given that my first 6 months were relatively smooth I suppose I shouldn't complain given what I've heard from so many women. I am feeling quite out of balance and unwieldy (strange, given that I wasn't particularly lithe and graceful before) and very fatigued, much moreso than I did in the first trimester where most women feel the most tired.

And I still have two months to go, during which I'm quite sure I'll get even bigger. After a lifetime of battling my body and dieting, I have to keep reminding myself that my belly is supposed to be getting bigger, and that it's not only okay but necessary in this case. I suppose I could consider this body image therapy?!

Again, though, I really should not complain. My blood pressure and blood sugar are both completely normal still, which I am eternally (and not complacently) grateful for, and our little guy's measurements, fetal movements, growth rate, and heartbeat are all perfect. He is definitely more insistent (and apparent) these days in his kicks and nudges, though for the most part he remains very quiet and still whenever I am on stage playing. I say "for the most part" because during the Higdon Percussion Concerto cadenza, which was sort of a fusion of a marching band drum cadence and a vigorous jazz drum solo, he went absolutely berzerk. I was alarmed because I was sitting quietly on stage and feeling this entirely separate percussion section going on inside my belly! I had to smile and remind myself that I was the only one aware it was happening along with the drum solo. Because of his history of being quiet and still during music most of the time, I'm not quite sure what to make of this percussion-inspired outburst. Did he love it? Was he dancing to it? Or did he absolutely hate it?

I suppose we'll find out when it comes time for him to choose an instrument. :)

Playing the horn, despite my decreased lung capacity due to my ever-expanding womb, continues to go well. I just have to breathe, and expel excess breath that I don't have room for, more often to prevent from hyperventilating and passing out. (Small details, right?) Fortunately I am sleeping marvelously and deeply and have been throughout the pregnancy. According to all the people that love to remind me of it, I am enjoying the sleep while I can, thank you. *smirk*

The past few weeks at work were quite intense. I was filling in for the Associate Principal Horn, who was on vacation/leave, and I played Principal on two of the more horn-scary Beethoven Symphonies, Nos. 2 and 4. They both have Principal Horn parts that are high, treacherous, and very easily glitched. Fortunately all four performances (two for each Symphony) went very well, and I was hugely relieved when they were over. I love my triple horn for high, delicate parts like that!

In addition to playing Principal, I also had to cover my own position as 3rd horn for the heavier pieces on the 2nd half of each program. This included playing Tchaikovsky's 4th after having played Principal on Beethoven's 2nd; and playing Howard Hanson's Symphony No. 2 after having played Principal on Beethoven's 4th. The position of 3rd horn is kind of like the weight lifting/sumo wrestler position in the horn section; you have to play high like the Principal, but you don't have an assistant like the Principal horn does. The Principal, on the other hand, has to be acrobatic and flexible like a ballerina, which is why s/he has an assistant to help out with the loud stuff so s/he can "save face" for the delicate playing.

I found it very difficult to alternate between being a ballerina and a sumo wrestler for two entire weeks; the concerts were okay, but the rehearsals often had the heavy stuff first, making my lip stiff and tired before having to play the high delicate stuff. I discovered that using an ice pack helped reduce the swelling immensely. One morning I pulled up at a stop light on my way to work with the blue drugstore ice bag on my face, and a woman next to me in the next lane looked at me in horror, as though I had been a victim of domestic violence. I didn't think she'd understand if I rolled down my window and yelled, "No, it's not my husband, it's Tchaikovsky that's slugging me in the face!!"

Anyway, I am glad that's over, and that I can get back to just being a weight lifter, which is in many ways what I do best.

Wow, it sure is good to be back...expect more frequent updates now that I don't have to worry so much about privacy and censorship! :)

Breckenridge, Books, and Babies!!

Hey faithful bloggers! It's been far too long since my last post; I'm long overdue to post something here. So here's the Darcy Digest for the past several months...

First and foremost, David and I have a new little cousin! Sara Cordelia Lewellen was born to Andrew (David's brother) and Pamela Lewellen on August 17th. She is absolutely gorgeous! I will send you the link to pictures soon. We are very proud and can't wait to meet her, although given the logistics of our own pending delivery which renders us unable to travel over the winter holidays, it probably won't be until 20o8!

The Breckenridge Music Festival was just fantastic. The musicians were from all over the place and almost all of them had full time jobs in music performance (orchestras) or college teaching. I made lots of new friends from Charleston (SC), Florida, Tulsa, Dallas, San Diego, and Indiana. The quality of the musicians was extremely good, and it was a genuine pleasure to make music with them, especially under the direction of Gerhardt Zimmermann, one of the best conductors I've ever played under. He's so concise, efficient, and clear. I really click with him musically - every suggestion he has makes such sense and actually makes phrases easier! - and his passionate energy that positively emanates from the podium is infectious. What a joy to work with such a musician. I surprised myself by using my triple horn for more than half of the playing I did! The 8D was fun to use on the bigger stuff like the Rite of Spring, the Shostakovitch Cello Concerto, and the bigger romantic works, but the triple proved to be the perfect horn for chamber music, french orchestral works, and pretty much anything high. Wow!

David and I returned home early last week, and I have loved being home again. We have lots of tomatoes, jalapenos and zucchini from our garden, and I've already made zucchini bread (with dried cranberries instead of raisins - a great variation) and a big bowl of zesty (medium) cilantro salsa. Tonight I'm making pizza from scratch - the dough is currently rising and I'm about to go make tomato sauce with a bunch of our romas that were picked this week. Have any of you ever tried japanese eggplant? They're the thinner banana-shaped variety of eggplants and they're very sweet and mild and we grew them too this summer. They're great in stir-frys or broiled. I'm putting some on top of our pizza tonight!

I read some great books this summer, all fiction (representing the rotation of my favorite fiction styles: historical fiction/murder mystery thriller/quality "chick lit"). The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai was an intricate exploration into the Himalayan mountains of India, exploring the disintegration of the various immigrant groups there as well as the parallel issues surrounding illegal immigration in the US - a fascinating, refreshingly different escape. I had discovered a new thriller author, Lisa Gardner, who wrote the brilliant and riveting The Survivor's Club. What a ride! I loved her ability to throw plot twists and shockers at you while simultaneously developing the characters with moving depth, and her writing in general was superb. Right now I'm reading the prolific Jodi Picoult's Vanishing Acts, and it too is excellent. I love authors that write different chapters from different characters' points of view, and she's a master at it. I'm impressed that she can crank out so many novels quickly yet each one is more riveting than the next. So....have you read any good books lately? I always love learning about new authors and hearing about what you all are reading these days.

The symphony starts quite late this year (9/25, my 37th birthday, is our first rehearsal!). In the meantime we are working hard to get the remodeling done on our baby boy's room! Once we get all the furniture out of what is currently the music studio (which will become the nursery), we will be ripping up the old stained carpeting in the hallway that leads into the studio and replacing it with hardwood floor laminates. We're having Lowe's do the installation. I plan to paint the baby's room white with one or maybe two buttery yellow walls. The bedding pattern I picked out for him is a bright patchwork quilt and should prove to be quite festive!

That's about all for now. How are your summers wrapping up? Would love to hear from you. Write soon! :)