Lord Nelson Mass with old ladies and all

Last night Jamie played a concert with Nova Sinfonia. The program listed a Beethoven overture and Hayden's Lord Nelson Mass (not the official name, but it has become known by this name). I'm about to show my stupidity in all things orchestral, but I didn't know that it was common for composers to compose their own mass. Essentially the composer would take the parts of the Latin Catholic mass and put it to music with choirs, soloists, etc. The piece had all of the parts of the mass...the Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Agnus Dei, etc...I'm leaving a few out, but you get the idea.

I'm sitting there thinking this is the most entertaining mass I've ever sat through. Going to Catholic shool for 13 years and having mass every Friday for 9 years of school then having mass once a month for 4 years of high school, I've been to my fair share of masses. I got to sit there and watch Jamie do something he loves - playing trumpet with a great orchestra. He is sooooo good at it too. I can't imagine having so much natural talent that it makes rehearsal and everyday practice enjoyable. I can't relate. If I'm not good at something, I usually don't have the patience to practice at something so that I achieve some level of mastery. When I started tae kwon do, I can honestly say that I think I had a natural ability at it. When I played basketball and volleyball, I think I was pretty good at it. Was I going to be the star of the team? No, but I was good enough so that practice was fun - unless running suicides were involved.

The choir last night was fantastic. The soloists were great individually, but at times when singing together, it sounded like a train wreck where cars are running off the rails in all different directions. I'm sure the conductor was doing a fantastic job and keeping all of these different parts together as a whole, but to this layperson's ear, it was about as good sounding as a baby cutting teeth while sitting in a poopy diaper.

Back to Jamie, the Mass had a lot of trumpet parts with fanfares and all. He did an excellent job. I tried taking a movie of a portion of the performance to post, but I'm not that happy the recording. Me and every old lady within a 15 mile radius of the Church thoroughly enjoyed it. You'll have to trust me - it was the best mass ever.

I hate picking out the seeds

Scene: 10:39 pm in the living room, and the State of the Union address is on TV. I'm changing the settings on the blog, and Jamie is eating an orange. I'm halfway paying attention to Bush's speech and pondering the feasibility of universal health care coverage in the US, while Jamie chimes up...

"These are good oranges, but there are too many seeds. We're only buying navel oranges from now on."

"Oh yeah. I didn't know those had a lot of seeds. Sorry."

"That's ok; they're still tasty...Cajunadian."

"What?"

"That's what Navarre is - a Cajunadian."

"Yeah, I guess so."

I love our deep conversations.

What's your flavor?

I'll be trying out different looks on the blog in the next little while. I'd love your feedback.

More creative stylings from Steven James May

Our friend, Steve, has a new website that lets readers into yet another facet of his creativity. I'll be looking for pics to send in.

Snow Day

Ah, the perks of being a teacher...the 6 am announcement of a snow day school cancellation. The cancellation today was due more to ice than snow. We started with a little snow over night, which turned to ice, and now it's raining.


I guess being married to a teacher has its perks too. I knew it must have been a snow day when Jamie said at 4 am, "I'll get her; go back to sleep." The next time my eyes opened it was 9 am.

Strike a pose

My au natural sister gave me 2 cloth diapers for Christmas for Navarre. She has a friend that creates custom-made cloth diapers. They are beautiful and extremely cute, but still made of cloth that absorb pee and poo that must be washed by me...there lies the drawback. There is a really cute chocolate brown print with turquoise and pink and a pink LSU dipaer. I decide to try it...here's my story.

I put the LSU one on her with a little dress. She was wearing her snow suit, so I didn't put tights on her over the diaper. We went out shopping, and she fell asleep in the car seat. She slept for about an hour after we got home, and we were gone for about an hour. She was screaming when she woke up....tried different things that didn't work, so I decided to change her. I took off the diaper, and I couldn't tell if she had peed or not. While I was trying to figure this out, she starts peeing. She was obviously saving up because it wouldn't stop streaming...allover the cloth diaper (which i determined she hadn't peed in before that), allover the dress, changing pad, etc. Now, she's screaming and peeing. So, it was cute and comfortable on her I'm sure, but I don't know how well it worked (leak wise) because I took it off before she peed!

The lesson learned here is #1 - she can go 2 hours without peeing; #2 - always have 2nd diaper ready (I already knew this one, but must have had a moment of insanity inspired by the pee vs. no pee debate); #3 - when the baby is screaming because she's hungry, it's not the time to determine if the cute cloth diaper is all it's cracked up to be.

The beautiful knitted coat is curteous of Auntie Nicole. It is gorgeous and totally one of a kind. She's so talented:)

Damn she's cute

A-yeeeeeee

We've done it...we've finally replaced Jamie's 1998 Hyundai Accent. I know some of you thought this day would never come. I think Jamie had his doubts too. However, we have prevailed and bought a new car. And the winner is....the 2008 Kia Sportage. I know what some of you are thinking...doesn't Kia make tinker toys?? The answer is no - they make cars. They have gotten very good at making cars. It helps that Kia is owned by Hyundai.

When Kia first came out in the States, I thought Kias were lawnmowers with roofs and big tires. They've come a long way, and after much research and financing, we are extremely excited about our Sportage. It's got a kick ass warranty and standard features that are options on most other SUVs. It helps that we got a trailer hitch, cargo box and roof rail crossbars thrown in for free.

Once I got over the fact that we were actually buying a Kia, my only other stipulation in buying it was that Jamie - and the rest of his family - couldn't yell "Ayeeeee" every time we got into the car just like the crazy Cajun man does on the commercial. If you don't have this commercial in the good 'ole U S of A, then consider yourself blessed.

It's January, and this is our first step to preparing (both physically and mentally) for our big road trip this summer. I'm thinking of a name for our trip..that will be posted at a later date. I'm so frickin excited I can hardly contain myself. Maybe I won't be after a day in the car with an almost 1-year old, but I'm optimistic.

The Pack lost, and baby girl is growing up

So much to catch everyone up on...Navarre's newest things, holidays, trip to Louisiana, Packers incredible season that ended too soon, car shopping, waterbabies, tae kwon do, etc.

So, we spent the holidays in Halifax and Mom came up on Christmas Day. She stayed a week, and we had a good time. We didn't really do much, but that was what was nice about it. My immediate family has been here enough that we don't have to do the touristy, sightseeing things anymore, which make the visits more fun in my opinion - not that that stuff isn't fun...it is for people who haven't been here before, but just like spending time with them.

This New Year's Eve was the first year I haven't made it up to midnight since I was a kid. It was pathetic; Mom bought champagne; we were ready to ring in the New Year, and Jamie and I fell asleep on the couch before midnight...way before midnight. So, we went to bed. I guess that's a hazard with having sleep deprived parents and a 5-months old.

Then, Navarre and I flew to Baton Rouge on the 2nd. I was nervous about how she would do on the flights, but she flew better than a lot of adults I know!! A little crying but not much at all. She was pretty curious in the Chicago airport. Everyone LOVED her...even TSA was helpful. I love having a beautiful baby, but if I heard, "What a beautiful baby, and what lovely eyebrows," one more time, I might have screamed. I would never think to comment on a baby's eyebrows...whatever, I have a beautiful baby:)

Louisiana was fantastic. It was so nice being home and being able to show her off to everyone. She was the center of attention the entire trip home. We had lots of good food (I don't know why the entire country doesn't ship crawfish and eat them) and passed a good ime...crawfish, king cakes, jambalaya, stew.....mmm, mmm, mmm. So, I guess this is why the baby weight loss has been going in reverse lately.

I'm starting to get sad...football season is almost over and my Packers aren't in the SuperBowl. The Giants played a good game, and I hate to say it, but they handled the frozen tundra better than Green Bay did. With the Giants winning from a Brett Favre interception, at least it was a former LSU player who got it.

The biggest news since we've been home is that Navarre is LOVING her solid food!! We started her on rice cereal, and she can't get enough!


The first feeding couldn't have gone any better. No picky eaters here so far, and she doesn't seem to mind if we look at her from across the table.