13 November 2011

After a little over a year of playing the violin, Helen has grown too big for her 1/10 size violin. We traded it in this week for a 1/8 size. We've bought both of Helen's violins from the same violin maker. His hand crafted instruments cost more than lots of cars, but he also sells used instruments to beginners. The music teachers all like him because he outfits student violins with top notch strings and makes them sound wonderful. Rather then rent violins, he sells them outright and then buys them back at a price determined by the condition of the instrument when you need a bigger one. If you take good care of your violin like Helen does, it's a good deal. John's shop is fun to visit because of the beautiful instruments he has displayed.

The soccer season ended last week and with the blink of an eye, Abe has switched to playing basketball. He's playing in a junior league for the first time this year.

We celebrated Helen growing to be 4 feet tall this weekend. Our tradition is to have a movie night with candy. It seems like we just had Abe's 4 foot party last week-- time goes by so quickly. Helen picked "Barbie's Perfect Christmas" to watch-- this was probably her only chance to pick out a Barbie movie for the family to watch.

Abe, Helen and Gibson gathered some branches Brandan pruned from our maple to make a lean-to fort in the backyard. 

Here they are inside the fort-- a cozy fit. We've had some beautiful weather this week.