Sometimes I have the opportunity to stop, look around, and just be happy. This is a happy room. Life is so fast and blurry and in this house, LOUD. But every so often I actually notice the quiet, peace, and happiness around me.
Like this morning.
Right now.
I got up early to try to work on the website(I always think I’m going to do it when the boys go to sleep, but that’s actually ridiculous since I can barely keep my eyes open by then. This is me trying a new approach.)
So I’m sitting here in the music room responding to a couple of emails (a brand ACTUALLY reached out to ME to work with me in Q4 to include them in my content! If that doesn’t light a fire under someone building an online business, I don’t know what does!)
Anyway.
I just looked up from the computer, sort of spaced out as I was thinking, and this is what I saw:
It may just look like a piano with a cluttered top and some messy kid art to some people.
But I see a happy piano in a happy room.
A Happy Piano
This piano was in my grandmother’s house until she passed away. She loved this sweet piano. Especially because it was gifted to her from a dear friend, whose home it also lived in, who has now also passed away.
When Grama passed away, my mom asked if the family who gifted it to Grama would like it back, and they said they would be happy for the piano to be at my house for my boys to learn to play.
How thoughty is that?!
My boys have loved this happy piano since they could reach the keys at Grama’s house.
And my mom taught (I guess re-taught-ish) herself to play on this piano when she was hanging with Grama helping her to live the very best last years of her life.
These pictures are A) Jake at about 14 months, and B) Mom playing with the boys accompanying her on the trumpet and bongo, shortly after we moved it to my house.
And now, the boys take piano lessons on this piano and play it nearly every day. I’ll have to find some of the videos I have of them freestyle-playing and link some here – it’s amazing! Even before they took lessons! Makes me so so so so happy happy happy happy.
Cluttered Piano Top
Clutter makes me so the opposite of happy. And yet – it’s a thing around here. I’d like to blame it on all the stuff that comes with having kids, but nope, it’s me.
One thing I’m pretty good about, though, is artwork around the house. There is not a picture hung or trinket out that doesn’t mean something to me and/or that I don’t love. There’s a ton of crap in lots of other places that gets stacked and moved around, don’t get me wrong. But the pictures and art make me smile.
So what’s up there?
- 1st-grade school pictures of the boys – soon to be replaced by 2nd-grade pictures
- Pictures of my mom and my sweet bonus-dad (who we lost in 2004), my dad, Grama; my other grandparents whom I adored (how UNBELIEVABLY fortunate was I to have had three of my four grandparents with me until I was 35 years old?! – and my last one until I was nearly 44!?)
- Little prints I made of some of the boys 1-year old art – I gave them as gifts that year also, just love them so much.
- Music and Theory books for weekly lessons, of courses. 🙂
All things that are happy.
What else is in this happy room?
- Mom made the art on the walls with the boys for me on my first and second Mother’s Days. How I will ever get rid of any of the kid art is beyond me.
- The marble-top table to the right was in my grandmother’s house. All the little things that remind me of her put a little smile in my heart – every time I see it, hear it, smell it, think it.
- The 1/4 size cello on the left – well lemme tell ya. Jake has been fascinated by the cello since he was very young. We watched a lot of Baby Einstein Meet the Orchestra – he could tell you all of the instruments in each section of the orchestra. He asked Santa for a cello for his 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Christmases.Santa came through on the 4th Christmas because when a 4-year old has asked for a cello for 3 of his 4 Christmases on the planet, Santa figures maybe the kid really does have a thing about the cello. Here he is playing an upright plasma car with a fiddlestick before he had an actual cello. He was also known to play a body pillow with a straw or paper towel tube.
This cello took a pretty good beating from a couple of little boys…so the strings didn’t last long.
But a few months ago the piano teacher, who we are so lucky to have and plays several instruments, put new strings on it for us. She showed Jake how to hold the bow and taught him some notes to play. Sometimes I will hear the sound of the cello wafting in from the music room. It makes me So. Very. Happy.
A music room is a happy room
Our music room is actually the dining room. Well, you know what I mean. It was traditionally a dining room, has a chandelier people often hit their heads on, etc. There was a table in here for a few years, but the room – and table – were basically just a catch-all. Kind of hated that room that way, even though I loved my dining room table.
But with a sofa and a few instruments in here, this room is amazing. It gets morning light and is cozy and comfy and a great little separate sitting area from the rest of the house. This is the room I go before the boys wake up, it’s where I go when they are plastered to my sides and I need a break from all that togetherness, and when I just need a change of scenery. It’s also where the boys go for a cozy space or to have some time away from each other.
The music room is such a happy space in our house.
So this morning it’s sure nice to be sitting here, drinking coffee, trying to make my online business dreams come true in the margins of life, and pausing to look around and for a moment, just to be happy.
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