What a final month in Vancouver, NYC, and driving back to LA with Adrian!

So much has happened in the last 19 days since I last posted, I’m not even sure where to begin.

On the music front, I was able to practice a bit, even though finishing up the house involved a Big Push towards completion.  It was, however, completely worth it and the final results speak for themselves.  Leslie and Gavin and the kids were thrilled — the kids even vanished into their new rooms as absolute proof — and Adrian and I felt that final relief that only comes with genuine applause.

On a Mozart Sonata note, one of the great moments for me was the morning right before Adrian and I took off for the 20 hour drive back to LA.  Leslie and family had arrived the afternoon before and A & I stayed the night.  That morning I played a mini-concert — a few slow movements — and when Christian (age 4) walked into the room and heard me his response was pretty fantastic.  He just said, “I’ll get my guitar and play with you,” and ran up to his room and grabbed his instrument.  He then proceeded to strum along as I played, but with true sensitivity.  He was really listening — not just “rocking out” like I’m told he does with the Jonas Brothers — and basically eagerly trying to “catch the wave” of music come from the keyboard.  As is often the case with kids, the undiluted enthusiasm and purity of the response — he simply wanted to play together as though we were forming a spontaneous Mozart garage band — was fantastic.

There is so much more to write about but not this Christmas morning.  In the last 20 days, I did after all teach the first Yoga of Belle workshop at Sankalpah and I also officially became a performance artist via the Duo Holiday Happening Event.  I will post video from the latter on this website soon.

Right now, with Adrian in LA for two weeks, our happy trio of me, Belle, and him are truly shifting into the full-time Andante vibe.  Our only scheduled activity for the foreseeable future is a Christmas hike in Runyon Canyon and we think a movie date with Colin over the weekend.

After three months of wonderful Canadian life, albeit one where I handed everyone a laser-printed, highly specific “to do” list every morning, like those first days of Summer Vacation, we find ourselves happy and relaxed as we ease our way back to Play.

Here are some pictures of the house — including one of adorable Christian and of my Vancouver keyboard.  (Note:  in FireFox they if you double-click they open nicely in a separate window, and then if you double-click again they are full-sized…but I bet you already knew that!)