The things you learn!

Every day with children is a learning experience. For mom as much as the children. Today I learned:

1. That cobalt blue acrylic paint and three-year-olds don't mix. Wait a second, that's not right. They mix ... only too well.

2. That two children snacking on chives in the community garden will cause an entire minivan to reek of onions for more than an hour.

3. When you leave gardening club 8 minutes late, get caught behind a road-painting crew for 12 minutes, and discover that you need to stop for gas, that if you know the highway really well you can still get to piano recital on time by engaging in judicious use of excess velocity.

4. Twelve-year-olds with high levels of performance confidence can smirkily pull of dynamite performances of under-rehearsed Scarlatti sonata movements when inspired by an audience.

5. That good piano teachers always bring enough helium balloons for all the younger siblings too.

6. That helium balloons are terrific accelerometers when left to their own devices inside minivans.

7. That when you're the fourth Suzuki violin kid in your family, your first ever start-to-finish "Twinkle Variation" might as well be the rhythmically awkward and tough-to-co-ordinate Variation B. Who knew?

8. That suffixes are fun when compounded for sport ... like in words like "agilitousability" and "beautyishfullness".

9. That the benefit of a bath is pretty much negated if you decide afterwards that it would be fun to wriggle your naked body up over the edge of the toilet bowl rim and through the toilet seat ring.

10. That three-year-olds who get up at 6, spend the day trying to keep up with their older siblings, don't nap and believe they're staying up long enough for a pre-bedtime family readaloud should have their teeth brushed before they snuggle up on the couch to wait for their siblings to finish practicing. Zzzzzz.....