Hopefully everything is up to par and we can get rolling on sheet rock, insulation, plaster, and carpet and put everything but the front door to bed by the weekend!

This is what things looked like inside this morning.

Here is the outside. Notice the dog ears on the corners of the garage? I got in touch with my inner cave man and beat the bricks out to square the framing out. I don’t have an updated picture of that, it was too dark.

Here we have the temporary door and new rough opening for the French doors all completed. Notice the nice square corners. I have to do a little brick work outside to close in the new opening, but I am so happy I took the time to do it right.

I filled in a 1/2″ depression in the cement where the garage door used to sit. I pulled out a ton of old framing for the door and was able to add back some 2×4′s and a 2×6 header to finish the rough opening for the new door.

The black 1×2 on the floor is there to keep the weight of the temporary plywood I tacked up off the cement for the night until it cures.

The door is on order and should be here by next Wednesday.

Looking back toward the house you can see the new tile we put down Saturday. All that is left is the edges which we will finish off when the drywall is in.

I also replaced the side door today.

Here is the new closet and some of the electrical. Most of this work was done last week.

We decided to go with a mini-split ductless HVAC system for this room which will go on the wall above the breaker box. It will end up blowing the budget a bit but will be well worth it in labor and energy efficiency.

After much prayer and council we have decided to invest a little money and a lot of time into converting our garage. The best thing is we will be doing this completely debt free thanks in large part to listening to and following Dave Ramsey and getting on a strict budget.

I highly recommend it.

The new space will be primarily used for Julianne’s Piano business which is growing by leaps and bounds.

I am so proud of her.

We will also use the space for our worship team rehearsals, I will start offering voice lessons, and Alex will utilize it for audio recording as he learns the trade.

I will be taking pictures of the progress and updating the blog as we go along.

After this project is over we start on the rest of the baby steps to becoming debt free.

We have big plans and can hardly wait till the next building phase where we will be replacing our garage with a new one complete with studio space above for me. Rohr Fine Art is my motivation to live like no one else so later we can live like no one else.

2.  Specify A.M. or P.M when you schedule a make up lesson.  I had a student come to my door at 7:30 a.m. for a lesson this morning.

3.  Even if you have a calendar of events, most people will lose, forget or ignore them.

4.  Send out reminders for every event you have.

S.  Send out additional reminders for every event you have.

6.  Email and call people for additional reminders for every event you have.

7.  Never schedule more than one make up lesson a month, per student.

8.  Specify that you will never schedule more than one make up lesson a month, per student.

9.  Most people will not pay you unless you remind them.

10.  Send out reminders every month that tuition is due.

11.  Most students will not practice unless they are motivated by three sources:  the teacher, the parents and themselves.  If you are the only motivation, they will probably not be successful.

12.  Do NOT agree to try to teach 15 minute lessons to 3 year olds.

13.  Do NOT agree to try to teach 4, 5 or 6 year olds, unless you have previously known the child to be advanced for his/her age.

14.  Always have a song ready for yourself to play for parents that ask you to play at Christmas Parties, recitals and other events.

15.  Smile and be gracious, even after the parent forgets to pay you for the 3rd time.  It couldn’t possibly be an inconvenience!

16.  Be encouraging and gracious, even after the child forgets to practice for the 3rd time that month.

17.  Send out progress reports for children that are not practicing and are not learning what the parents expect them to.

18.  My teenage children will not hear the phone ringing and answer it when I am teacing a lesson because they have headphones on.  Regardless, don’t interrupt the lesson to answer the phone.

19.  Smile and be kind, but don’t be a push over.  If you say you need to get paid, people will more than likely pay you.

20.  Take a break for a week or two during the summer!

Tomorrow is our reception!  That means that I will be done with piano for this year, although I do have 9 people that are coming in July for summer lessons.

You can see I have a maternity dress on now.

Elizabeth played “You’ve Got a Friend in Me.”

As Daddy would say, “Isn’t she beautiful?”

Alex was a big help–and big as well!  He’s growing up!

This is me giving last minute instructions to my students.

David was the one taking pictures, so we don’t have one of his pretty face, but I will try to catch him at some point.

In my defense, I have been sick the past week. The yucky flu that seems to be going around. I went to the doctor on Saturday and they gave me antibiotics for a sinus infection. Now I am blowing lovely green snot out of my nose. At least it is coming out!

I finished up this lovely project for a friend of mine that had her baby. Mind you, I forgot to take a picture of the finished product–it has pretty white tassels on each end of it, but you get the picture.

I was very happy with the way it turned out. The only problem now is that I have to find another project to work on. I think I found a pattern and I think I will give it to Sue as a wedding gift. I’ll post more when I get started.

We are 16 weeks pregnant. So far, everything is pretty good. I’m liking the fact that I don’t feel so sick anymore, but I’m not liking the fact that I seem to get heartburn an awful lot lately. I’m still in my jeans, but I do have a bulge started. I’m looking forward to the maternity clothes though. They are so much cuter than they used to be. My sister send me a whole bunch of them–so I’m kind of excited to try them.

Beth and I are making plans for the nursery. She is very excited and happy about this new development. Right now, we want to do ‘vintage’ Pooh–not the Disney kind, but the old kind. I have a glider that I want to re-upholster with either yellow or green fabric. We are going to try to find Pooh fabric–I think you can order it. I’m also going to try to make some sheets of my own and a bumper pad, once I know what size mattress we will have. We will see. The afghan will have to wait until we find out what color it should be–I’m not doing pink or blue, but want to try green or yellow, depending.

Piano lessons are going fine. We are getting started on our recital pieces for May. Homeschool is fine, although I missed a whole week, since I was so sick. I need to order their end-of-year test packets this week.

That is about it. Good stuff going on in our church–you can read about it on David’s blog. I’m going to try to post a recipe or something soon, so watch for it. Of course, I make no promises, but that is my hope!

There were 21 kids performing–I have about 30 in my studio, so some of them couldn’t make it.  Here are some of the kids:

A student I have had for 3 years.

Our daughter, Elizabeth.

Brother and sister.

It was a lovely piano.

So she comes on Tuesday. Of course, the first thing she says to me is, “I practiced, but we were really busy this week, but I did practice.”

After hearing the first song, I’m skeptical.

I look at her practice log and she has 5 days of practice in (supposedly).

So I torture myself listening to another song that she can’t play and finally I say, “Tammy, it would be a lot easier for Mrs. Rohr to know where to start if you tell her right away that you didn’t practice. You know I’m not going to yell and scream at you.  I may be disappointed, but that’s the way it is.  If you told me right away that you didn’t practice, then we wouldn’t have to sit here and listen to songs that you don’t know.”

“But I did practice.”

“Well,” I say kindly, “I’m wondering how you don’t know this song at ALL if you practiced for five days. That usually doesn’t happen. Mrs. Rohr can tell if you haven’t practiced. Did you have a chance to do any songs?”

She looks at the practice log and gets an “ah-ha!”expression and says, “Oh…… I filled in the practice sheet by accident. I thought I was practicing this weeks songs, but I actually practiced last weeks songs.”

Yeah. Right. How could you not know what your lesson is when I write it on the practice sheet AND in her notebook, with the date?

So we struggle through the lesson.

At the end, I decide to speak up.

“Tammy, I know that you are a Christian, and you know that I am too. I want to follow what God tells me to do, and honestly, I’m having a hard time having your mom pay me for your piano lessons and you not learning anything because you don’t do what you are supposed to. I just don’t feel right taking her money if you can’t do what you need to do to become a good piano player. I’m going to make you a deal.”

She looks at me, and I forge ahead, “If you come to me next time, I expect you to have practiced and not to lie about how many times you practiced. If you can’t do that, I think we will have to talk to your mom, because I just can’t continue to get paid by her when you aren’t learning what you need to learn. So that is the deal. If you practice, and show me that you practiced, then great, otherwise, we will have a chat with your mom. Do you understand?”

She nods. I pat her shoulder. I was kind and nice, but man, I had to lay it out.

“So, come next time having your practicing done, Okay?”

She agrees and that is the end of it.

I know I was probably too easy on her, but I also didn’t want to make the kid cry. When you are one-on-one with a child, just you and them, it is pretty easy to make them cry. So I was kind, but firm. I gave her the benefit of the doubt, but I knew she was lying. I don’t get how you expect to get away with telling your teacher that you practiced when you haven’t. It’s not like you can play the songs–that is why you PRACTICE them, so you can get better at them.

Duh.

Well, she has a whole two weeks to practice before she comes back to me. I wonder what she will come up with?

School is going along well. The kids each had their first math TEST last week and both got an A. I was happy about that. We are having a geography test on Monday and a science test on Wednesday. Spelling will be getting underway–finally! I have been kind of slack with the spelling. We are doing a geography project. A topographic map. It was something I remembered from my school days and we got a map of Chesapeake and will be getting that done this week, hopefully. I will post the pictures.

The piano lessons have been absolutely amazing. Who would have thought that there would be so many people that want lessons? I have 30 students. I had Alex take the sign down on Friday, because I think this is it, for the year. It is a nice little business, and it is going well, for being the first week. I am enjoying it, and we are talking about possibly converting the garage to a studio. (Down here, there isn’t much need for a garage, per say, so lots of people take that opportunity to add another room to their house.) That won’t happen for awhile, but it is nice to think about it.

We got word from church that they want David and I to take the 8:30 praise and worship service. We are excited and the kids will be singing with us too. On Friday, we played/sang for the intercession that evening. We had a great time! Our drummer and bass player said they didn’t want to quit playing. Neither did we, it was so fun. I’m hoping that they decide they want to be part of our team instead of the 10:00 team, because we all work well together.

David is going out of town tomorrow!  I hate it when he is gone, but at least it is only for a night.  He is going to the trade show in Chicago with his boss, the boss’ son and another guy.  We will drive him to the airport tomorrow at 5 a.m. and pick him up on Monday at 10:00 p.m.  I will miss him!

Another week gone by…