Brrrrrrrrrr!

It is really chilly here! We don't usually get this cold until January or February...if we get this cold at all. I actually bought a new coat, which is kind of a funny story. I bought this lovely light brown coat with white fleece trim. I liked it a lot until we went to walk the dog the other day and I heard a shot in the woods. Not unusual for this time of year since we live right beside the WMA property. But that shot made me realized that now I looked just like a DEER! Eeeek! I am going to have to make myself a red hat.
Anyway, besides the cold, not much is going on here. I have been practicing hard on my violin because my violin teacher has set us up to play for a nursing home in the area on Dec. 13. The "us" I am referring to are her 4 students. Myself who has been studying with her for a year, a 12 year old girl who has been studying for 6 months, a young man who has been with her about a month and the 12 year old's older sister (maybe 14 years) who has been with her for 2 weeks. Yeah...you are thinking the same thing I am...that we are going to be really bad at this and we have had one practice together and we are definitely not sounding good. We have several weeks until the 13th but we only have two more practice times together. Plus we are not just playing the melody but 3 of the songs will have three different parts which we play all together (ugg!). We are to play, Jingle Bells, Jolly Old St. Nicholas, Silent Night (those are the three with the three parts)then we are to play Joy to the World together and then she and I will play Up on the Housetop and then we each have a solo piece. I will be playing I'll Be Home for Christmas. I am pretty nervous about it as I tend to mess up even when I play just for my teacher but it will be good experience I suppose though I would rather just have kept studying several Christmas songs that I wanted to play for my family.
Other than that work has been a absolute horror lately up until this week. I now just take it one day at a time and get through it and close my eyes to how bad things are. I need the job too badly to leave it right now.
There are other good things going on though:

 I started a new blog called The New Violinist. I think I will enjoy writing about my experiences learning to play the violin.

Thanksgiving is coming! We'll have our regular one at home and then on the weekend our family will get together at my brothers and we'll bring Phil's turkey fryer and fry a turkey....so good! I hope it is warmer that weekend! Maybe I'll remember to take pictures for you all and you'll get a second post this month!