Bode's Recital

Bode had his first piano recital yesterday.  Fifteen thousand people from Colorado Springs packed World Arena to hear him play (a bit of an exaggeration).  Actually, there were probably 50 people and 12 players at a local church.  Still, it was very enjoyable.  In the morning, Bode told me he was scared of the recital because playing in front of people was hard.  I told him not to worry about it, and he seemed fine, although I was concerned after he said this.  Still, we knew he could do well because he'd been practicing so hard.  Bode got to the recital early, and spent some time with Miss Pat going over things and loosening up.  We all then gathered in the church, and Miss Pat said some opening remarks. I snapped a quick photo of Bode and Mommy.

Miss Pat then said the first player would be Bode McGuirk.  Little Dude gets up and calmly walks to the front.  I told him to bring his bag which contains his music.  He had told me he had everything memorized, but I thought he might want it in case he froze up (although I didn't tell him this).  Miss Pat introduced Bode to the crowd (small group of people), and said he'd be playing three pieces.  I took the opportunity to snap another photo.  No signs of nerves in this little guy.

His first piece was Pop Goes the Weasel.  Only a couple mistakes, and those were with the dreaded left hand.  Plus, no need for any sheet music.  The kid has a memory!

His next piece is a song called The Accompaniment.  I started the camera late, so I didn't get the beginning.  Because of this error, I decided to just keep rolling and include his third piece in this clip (yes, I know there are easy movie editing software packages that would cut and splice the footage; I'm too lazy to do this).  His third song is called Go For the Gold, and I think he played both pieces amazingly well AND all from memory!

Obviously he needs to work on his bow at the end--he just sort of dropped the microphone and walked off :-)  The whole ensemble posed for a group picture afterwards

We are very proud of how hard Bode has worked on the piano.  We don't really have to bother him to practice--he'll sit down and play a few songs, although we think he does this just to butter us up so we'll let him play Agario, a very addicting and simple computer game.  We don't have much else going on right now.  The garden is winding down a productive year.  We even got a few stalks of corn and some peppers to go along with the tomatoes and broccoli.

The corn was ok--a little rough and chewy.  I don't know if it makes sense to grow it here.  I think next year I'll start six seeds in cups in March, and then transplant them.  Otherwise, I don't think the growing season is long enough.  I spent a couple days this week at the mountain estate cutting, splitting, and stacking firewood.  I think we have close to three cords of wood ready to go.  It took me all of Thursday and part of Friday morning to do this.

We are going up again over Columbus Day weekend in a couple weeks.  I still have about 100 more logs to cut.

Obviously the weather was gorgeous the two days I was there.  In Colorado Springs, it's been great--almost annoyingly hot, as the high for today is predicted to be 87.  A week ago, I took Bode on a short bike ride.  I didn't know if he really liked it or not until last night when he said, "Daddy, can we go on a bike ride tomorrow?"  Of course we will be going.  Pleasant week, and Happy October to all.

Swim Team

As I said in a previous post, Bode has joined the Rocky Mountain Rapids as a Class I swimmer.  There are five classes, with Class V being a high-school level swimmer.  Bode is doing amazingly well, and I say this as an unbiased observer (really).  I tried taking some pictures and movies yesterday.  They didn't turn out great, but it's not really my fault (yup, this craftsman is blaming his tools).  Bode was swimming on the other side of the pool, and all the parents/observers are sitting in the bleachers on the far side.  I didn't want to be "that parent" that is taking pictures of an ordinary workout.  Therefore, I had to use the zoom feature on my circa 2004 camera.  Thus, things are blurry and shaky.  Still, I think you can get the idea.  First up in Bode just chilling in the pool.

Next is a movie of Bode doing butterfly, turning off the "wall," in quotes because they Class I team only had one lane, so they put in a fake wall in the middle of the pool.

Note how good he looks doing butterfly.  Also note how fast his turn is off the wall as he transitioned to backstroke--just a couple months ago, he would stop, and let his feet touch the bottom of the pool before starting again.  Now, he just goes right in to backstroke, and simply overtakes the swimmer in front of him.  Very nice!  Next is a blurry movie of Bode doing freestyle.  His flip turn is very good, and he looks very smooth.

Towards the end of practice, they work on their starts.  Today was Bode's first time going off the starter's block.

Finally, the team did some sprint racing at the end.  Here's Bode winning his race--I think the person he swam against is about a head taller than he is.

Swim practice again tomorrow and Thursday.  I foresee many hours spent sitting on a pool deck :-) Bode has a meet on 17 October.  He will be swimming the 25-meter freestyle, 25-meter backstroke, 25-meter butterfly, and the 100-meter individual medley.  Should be a great time!  Pleasant day to all.

Lots Going On

...since my last post.  Has it really been over a month since I've put anything on the blog?  Shame on me.  We've seen a lot of activity over the past month.  First and foremost, Bode started 2nd grade on 18 Aug.  Here's a nice shot of him on his first day of school--such a grown up young man.

He has a very nice teacher, and it's her first year teaching, just like his kindergarten teacher was a "rookie."  She's very motivated and excited, so we are confident she will do a fantastic job.  Nothing too exciting has happened in school, which is good.  He says he likes it, although when we ask him about the best part of his day, the answer is always, "Recess."  At first, we thought this was not good, but then he would ask me about the best part of my work day, and my answer is usually, "When I went to the gym," so we can't get too upset with him.

Bode also started swimming for the Rocky Mountain Rapids swim team.  He practices three times a week, and we think he's doing awesome.  We have some videos, but those are on Ashley's camera, and she's yet to upload the videos.  We have practice tomorrow night, so I'll be sure to get some action shots and post them (hopefully before mid-October).  Bode is also running cross-country.  He's more of a social runner--he likes hanging out with his friends, as evidenced by his demeanor at the starting line--not exactly laser-focused on dominating the race.

I did get the below action shot of him on the course.

He ran the whole way, and we are very proud of him.  Bode's friend, Hunter (the tall kid on Bode's left is the pictures above) won first place--he's quite fast and has a nice stride.

Another new event in the McGuirk home is we have a new "manny"--Corey has been taking care of Bode after school.

We spent Labor Day weekend in Breckenridge at the Mountain Estate.  For some reason, I didn't take any pictures (not sure why).  We had some friends visit on Saturday (the Hardman's), and we all enjoyed an Auburn victory.  And even though Auburn won yesterday, we can't really say we enjoyed the game, as going into OT versus an FCS opponent was enough to make Ashley say, "I'm going to the Mountain Estate this week to cool off," (she's going up to work on some things, but it's funnier to say she had to leave town to recover).  The dogs are doing great--Bode really enjoys playing with them.  I'm not sure if they dogs enjoy everything Bode does, but they sure seem to love their boy.

The garden is winding down.  We've had 20+ tomatoes, lots of excellent carrots, peas, lettuce, broccoli (I'm very impressed how this has done), about 15 strawberries, and a couple ears of corn.  The weather is still very warm, and I'm hopeful we'll get five or six more ears before the weather turns.  Our raspberry plants have really grown, but no fruit yet.  Maybe in a couple more years.  Finally, we have a very large pumpkin growing.  It's about the size of a honeydew melon, so I'm hoping it's really large come Halloween.

Pleasant week to all!