16-Patch Star

Music is science.

It is exact, specific; and it demands exact acoustics.

Music is math.

It is rhythmically based on the subdivisions of time into fractions.

Music is foreign language.

Most of the terms are in Italian, German or French.

Music is history.

It reflects the environment and times of its creation.

Music is physical education.

It requires coordination of fingers, hands, arms, and lips as well as facial, diaphragmatic, back, stomach, and chest muscles.

Most of all, music is art.

It allows a human being to take all of these techniques and use them to create emotion.

Why teach music?

Not so our students will become musicians. Not because we expect them to play or sing all their life. Not so they can have fun. But so they will be human. So they’ll recognize beauty. So they’ll be sensitive. So they’ll have something to cling to. So they’ll have more love, more compassion, more gentleness; in short, more life. - Tim Lautzenheiser

The Secret Drawer

The loveliest tinkle as of golden bells answered him. It is the fairy language. You ordinary children can never hear it, but if you were to hear it you would know that you had heard it once before.

Tink said that the shadow was in the big box. She meant the chest of drawers, and Peter jumped at the drawers, scattering their contents to the floor with both hands. In a moment he had recovered his shadow, and in his delight he forgot that he had shut Tinker Bell up in the drawer.

He tried to stick it on with soap from the bathroom, but failed. A shudder passed through Peter, and he sat on the floor and cried. His sobs woke Wendy, and she sat up in bed.

"What is your name?"

"Peter Pan."

She asked where he lived.

"Second to the right," said Peter, "and then straight on till morning."

Cornflower

Covenant-keeping women with mother hearts know that whether motherhood comes early or late; whether they are blessed with a “quiver full” of children here in mortality or not; whether they are single, married, or left to carry the responsibility of parenthood alone—in holy temples they are “endowed with power from on high” (D&C 38:32), and with that endowment they received the promised blessings and are “persuaded of them, and embraced them” (Heb. 11:13). Every girl and woman who makes and keeps sacred covenants can have a mother heart. There is no limit to what a woman with a mother heart can accomplish. Righteous women have changed the course of history and will continue to do so, and their influence will spread and grow exponentially throughout the eternities. How grateful I am to the Lord for trusting women with the divine mission of motherhood. Like Mother Eve I am “glad” (see Moses 5:11) to know these things.  – Julie B. Beck

Hit or Miss

Baked Eggs in Cups

The next time you serve baked potatoes for dinner, put about half a dozen more potatoes than you need in the oven. You can use the left-over spuds for this recipe the next morning: Take 4 to 6 day-old baked Idaho russets and shred them. Spray a 12-hole muffin tin with Pam. Divide the shredded potatoes evenly among the 12 muffin holes. With your fingers or a spoon, shape the potatoes into 12 little cups. Spray again with Pam and bake at 400F for 15 to 20 minutes, until golden brown. Remove tin from oven and gently crack an egg into each cup. Season with coarse salt and fresh ground pepper. Return to oven and bake about 15 more minutes, until yolks are just set. Serve warm with fresh fruit and juice.

May Barn

This week marks the 40th anniversary of Mel Brooks’ Blazing Saddles. The American Film Institute lists it as the sixth funniest movie of all time after Duck Soup, Annie Hall, Dr. Strangelove, Tootsie and Some Like it Hot. I have to admit those last two are really funny. If I’m in the right mood, so is Duck Soup. Mel Brooks, annoyed with sixth place, said Blazing Saddles should have come in first with about 50 blank spaces between it and the next runner up. I’m told Monty Python is much funnier after 2:00 a.m., but I’m not ready to test the theory. I love Groundhog Day, and I make a point of watching it at least once a year. I never get tired of watching Galaxy Quest, the Three Amigos or The Princess Bride. I’m also very fond of Arthur (with Dudley Moore, not Russell Brand), A Mighty Wind and Arsenic and Old Lace. So, what’s YOUR favorite comedy?

Spools

This week I've been reading about a bridge over I-15 accidentally set aflame and destroyed by its builders. It reminded me of Mark Twain’s Innocence Abroad: “I speak of the famous bridge of boats which Xerxes ordered to be built over the narrowest part of the Hellespont (where it is only two or three miles wide.) A moderate gale destroyed the flimsy structure, and the King, thinking that to publicly rebuke the contractors might have a good effect on the next set, called them out before the army and had them beheaded. In the next ten minutes he let a new contract for the bridge. It has been observed by ancient writers that the second bridge was a very good bridge. Xerxes crossed his host of five millions of men on it, and if it had not been purposely destroyed, it would probably have been there yet. If our Government would rebuke some of our shoddy contractors occasionally, it might work much good.”