Day 2343. On Friday I was able to go back to bed after everyone had left and got up again at 10 am to get ready for my 10:30 am student. I taught for an hour then started my second student at 11:40 am, going until 12:30 pm. Randy had already left at noon to pick up Tammy and Emmy and take them to their tennis class at 2 pm. Thankfully we had leftovers to eat. As for me, I didn't have time to eat as I usually pick up Sammy at 12:30 pm. So I left right after being done teaching to go pick him up. Once back home, I got to eat lunch and wrap up my lesson.
It wasn't a typical Friday as the kids' breakdance class was canceled because of their teacher getting married. That meant they came back home after tennis and that I was able to teach. I ended up teaching for 3 hours instead of one on a typical Friday afternoon, from 4 until 7 pm. I made their sandwiches before and cut up their fruit during my short breaks. Once I was done at 7 pm, we went downstairs for piano practice. Then it was bathtub time. Back out, we read a quick Bible story, then I prayed for them, and they went to bed while I sat down to teach from 8 o 9 pm. After I was done, I got to eat then I went back to work.
Today my first alarm went off at 9:30 am which was nice. I got up and got ready to leave the house which I did before 10 am, together with Tammy and Emmy. We did reading practice on the subway going downtown. Then we walked to their music school. It was the last class of the semester. Emmy always protects my bag when I go to the bathroom before class starts, and I never know what to expect when I get back. He always builds a protective wall around it with the foam cubes.
Their class always starts late but it started extra late today, at 10:50 instead of 10:30 am. There was only one other student there; the fourth one hadn't come in over a month. They did their finger warmup, then the song they had started before Christmas but not played all January because of the concert. Then she started a new song with them. Time was short so the class was over after that.
She had them come to the front and gave them a ribbon each - it was for all they had accomplished this semester, including their concert last Sunday. Then she got the special prize out that they had all been looking forward to this semester: a glass piano music box. To get that, we had to first count whether they had practiced a 100 days this semester. So I started counting. Tammy had practiced 115 days, and Emmy 116 days. Tammy was especially excited and jumping around shouting out her number. The teacher then came with the three pianos and handed them to each of the students one at the time. All three were very excited about this special gift. The pictures speak volume. Before leaving, they still wanted to get their last stamps and the final sticker in their sticker book. Then they got a cookie each, and the semester was over.
We put our coats and shoes on and walked back to the subway. Everything was icy as it had rained and then frozen so we had to be careful. We rode the subway home where we arrived at noon. I quickly put a pizza into the oven and warmed up our leftover pasta and ate it. I got everything else ready so Randy could eat and portion out the pizza for the kids. Then I had to start teaching at 12:30 pm which is why I had been under pressure to get it all done before. Randy left with Sammy at 1 pm to take him to his music class at the same school. He also got a certificate and had a picture taken with his teacher that he loves so much.
Just before 1:30 pm I was done teaching, and I quickly got everything ready for us to leave. Tammy, Emmy and I left at 1:30 pm and took the subway then the bus then walked to the school where Emmy's end-of-semester soccer match was taking place. He had to be there at 2:15 pm, and we got there just before that. Many other kids were arriving as well, and the kids that had played in the morning were just leaving. We made our way through hallway after hallway, following the signs until we finally got to the locker rooms. Emmy got changed, then we went to the gym where the trainers were. One trainer took Emmy to the trainer in whose team it was. There were 10 teams according to the locations where the kids had done their training this semester. In Emmy's teams, there were four locations combined together, I guess those with few kids that had registered for the match. All kids were first and second graders. We left Emmy there and went upstairs to the rafters to find ourselves some seats. We also reserved seats for Randy and Sammy. In the end, all the seats were full. I had brought Tammy's tablet with us as we were going to be there for 6 hours which was a long time. Tammy started watching fairy tales on her tablet. The matches were only starting at 3 pm so we still had time until then. We were sitting right by the guy with the computer and the microphone. He was commenting everything and putting the scores into the computer. We were able to keep up with the scores and statistics on a website. Emmy's team was in the last pairing to finally get to play so it took a while. Each match was 9 minutes long but then Emmy didn't even get to play the whole time as they had too many players so that some had to stay on the bench for half the game which was the case for Emmy for four out of the five games they played. When he was not playing, I was on my phone as I'm actually not interested in soccer at all. I talked to Randy a few times who wasn't too excited about coming especially because of all the stairs at the school which is difficult with the wheelchair but then he decided he'd come for Emmy's sake. Emmy was just playing his second match when they arrived after 4:30 pm. Sammy was excited to see us and be with us. He was also on his tablet but when Emmy was playing, he was cheering for him, just like Tammy. Emmy was coming up to see us between games a couple of times. We bought popcorn, and Emmy wanted gatorade. Emmy had a good team so that they won 3 out of the four games and were in first place in their group of five teams. Once al the teams had played four times and there was a ranking, the first team of each group, the second etc. then played another match (this time 8 minutes) to decide whether they were first/second, third/fourth etc. in the overall ranking. The last teams started so that Emmy played the very last match of the day. The other team was very strong and won 2:0. Therefore Emmy's team was second overall which was a great achievement. Emmy had the ball a few times but didn't get to score a goal.
Tammy and Sammy were already pretty tired as it was nearly bedtime which is 8 pm. It was about 7:45 pm when the award ceremony started. Emmy got a silver medal and what I thought was a certificate but it turned out that it was advertisement for their camps. Emmy does their camps during every school holiday anyway. They took a group picture then returned to their spot among the other teams. After all ten teams had received their medals, a player in each team still won a fair play prize but it was not Emmy. Randy and Sammy were already making their way to the exit as they had to conquer a few staircases. Tammy and I were making our way downstairs to the gym and the locker rooms. We were looking for Emmy but couldn't find him. He finally arrived. He had gone upstairs to find us but we had already left there. I took a picture of him with his medal. I was so proud of him! Then it was time to get changed. Emmy was among the last ones to be done which is not untypical. We then started our long trek through the maze to find the exit where Randy and Sammy were waiting for us. Then we had a bit of walk to the bus stop plus there was some construction but we found it and had to wait a bit. Then we took the bus and the subway and got home at 8:45 pm which was quite late for the kids. We got them ready for bed immediately; I had taken sandwiches with me for them to the match that they had long eaten. Randy and I then got ourselves something to eat. Then I went back to work, working on the pictures. I had moved my 8 pm student to Sunday because I had known we'd come home late.
