Ethan and his TROMBONE!!!

Ethan will be attending Heritage Academy next year along with Carlie.  At Heritage, you are required to take either band or choir and since choir is strictly forbidden at our home (for MANY reasons but mostly because I was a die-hard band nerd:) he wisely chose band:)

I was encouraging Ethan to pick a low-brass instrument.  I was imagining baritone for him but Mr. Taylor, the band teacher, said he could really use trombones.  Chris was with Ethan at this new student orientation and so he calls me on the way home and says, "Ethan wants to play trombone and he has an audition for Mr. Taylor in 2 weeks."  "WHAT?!  An audition for BEGINNING band?"  I ask.  "Yep, everyone has to do it."

So telling me I have to buy a musical instrument is like telling a man he has to buy a new power tool--I was ALL over it!!!  WOO-HOO!!!  I hit my favorite music store the next day to "rent" a trombone-- which would have been $20 per month--but they had a used trombone for $100 so I decided to just buy one instead.  I had NO idea how affordable trombones were!!!  (Carlie's USED oboe that we bought 2 years ago was $3000!)  So I was quite thrilled with my bargain purchase!  I bought a book to go with it and VOILA!  Ethan is a trombone player!

I tried to helped him a lot in the beginning but then quickly realized to back off and let him do this on his own!  And by golly!  The boy is getting it!  He quickly taught himself an entire scale and has figured out the Veggie Tales tune:)

I'm still getting used to this sound in my home.  I am so used to piano, singing,  & oboe going on and every time Ethan starts practicing, it startles me just for a moment:)  But he REALLY seems to like this instrument and it' probably because no one else in this home is playing anything remotely close to it.  This is DEFINITELY his OWN thing!  SOOO proud of this boy: