music=magic

Music=magic; they even share a lot of the same letters, like m, i, and c, AND all their vowels are in the same place. They are pretty much the exact same word. Maybe I should buy this cd to help learn how to be more musically magical. Or maybe this one. Or find a guitar like this one. (Who knew there was so much magic to be found in the free market? I sure didn't. I thought you had to be born with it or have a wizard give it to you or something. I guess not!)

Anyway, today I brought a guitar to one of the handicapped orphanages (maybe a magic guitar?) and played it for them. Not my guitar, mind you, because there are 3 guitars just sitting up in the library of the house so I took one of those so if something happened to the guitar in transit or on site I wouldn't have to cry. We put the kids wheelchairs all in a circle around me—a captive audience, if you will—and I just played random songs for a while. One of the more mobile girls pulled her chair up really close to me so that she could watch my fingers the whole time. It was pretty cute. The kids really liked the music and it made them smile which made me smile. One of the girls has had her head down a lot recently but she picked it up a few times and smiled while I was playing—that was awesome. I need to memorize more songs because even I'm starting to get tired of "It's All Been Done," "You Are What You Love," "The Sweater Song," and "You Are My Sunshine." And maybe I should learn some in Spanish so the kids can understand what I'm saying... Things to think about.

miracles

I went to the handicapped (and by handicapped I mean "differently abled") orphanage today! I was a little nervous about it because I've never worked with kids like that before, but it was actually awesome. I worked this shift with my roommate Cortney who is the "mom" at that site and I think that is what made a huge difference. (I've worked at some other sites with girls who are not as informative or excited and I tell you what those sites were not as fun.) I was there in the afternoon so all we did was help put them in their chairs after their nap, took them for walks around the orphanage grounds, then did an activity with them (we painted their feet and printed them on a sheet with their names), helped feed them dinner, changed their diapers and put them in their pjs. The people working there take super good care of the kids and you can just tell that you love them—that was my favorite part.