Piano and other living room additions

Michael came home with a surprise tonight (well, the girls were surprised, anyway). A Young Chang ebony professional upright piano. He had championed the project all by himself, searching Craigs list for weeks, showing me links, visiting and checking out the piano, researching movers and tuners and inspectors. Our piano was built in 1985, has an almost new look to the exterior, and, according to the piano inspector, only needs routine maintenance of a felt piece replaced and post-move tuning in a few weeks.

I love the way it plays. I also think the finish looks very classy in our living room. And it is a full upright like I grew up with, just with a different finish and cleaner lines. After the girls went to bed, I played with the dampener on for an hour or so and just loved it.

Ansley took an informal piano lesson from Auntie M before she left for college, and just reveled in the experience. So we're hoping that enthusiasm holds up for real piano lessons in the near future. I haven't found a teacher yet, but now I have a strong incentive to start the search.


We also got a great photo of Emberly from her 6-month professional pictures. (forgive its sideways appearance, I am formatting challenged). I think it is my favorite; and anybody who's been to our house knows how many great pictures we have of our girls.



The Emberly photo took the place of the old living room clock, so we needed to get a new one. For some time, I've wanted one of those really really big clocks from Target. And Michael actually told me to go to Target and buy one (by myself!) and enjoy dinner out while I was at it. Isn't he wonderful?

Anyway, we put it right below that drywall window thing at the top of the stairs. It looks awesome, at least to me.