♫ So Long, Farewell, Auf Weidersehen, Goodbye! ♫

 

It's a super sad week for me here, as I'm saying goodbye to all of my piano students, many of whom I have taught for 4/5 years now - some since I arrived in Toronto and started teaching here!

 

With all the other excitement happening this year, my time with these students has come to an end - at least for now!  I'll be away from teaching piano for a few months but I'm so pleased with how I chose to celebrate my students and my time with them.

 

In the past, for Christmas and Summer gifts I have mainly baked their treats!  My favourites have been Musical Shortbread and High Five Cookies :)  But this little project was something baked in the oven, that, for once in my life wasn't a cake!

Having seen DIY Sharpie Mugs for a long long time now on Pinterest, and in other bloggers' projects, it's surprising to me that I've actually never tried it!  So now was the time!

 

A black and white piano, using a black oil-based Sharpie on a white mug... I liked the idea of a distinct image on the white mug, and then to take it to the next level for my students - to personalise it for each of them.  That was my favourite part, and definitely their favourite part when they opened their gifts!  It worked especially for those students who were siblings because the mugs were individual for each of them :)

 

 

 

I read many posts about the DIY Sharpie projects, and saw how most of them were similar enough, but each had something slightly different they did about them.  I'll tell you how I did it, and how I combined many elements of the "usual" way I found, and chose my own way as I went along as well.

 

What you'll need (weird not to be writing 'Ingredients' here!):

 

Oil-based Sharpie pen in colour of your choice - I purchased a Fine Black pen from Michaels, with 40% off of course!

Plain white mug - I read a lot that the cheaper the better - I got 3 packs of 6 plain white mugs for $10 from Canadian Tire.

 

Before I bought the mugs, I put together a word document with my students' names on in 3 different fonts, some to match personalities, others that fit the style of font with the name itself!  I chose these fonts which I had previously downloaded free: 'Hello Heartache', 'Girls Have Many Secrets' and 'KG When Oceans Rise'.  In the end I only used these as a reference as I copied the font, and used them as a guide on sizing too.

 

Directions (Method?!):

 

1.  Wash the mugs in soapy water, rinse and leave to dry.  Make sure the mugs are completely dry to make you start.

 

 

 

2.  Decide on your image, and using the Oil-Based Sharpie Paint Marker just let it happen!  You could etch out the design with eyeliner (as I found when I researched), or even try a pencil transfer from a printed design, but I used the printed names as a guide for sizing, marked where I wanted to start and finish, and then freestyled the rest. 

 

 

3.  Once the names were done, it was piano time.  I'm lucky - I have drawn an octave of a piano MILLIONS of times in my life!  It was easy to draw freehand, just using a random rectangle (in fact, a pack of stamps!) for the sizing, and then colouring in the black keys by eye.

 

 

4.  The paint pen did appear to dry just as I worked on each mug (I did 4 the first day, 11 the next, and 3 the final day of DIY-ing - I always had to stop and leave for work!).  Then, placing the mugs on a baking sheet - so they are not touching, place in a cool oven and turn the oven on to 450°F.

 

 

 

Careful not to pre-heat the oven before you put the mugs in.  The gradual heating of the oven helps the mugs adjust to the heat, to slowly heat up and to keep everything from cracking.

 

5.  Bake for 30 minutes, then turn off the oven and leave to cool without opening the oven door.

 

*** Whilst my mugs were baking, especially the day there were 11 mugs in there, the smell did get quite toxic!  Luckily, with both the oven fan, and our unit's fan on, and a sunny balcony to go and sit on, it was okay - but do be wary of this if you're in a small space, or are doing a lot of these!  I don't know if it is anything super toxic, but the smell was not great, and I felt like it was not the best to sit inside while it smelt so pungent! ***

 

 

6.  When the mugs have completely cooled (and for me, overnight) - wash in warm, soapy water again and leave to dry.

 

 

7.  Go over any patches of the black design that might have cracked, or be more faded than the rest.  Some of the black piano keys needed a second coat of the paint marker, and some of the thicker parts of the names - but it was super easy to go over a second time.

 

8.  Do a second bake in the oven, again placing them in a cool oven, turning on to 450°F, baking for 30 minutes and then leaving them to cool completely.  When cooled, give them another wash in warm, soapy water.
 

 



So there were many different thoughts on whether these mugs could be dishwasher safe or not.  My research on everybody's different blog posts on the project lead me to believe, that yes, if you use the oil-based Sharpie paint markers, and do at least 1 bake in the oven, they are likely to be dishwasher safe.  In my two hand-washings of the mugs there were no problems at all, I just haven't been brave enough to try the dishwasher yet! 

 

I marked up the tags (that had a special note to each of my students telling them I'd miss them a lot!) as Hand Wash Only, just as a precaution, and then stuck one of my Sew Lah Tea Dough stickers on too!

 

A double wrap in tissue paper to keep them safe as I took them to student's houses, and schools, placed in white paper bag, with a strip of piano tape I have had in my craft box forever, and they were ready to go!

 

 

17 DIY mugs made, as of today, 11 given out, and 6 more to go before my time teaching all of these amazing students is over :-(  I am SUPER happy with how much they have all loved the mugs.  Many have finished their lessons to run to their Mum/Dad and show them their new mug with their name on it... YEY!  That's a good feeling!  Hopefully they'll be able to keep them forever, and always enjoy their piano lessons.

 

 

Now I have tried this DIY Sharpie project, I cannot wait to do it more!!  New colours, new designs... I already have one in mind for the Summer time, you'll just have to wait and see how that one turns out.
 

 

I'd totally recommend this project for anyone!  The Sharpie pens make it easy to design and draw with, as you're holding a pen - not a paintbrush!  Keep the design simple and it will be totally effective - it's shiny and well glazed and looks professional (at least to my 10 year old students!!).

 

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ 

 

Good luck to all of my students in their future musical endeavours and piano playing... I am going to miss you all A LOT and hope to always keep in touch!

♫ High Five to my students! ♫

As the school year draws to a close, I thought I would share with you the baking I did for my piano students, as their 'student appreciation' gifts!  There are so many teacher appreciation gift ideas around, but I love to give my students a little treat at the end of the year, at Christmas time and before the Summer break.  Just a little something to reward their hard work and their piano achievements during the year.

This year they have made me a very proud piano teacher! ♫  I had 5 students taking their VERY FIRST ever piano exams this April and they all did SO well, some with really great marks and comments/feedback so I am very very proud of them for all they achieved.  I have another 2 with Summer time exams and I am so looking forward to being there for them and working with them on these.  

Yesterday was also our Summer recital, and the students of mine who were able to perform did a fantastic job, worked hard on their pieces and played really well, having fun at the same time :-)  

Of course there have been a number of challenges too this year, there's the constant battle of practice with some children... some frustrated learning difficulties... etc etc, but this never wins over the amazing job my students do, the hard work they can put in, and the good feeling they get when they master something tricky.  

Hence my reward for them at the end of the year too!  This year I wanted to bake them a 'High Five' cookie, as I had never used a hand shaped Wilton cookie cutter I bought years ago (I think in Edinburgh 2010!) but knew would be perfect for this little treat :-)

I included a little note on the packaging saying "Well done on a great year of piano.  Keep playing this Summer :-)".  Now not all of my students have had these cookies yet, so parents, if you're reading sshhh, don't tell them!  I teach at a school who is done for the year so our lessons are done for a while.  I have a bunch of students continuing with Summer lessons but I decided to give out the cookies now anyway, as the end of school year treat.  My in-home students will be getting theirs in the final week of June!  I hope the note reinforces what I have been telling them about continuing to play.  I also gave students who I will not see over the Summer an activity pack, with some piano challenges, things to try at home this Summer in their playing, some Summer activity worksheets and some manuscript paper to compose some of their own music.  Let's just hope everybody keeps their fingers in piano mode, and they don't forget their 'piano brains' before September!!

So, about these cookies...

I baked a sugar cookie using a recipe I had used before.  It was a simple recipe to make, and kept it's shape pretty well, which was lucky as I was a little worried about how the fingers would look once cooked.  Especially as this was the first time I had used the cutter.  

Ingredients all ready to go.  But in case you can't guess what the measurements are from this, I'll write the recipe down too :-P  The recipe I made states it makes 4 dozen cookies - I haven't used the whole batch yet but at the end of June I'll let you know how many of the hands it made :-)

Ingredients:

3/4 cup unsalted butter

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

1/2 teaspoon lemon extract

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

Method:

1.  Pre-heat oven to 400°F and then in a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  

2.  Beat in eggs and lemon extract.

3.  Combine the flour, baking powder and salt, and gradually add to the creamed mixture and mix well.

4.  Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours or until easy to handle.

5.  On a floured surface, roll dough to 1/8 inch thickness...  

Alright, with a chunk of dough ready to go I got rolling and cutting before placing my cookies on a greased baking sheet and baking for 7-9 minutes (or until lightly browned).  

I LOVE the hand shape and am already thinking about other ways to use these cutters again.  Perhaps engagement cookies?  A silver ring and silver ball for a new shiny ring celebration!?!  A 'helping hand' cookie?  Hmm, what else?

I went with the 'High Five'... which kid doesn't love to give/get a high five!?  And this one's edible :-)  While the cookies were cooling I made these labels in Word and printed them on coloured card.  Chopped and hole punched, they were ready!  Should I make these into a PDF for all to share and print?  I think I will...just bear with me, it will be here in a couple of days :-)

Cookies cooled, and seeing as my first few were going to be given out the following day, although it was late in the evening (as most of my baking ends up being) I thought I should get going on the royal icing decorations, just in case it took a while to dry.  I didn't want the humid weather to mean everything was still sticky when I had to package them up!

A little outline test to check the fingers would still be seen once the icing was there and then I got to work on piping and flooding the cookies.

I used a Royal Icing recipe using 2 large egg whites, 2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice and 3 cups icing sugar mixed together and coloured some of this blue.  You may need more/less than this, I had some leftover from the initial 15 cookies I made but haven't finished yet, so I'll make some more icing at the end of June.

Late in the evening meant I didn't want to have to stop and get photos every few minutes as I went along, so Jonathan kindly took a few while I worked!  Please excuse the blurry moving ones, I obviously didn't want to stop with that icing, not even for a second!

All the cookies were finally flooded, and actually some of the first ones I had flooded were already starting to dry so I risked piping the writing on them, really REALLY hoping the colour wouldn't bleed into the white.

The risk luckily paid off, and the writing was fine so I managed to get everything done before bed!  I was super pleased with the blue on white and the writing I piped.  Most of them anyway.  I had made a few extra  which meant for some practice runs and/or discard cookies...discard into our tummies that is!

The next morning I did some photos before packaging them up ready to be given out at the end of each final lesson!

I was pretty pleased with how these turned out, a simple shape with simple blue writing on white flooded royal icing topped sugar cookies.  BUT a fun idea, which the kids loved!!  :-D  Yey! Success on winning their approval hehe.  Many also couldn't believe they were homemade (now THAT feels good!), so well, that was nice!

I've got a batch of cookie dough in the freezer, and the other high five tags already cut out so just a little more baking to go and all of my students will be well and truly 'appreciated' in my piano students' favourite way...food treats! 

Congratulations on a GREAT year of piano everybody, you make me so proud! :-) ♫

♥ Valentine's Day Piano Worksheets ♥

Valentine's Day is coming and starting tomorrow afternoon I will be taking along my musical Valentine's Day worksheets for all of my piano students along with a little pencil for them to use and keep!

I wanted to give them a little treat but also develop some of my own worksheets this year.  I started off with my Composer Love Stories - telling them stories about composers, their wives, children, songs they wrote for them and then also mentioned some things about the 'Romantic' Period of music of course!  To finish off this worksheet I did a little matching quiz to check to see if they really had read it all.  Then I realised I needed more.  A worksheet or two that would also be suitable for my much younger students!  A Love Story to write, and you'll see I suggested they write it about music, or from their piano's perspective because really, which 6 year old will tell their piano teacher which boy they love at school?!  And then finally, for all of the students that need quizzing on their notes on the staff, they can fill them in on the Love Note Staff Hunt hearts.

For Composer Valentine Love Stories just click for the PDF!

Valentine's Day Piano Love Song (Click for PDF) 

Love Note Staff Hunt (Click for PDF)

I bundled it all together, added a heart I cut out from music scrapbook paper, holes punched on either side and a pencil slotted through so it holds together.  I used just curling ribbon we had a large roll of to tie it all together.

Just a little note:  I purposefully do my documents in black and white only.  I LOVE everybody's worksheets in colour, they look amazing, but for little piano teacher me trying not to print like crazy all the time I thought it would be good to stick to black and white for my worksheets this time (as my printer just ran off 75 sheets for this week!)... And well, my students love to colour anyway :-)

For when I am printing in colour (and I do that a lot too!) here is a great list of printer cost saving tips from amazing piano blogger Susan Paradis with her latest blog post - just click here!

I think we'll be having a lot of fun with it this week, please feel free to download these documents and let me know how you used them too!

♫ Happy Musical Valentine's Day ♫

Harry Potter Music Challenge ♫

What a crazy day!  I am home now after what has been my most Wintery experience in Toronto ever... and I LOVED it!  Trudging through knee deep snow, it all definitely falling into my boots was totally awesome!  Music classes in the morning, and then back to the same area for piano lessons in the evening.

And that is what brings me to this post's subject!  I had an email from a parent just yesterday telling me her son had been invited to audition for a choir school in the area - great news you might think! Not for the young boy who wasn't sure about this whole 'vocal' audition!  Mum still wanted to see if he might get used to the idea and do the audition so asked for some secret help from me!

She asked if we could work on elements of the audition without him knowing exactly why.  Now some of them were ear training exercises we often do during class anyway so I knew that wouldn't be a problem but the voice specific performances or exercises I felt he may be less inclined to do.

Until Mum mentioned something that just sent ideas whirring.. "If only Harry Potter were in a choir, there would be no problem!  That's why he liked the exam idea, because they have exams at Hogwarts! Sigh..."

And for anybody who knows me also knows I LOVE Harry Potter too so I thought maybe there was something more I could do to introduce some of these exercises in a fun way :-)

I have a bunch of Harry Potter stickers, and the kids LOVE getting stickers especially as part of a challenge so that's where I began.

I came up with 6 challenges, some that were part of the vocal audition process he may go through... Others were performance or improvisation based.

Check out the PDF document here.

Thank you MuggleNet for this awesome insight into Harry's piano playing ability!  Who knew?!

After making and printing these (2 copies this time, as both Harry Potter obsessed brother and sister would be doing the challenge!) I realised what I could do to make this MORE awesome for the kids...

... A HOGWART'S LETTER!!!  Inviting them along to the music challenge the night before to give them something to look forward to in the next lesson.  Luckily their house was on my way home from that evening's piano lesson so this was easy to do - alternatively I thought I could have also asked a parent to print the attachment and leave it for them.

But as I did it myself I was also able to tea-stain the letter (after a nice warm cup of tea of course!) and give it an old letter feel that I'm sure the real Hogwart's letters were like!

Here's the PDF I made for the Hogwart's letter - gaps for name, date, time, location and teacher's name so you can fill them in as needed!  Just click here!

So after an email request, and quickly whipping this together I definitely was getting excited about it!  ...We had a LOT of fun in today's lesson, they all completed their challenges, got their stickers and one of my student's even dressed in her Halloween Harry Potter robe for the challenge!  Loved it!

♫ We'll definitely be doing this challenge again! ♫