Bluebird

I hope you had a happy Mother's Day!

We started the day with a special breakfast, after which Evalyn and I took turns telling Lisa what we appreciate about her. We ended the day all lying in bed reading Harry Potter.

One of Evalyn's gifts for her mom was an original song which she wrote and recorded herself. It began as a picture of a bird she created with her fingerprint art kit. She wrote a poem on the page as well, called "Bluebird" and she began singing it. I noticed that she was using the same melody every time, so I asked if she wanted to record it.

We had a clandestine recording session last night while Lisa was shopping at Lowe's. Evalyn wanted to get out every instrument in my collection, but we finally settled on some jingle bells and an egg shaker. She sang her vocal, added the percussion, then wanted me to add guitar.

I had trouble matching a guitar part to her vocal. It's tough to get a six year old to see the value of planning a session and rehearsing - Just hit record, Dad! So we kept it fun, and we burned a CD for Momma to hear this morning. Of course she loved it.

Now I, being the perfectionist I am, and hearing much potential in Evalyn's melody, tried to create a cleaner version of the song with some editing, pitch correction, and added drum loops. Lisa and I both rather like the "dance mix" version. But Evalyn is unhappy with it because I edited out a couple of her words. I may put them back in and try to create a track we both are happy with, but for now, Evalyn has banned the "dance mix" from public listening. I guess it goes to show how important ownership is to a child in her own creative work.

You can hear Evalyn's version of the song, and view the artwork, at Lisa's Kids Music Planet Podcast Myspace page - yes proud Mamma posted it there already!