How low...

..... can you go? 

All the way to the lowest note of her wee Eb clarinet is how low Katie can go as of this week. She was very excited. 

But shortly after this photo we reached a further new low for the week. I dropped the beloved clarinet and it snapped at the joint to the mouthpiece. Clarinet broken.

I was utterly gutted. She was incredible. She was so upset but very brave too. She cried, but cuddled me and told me she loved me, that it was an accident. She sat at the piano, playing that while I tried to come up with a plan. She focussed well, but stopped and said "I don't want a new clarinet, I need that one, it's my special first one. I love you." I told her I would do what I could but would sort something somehow. She got on with her day, confident in my word thankfully. She went off to school happy. I went to my piano lesson, clarinet in hand. Before I even told B what had happened, she knew the break that must have occurred. The absolute saint of a woman put her day aside to help us. We made some phonecalls, we had my lesson and then we set about to try a repair. It took us  a few hours but she didn't stop until she'd played & thoroughly tested the final repair attempt. We made a tube case for it. We put the world to rights as glue dried and such. As I said goodbye she said "I remember the days when you just need someone to say 'Let's fix this together'". I was incredibly grateful she was there to do that today. 

I made a sheepskin lined "clarinet-sock" to go inside the tube case we'd made. The fix seems to be holding and it's playing ok. It's a cheap clarinet, it's not worth paying to have it repaired if this holds, as she will only be able to use the Eb to G3 and her teacher doesn't think that's going to take long. I was a couple of minutes late to school for Katie. I wasn't last to collect her from her class, but she scowled and said "Naughty Mummy". I said "just before you get sad with me, ask me where I was". When I explained, the frown went away and she gave me a massive cuddle. 

I was very sad at the fact that her so loved clarinet got broken, and still am for Katie's sake, but I'm very proud of her behaviour towards it all. And that she valued the fact B & Mama had spent this time on her clarinet, even though she can see the mend and doesn't have her posh original case, she's been able to be grateful that she could gently try it tonight, and go to bed knowing she can play it properly tomorrow.