You might remember that Derek has been playing drums in a band, Parental Petulance.
We've all enjoyed his involvement and supporting the band. Owen has even learned to say the band name. haha.
Back in July, I posted about the great fun we had when they played at AudioFeed.
It was so fun, in fact, that I couldn't help but wonder how I could be involved too. ha. You know, it's kind of a family themed thing. I asked Derek if it would be crazy if I learned to play the missing piece, the bass guitar... and he didn't think I was completely nuts. We tossed the idea around for a couple months, but I drug my feet a little since I wondered if we could even work out the logistics of playing shows if I was in the band too. After talking it over with Marshall & Ashley, we decided we could work all that out if I learned the bass. I still didn't get very serious about it... but right after Labor Day, Marshall sent Derek a link to a bass practice amp for sale. This was something we'd been missing, but that was necessary for learning to play. :) Derek paid $25 for this little amp and it got the ball rolling! He pulled out his bass guitar and started figuring out how to play the xPPx songs.
Of course, now that it had sound coming out, everyone wanted a try.
At first I wondered if Owen would figure the thing out before I did. 😏
Derek is a very talented musician... 😍 He can do it all, folks. He listened to the songs, figured them out on the bass and wrote out all the tabs on staff paper so I could learn to play them. Some nights he did this while nearly falling asleep. ha! One song at a time, he wrote them down and I started learning which string to hit on which fret. We also borrowed Marshall's four string bass so I didn't have to learn on Derek's huge five string.
I know I drove my whole family crazy with my practicing! Owen even fell asleep right on the floor while I was playing. He'd been fighting naps that week and finally crashed when it was almost time to go pick up his brothers from school.
When he could stay awake, he would get out his little Dollar Tree guitar and play along.
He's also tried his hand at the drums. As he crawled up to play he said to me, "I'm the best drummer all day."! 😂
After about a month of practicing, I had learned to keep up with the songs on the CD. And, it was time for band practice since there were some shows coming up. So we set up in the basement and had the band over. This also works great now that, as I keep mentioning, Marshall & Ashley live six minutes from us!
I was nervous, but it was SO much fun! Playing with a CD to learn the songs worked, but nothing is as great as playing with a group. That night I became an official member of Parental Petulance!
Like I said, there was a show coming up. It was time to get ready for a three show mini-tour at the end of October. So we had practices once a week for a few weeks. Practices are pretty crazy with all five of our boys present.
Cooper took this video one night and it captures just a little of the chaos.
Miles has a DIY book form the "Wimpy Kid" series that he writes the stories himself.
Not going to lie, it made me feel like a rock star when I found this one day!! haha!
There was lots of practice for me to prepare for shows. And also some costume prep! One of our shows would include them...
Stay tuned! (yes, a pun.)
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