My Kilt arrived today from Scotland!  It was fun to unpack it and finally get to see the Greene Tartan in person.  I am really pleased with the color and pattern and the fit is perfect!

My Kilt is an 8 yard 18oz heavy weight 100% wool kilt, that sucker is heavy!  I don't have any pictures yet but once I get more of my "kit" together I'll be sure to post some.  All I need now are my pipers hose (my sister is knitting those) my brogues (shoes) and a Prince Charlie jacket!

I have been keeping a practice journal the last couple of weeks, it really helps keep me focused on what I am doing and what I need to do next. Rather than write down what I'm "going to do" I write down what I actually did.   I can now look back and see what issues I was having with the pipes, or chanter and read the "mental notes" I used to make but would quickly forget because I didn't write it down!

I think it has made a big difference in respect to getting the most out of my very limited practice time.  I have been averaging about 45 to 60 minutes for each practice session.  Most of that time is on the chanter doing my fingering exercises from Jim McGillivray's excellent book "Rhythmic Fingerwork".  I have once again pulled out my Metronome and have been really working on my timing again, I was slacking off on the metronome and didn't realize that without it things were really starting to fall apart.

I had another Jori lesson on Tuesday.  But this time instead of jumping on the red eye boat at 6am and driving down to his teaching studio for my 11am lesson, I just sat at my kitchen counter and logged onto the Internet.  Yep, no waking up at the crack of dawn, waiting in line, on the ferry, dodging morning commuters on I-5, I didn't even have to put my pants on!

The way it works is you load up a free software called "Skype", configure your Web Cam and Microphone and at your scheduled time ring up your instructor!  I was skeptical at first but it really works, and works quite well.  Every so often I will make the trip down for an in person lesson to take care of things that you just can't do over the web, but for the most part video lessons are the way to go.

Just had my first lesson with Jori since he's been back from Scotland.  It felt great to get back into some sense of structure.  I'll be seeing him twice a month from here on out, but instead of in person we'll be doing lessons over the Internet.  This will save me a considerable amount of time since I won't have to leave the island to see him.  I'll probably set aside every 3rd or 4th lesson to meet with him in person but for now the Video chat thing will do the trick.

For this lesson we put the Kinnaird Bass reed back in my pipes and got it tweaked so it sounds really good, and the tenor's are also set too.  I suspected my top hand notes were a bit sharp with my current chanter reed and I was right, the High A and E were a bit sharp so Jori taped those notes to flatten them out.

I wasn't expecting to play the pipes on this lesson but the reed setup thing went pretty fast and before I knew it I was huffing and a puffin away, whew, what a work out!  With about 15 minutes left to my lesson we then moved on to the practice chanter and he had me go through the Jig I've been working on, nothing new there, just need to keep doing my exercises, esp GDE's (for Jigs and Reels).

One of the tasks I was given was to create a list of tunes, those I know, tunes I'm working on, and some I'd like to learn.  It should be a good mix of Airs, Marches, Strathspeys, Jigs, Reels and maybe even a hornpipe!  I have a list, its pretty long so I'm listening to those tunes over and over to whittle it down a bit to, say around 10 or 12 tunes.

I'm looking forward to getting structure back into my practicing and making some forward progress again.