I just want to play this today

This song was a gift to my daughters' childhoods.

I first heard it when a music critic on National Public Radio brought this CD into the studio for a show about new music and talked about how utterly charming this piece was, how lovely the arrangement. And it was. I bought the cd, and everytime I played it for the girls, it would immediately snap them out of whatever funk they were suffering at the time. Delia turned it on in the car on the way to school today, and, as usual, just melted into grins when the mouse came in on the high descant.

Let's hear it for singing mice.

Another reason why my alma mater rocks

You know another reason St. Olaf College is cool? Because in November 2010, they decorated Stav Dining Hall like the Great Hall at Hogwarts Castle.



(See more pictures at the Facebook page here. Many more pictures, all quite fun.)

Edited to add: The food service contractor at St. Olaf College has a bulletin board where student comments are posted. The Facebook group has published a number of photographs of the cards that were left after the Harry Potter dinner. This one says it all: