{"id":11,"date":"2006-06-14T22:20:06","date_gmt":"2006-06-15T05:20:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ukuleletonya.com\/blog\/welcome\/"},"modified":"2013-03-02T15:29:12","modified_gmt":"2013-03-02T22:29:12","slug":"welcome","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/ukuleletonya.com\/blog\/welcome","title":{"rendered":"About Tonya"},"content":{"rendered":"

I like ukuleles. They\u2019re fun, approachable and, without question, one of the \u201chappiest\u201d instruments I know.<\/p>\n

I like ukulele people even more. They\u2019re fun, approachable and, without question, pretty darn happy, too (well, there are a few exceptions, but I don\u2019t consider them \u201creal\u201d ukulele folks anyway).<\/p>\n

Enjoy visiting with me for a bit and finding out more about this unique instrument (and, yes, I pronounce it in the Hawaiian fashion, \u201coo-koo-leh-leh\u201d not \u201cyou-koo-lay-lee\u201d\u2014and, since it\u2019s my website, I can do that without being labeled an elitist).<\/p>\n

To find out more about what’s going on lately with ukuleles, see my blog<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Comments? Drop me a line!<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

How did *you* get started playing the ukulele? The picture here shows the first time I picked up an ukulele\u2014it was at the WorldMark Kihei Resort on Maui. David Nitta, all around “best guy” there, was offering a free ukulele lesson to guests one morning. I’d always been entranced with the “look” of an ukulele so I opted to take the lesson instead of snorkeling that morning at Ulua Beach. My mom and sister humored me by taking the lesson, too.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"HawaiiUkuleles\"<\/a><\/em><\/div>\n

Within a few strums I fell in love with the ukulele. I’d never played an instrument before and the ukulele (four fingers, four strings\u2014what could be more intuitive?) spoke to me with its sweet sound as well as its echoes of Hawaii (my favorite place). I was hooked. Here I’m shown at my very first ukulele encounter\u2014I’m between my sister, Sandy, and my mom, Maxine (note the matching Hawaiian shirts and the beginner’s favorite C chord). David’s in back (he’s *still* at the WorldMark in Kihei and still teaches ukulele to guests).<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I like ukuleles. They\u2019re fun, approachable and, without question, one of the \u201chappiest\u201d instruments I know. I like ukulele people even more. They\u2019re fun, approachable and, without question, pretty darn happy, too (well, there are a few exceptions, but I don\u2019t consider them \u201creal\u201d ukulele folks anyway). Enjoy visiting with me for a bit and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":347,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-11","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/P6Wqkt-b","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ukuleletonya.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/11","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ukuleletonya.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ukuleletonya.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ukuleletonya.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ukuleletonya.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"http:\/\/ukuleletonya.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/11\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":364,"href":"http:\/\/ukuleletonya.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/11\/revisions\/364"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ukuleletonya.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ukuleletonya.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}