@Gordon Shumway If you have another half hour, why not work on a piece of you choosing to reinforce the other sections of your practice. Or, make it a simple piece that you can do without much difficulty (ie not a Mickey Mouse piece) and play around with getting it smooth and then enhance it with what you have been learning. I hope I explained that correctly.

I include my Books 1 and 2 from my cello at the beginning of practice, played as written, to warm up because they are easy for me and I am comfortable with them and can relax. I actually work front to back of each (Skipping the ones I am not find of, not because they are more difficult, but because I am simply not fond of that tune) At the end, I take the books again and play around with them. I have added arpeggio fills, etc. What I have added does not necessarily add quality to the actual song, I just used the techniques or whatever I have been learning or already learned in tunes that are not practice tunes. Again, I hope I explained my idea behind that correctly. Rarely, are they done the same twice at the end every day because I don’t write anything down. I just do it they way I feel like doing it to incorporate skills and techniques, lesson material.

Ah. Gotcha

Fiddlerman said 

I know that some teachers and professionals would disagree with me, but remember that your "pieces" consist of scales and arpeggios as well. That means that if you practice those pieces properly, you're getting some great work done as well.

I am not saying that you should not practice scales, arpeggios and etudes, just that you can get a lot out of practicing any kind of piece with the proper mind set.

  

I was wondering about that. I read a lot about “needing” to do scales and arpeggios, which makes sense because it does seem to help with fingering and bowing. But then if you are working on pieces, be it violin, viola or cello, and they have a lot of arpeggios, wouldn’t spending double time on the arpeggio piece instead of taking time away from that piece to do arpeggio scales benefit the piece more, and still give you the arpeggio practice benefits? I was always wondering about that.

If I spend time with it in a piece, I am also adding timing more exactly to have that arpeggio fit a specific piece. To me, that arpeggio means more, has a reason and belongs to something. If any section of music just sounds like it is thrown in, or does not sound like it belongs to the rest, it just does not make sense to me. That is why the arpeggios in actual pieces always seem to make sense to me.

It is like jazz. To me, it is just a bunch of noise, my apologies to all you jazz fans. Or it is like the occasional jazz piece might sound nice and then someone goes off on a tangent. Once that happens, the piece makes no sense. The sections of that piece do not belong together. With arpeggios on their own, they do not belong to anything, no direction. In a song they belong and make sense.