Craptacular

CARE AND FEEDING: Annabelle and the Triops enjoyed a sunny breakfast at the kitchen island this morning. The Triops seems to be continuing to grow. This morning CJ was quite amused when I spoke of it perhaps tunneling its way out of our house, working its way through the sewer system to Elliott Bay on its way to Puget Sound and eventually dominion over the Pacific Ocean.
STOP, DOG. STOP!: This morning we deviated from our regularly scheduled programming. I told the kids we had tickets to the 12:30 Seattle Children's Theater's production of "Go, Dog. Go!" based on the book by P.D. Eastman.

I can't recall ever having read that book to the kids, so I hoped we could find it on YouTube. Sure 'nough, there was a nice video someone had produced that was faithful to the (very simple) text.

"Is this by Dr. Seuss?" CJ asked almost immediately. I could certainly see why - the artwork and even the clip of the text was very Seussian. The book is short on words, so the kids and I were curious about how it would be adapted to a play.

We also spent some time talking about one of the running gags in the book. Every so often a female dog would wander in and ask, "Do you like my hat?" and a male dog would tell her, "No!"
I asked the kids if they thought there was a graceful way to answer a question like that without hurting someone's feelings but also without lying.

"That's impossible!" CJ immediately replied.

I suggested they might point out one thing they liked about the hat, like its color. Or, they might answer the question with a question, like, "Oh, is it new?" and hope that would suffice.

It was a beautiful, sunny morning. I parked several blocks away from the theater and we enjoyed a nice walk over. We arrived to find locked doors. Hmm. I thought to check our tickets and lo and behold, they said 3/9 NOT 2/9. We were a month early (which, I suppose, is better than being a month late). I'd entered the date wrong in my Yahoo! calendar.

Choosing to make lemonade out of lemons, the kids each got a bite of lunch from the food court and we walked the grounds while they ate.
PRIVATE CONVERSATION: Recently, it occurred to me that I haven't had a Stranger Danger, Personal Space type conversation with the kids in awhile. I looked for some online resources, and found one that would work for today - Dr. P. Body. The Web site looks dated, but the good Dr. says he "and his friends will help you find out all kinds of interesting things about health and safety." I found a PDF on there of a couple of kids in bathing suits. It was a good springboard for discussion.

The print out, in part, pointed out that "Bathing suits cover the parts of your body that are private." But rather than just go with things presented as is, I pointed out to the kids that "normal" isn't the same everywhere. For instance, in Europe, the boy or a man might be wearing a bathing suit that looks like briefs/underwear - and the woman might not have a top on. And in some places in the Middle East, the woman would be compelled to be covered head to toes in yards of flowing fabric.

I asked the kids to color suits that looked like theirs. Annabelle produced a dead ringer. CJ, well, notsomuch ...
In his first go round, he had some story about some crazy suit swallowing people up. Clearly, he missed the point entirely. We had a Talk and I made him do it over.

MELTDOWN: We made the drive out to Shoreline for science class, and that's when the day went to hell in a BIG way. For, you see, apparently somewhere along the way, my sweet, obedient children were replaced with mannerless Pod People.

But how 'bout we let them tell how it went down in their own words. Here are the letters of explanation they wrote (verbatim) when we got home.

By: Annabelle Kisky
I shoved my stuff off the table (including my pencil). Next time I will just put my stuff down. And I also did not sit-up right. And I also was talking alot. And when I shoved my stuff off the table I shoved it (toward) the teacher.

And, from the desk of CJ
I was playing with my pencl (and a cup)
I was putting my hed on the table
I was ignoreing the techer."

Suffice it to say, sitting in the back of the room watching this go down, I was MORTIFIED. And I even did some mid-class corrections for each of them, but honestly, it didn't seem to register. They were just bad, Bad, BAD.

Naturally, I asked them to each write a course of corrective action, as well.

Annabelle wrote
Next time I will just set my stuff down and sit up right, and not talk so much because I always talk alot and I will even stop talking when (the teacher) uses her big teacher voice. Because when she does she wants us frozen.

CJ wrote
I will not play with things that I shod work with. I will not put my head on the table. I will lisin to the techer. I will look and lisin!

They both spent a quiet, contemplative night with no computer and no video games.

DISNEY STYLE: This afternoon we returned a few books to the Magnolia branch of the library, and checked out more, of course. We got a couple of cartooning books featuring familiar Disney characters. Bee tried her hand at Minnie Mouse tonight.