PLAY DAY: This morning, CJ and Annabelle had the pleasure of attending "Harold and the Purple Crayon" at the Seattle Children's Theatre. Before they went, however, I had them watch the Weston Woods animated version of the book. CJ recalled that he watched it as a kindergartener at John Hay.
Their big bro Kennedy took the kids to the show. I dropped them at the curb right when doors opened and they managed to get front-and-center seats.
The play is based on the 1955 book of the same name. According to SCT's Web site, "Anything is possible with a crayon and a big imagination. With a burst of inspiration, Harold launches a magical exploration and simply draws where he wants to go."
CeeJ and Bee both liked the play. CJ said, "It was a pretty good play, but I like to tell you the weirdest part of the movie was when the porcupine and the moose were on the stage. They were talking French until Harold gave them the pie. They ate it and they loved it. In fact, so much that the porcupine kept asking him how does he make it. But Harold never answered. But he kept asking and asking and asking."
Annabelle reports, "The person who played Harold in the play was actually the person that played the mouse in "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie."
Honestly, of the three, I think Kennedy was most jazzed about the production. It's the first time he's seen a SCT play, and he was really impressed by the great props and the quality of the acting. I'm glad he was able to take the kids. :)
SCARY STORIES: We popped into the Ballard branch of Seattle Public Libraries today. The kids took a few minutes to check out their nicely done "Spooky Stories" display. CJ, especially, dug all the creepy covers on the books and kept going back to it.
CUT UPS: This afternoon we set out for the fabric store in search of supplies for Annabelle's Halloween costume. She has decided to be Nyan Cat (also known as Pop Tart Cat). In case you haven't heard of Nyan Cat, it's an Internet meme created by prguitarman. The (gray) cat is an animated GIF with a cherry Pop Tart body. Nyan Cat flies through space with a rainbow trailing him/her/it. So, to pull it off we had to find a pattern for a costume of a cat, some gray fuzzy fabric, and fabric Pop Tart makings.
We perused the pattern books first. I encouraged CJ to try to find some inspiration as we looked, since he still hasn't hit upon a costume, and the clock is ticking (as he might be want to point out). Finding a cat pattern wasn't too terribly hard and it was on sale for 99 cents, which was nice.
CJ was not inspired by anything he saw, which doesn't surprise me. At one point I stopped on a page, pointed to a costume of a guy in sandals and a robe and (sarcastically) said, "How about this?"
CJ looked at me like I was insane and announced loudly, "NO WAY I am going to be JESUS for Halloween." Here's the look on his face just seconds after his proclamation.
Well OK then!
He was still laughing/ranting about it after dinner tonight.
TWO'S A CROWD: At most times on any given day, we have at least three computers on at all times, and often four. But I can't tell you how many times a day the kids are crowded in front of the same screen, watching something together. I think it's nice, actually. There's often a lot of lot of give and take and cooperative learning going on in those situations.
RED ROVER: You can be sure we will be learning about the Mars Curiosity Rover every day between now and when I leave for the NASA Tweetup to watch it launch.
Today, we watched a couple of videos about Curiosity (named by a sixth grade student, in case you were curious), including a cool one in sort of a movie trailer tone. It's just so amazing to think of a rocket leaving earth, approaching Mars, a capsule breaking off from the rocket, and then ... wait, I don't want to ruin the movie for you.
Harold and the Purple Crayon is fascinating. I like it a lot. a lot!
ReplyDeleteI think CJ was right about mixing Jesus into Hallween but not all sandalled robe wearers are religious figures