The Continuing Adventures of Bonnie and Clyde

Now that September is almost over, I think it’s safe to say that we’re back into the swing of our normal school time routines.  Bonnie is tackling the 5th grade this year, and Clyde is exercising his middle school wings in 7th.  We’re still trying to find the right balance between classes outside of the home, and stuff to do at home without feeling isolated.  Some day we’ll get it right, but by then, I’m sure they’ll be ready for college.

So what are they doing this year?

Both kids are continuing piano lessons, and will take periodic pottery classes.  Each are continuing their writing classes based on the Institute for Excellence in Writing materials, and are studying Latin during the week.  Their dad got the job of teaching US Geography and Virginia history this year, so I’m quite curious to know how that will go.  Both kids are still involved in their scout troops, and will continue to alternate sessions of yoga.  We’re hoping to also squeeze TaeKwonDo back into our schedule, too, but that might have to yield to orthodontic appointments and other field trips.

Clyde is enrolled in a middle school course in Spanish, and is in a science co-op for middle schoolers.   At home, he’s tackling Pre-Algebra and Algebra I plus the usual Language Arts suspects.  We did add typing lessons to his official course load this year, too.

Bonnie is going to be a part of a mother-daughter book club, and is looking forward to working on her Girl Scout Bronze award this year, too.  She will continue with Singapore math, and is excitedly looking forward to starting Life with Fred, as well.  She’s been watching her brother laugh at these math books for a few years now, and is looking forward to finding out what’s so funny.

Their dad has been recording some of their piano songs, too.  If I could get him to convert them to mp3, I could upload them here, too.  Else, you may have to wait for the Christmas CD again this year. 

One of the nice things about the summer is the extra time to head out for a day trip.  This time, we visited the National Building Museum, in Washington, DC, to see the exhibit LEGO Architecture: Towering Ambition.  The architect, Adam Reed Tucker, one of 11 certified Lego professionals, has put together an exhibit of 15 world-renowned structures out of Lego blocks.

The exhibit encompassed two rooms of the museum, and our ticket granted us a one-hour entrance into the exhibit and attached building area.  Once the initial rush of people went through, we were able to take pictures of the structures fairly easily.

The Burj Khalifa, in Dubai.  This model was 17’6″ tall and was made up of 450,300 lego pieces.

The Empire State Building, on the left; the Hancock Building, on the right, and one of the World Trade Center buildings in the background.

The Empire State Building used over 12,000 lego blocks to build.  The spire on the original was originally intended as a dock for blimps before the idea was scrapped as being impractical and potentially dangerous.

The exhibit also included structures that haven’t been completed.  The Chicago Spire project is currently on hold, in Chicago.  This model took 200 hours to build.  The curved design is supposed to add strength to the structure and minimize wind forces.

The Marina City apartments and parking garage, in Chicago, are often called the “Corn Cobs.”

One of my favorites, Fallingwater, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.  Made up of over 21,000 blocks, this model took 130 hours to build.

And the kids’ favorite model – a model of the Building Museum itself, made out of Lego.  This one is housed in the lobby of the museum, not in the Lego Exhibit, but Clyde was adamant about getting a picture.

It was a fun visit.  Next week, Bonnie goes to camp.

Well, I guess it HAS been a little while since I’ve updated here.  (Sorry Joey, I’ll try to do better!)

The end of the school year has been a whirlwind of papers, orthodontia, Harry Potter science classes, art projects, bickering, scouting, oh, and math, language arts, and those other school-like things.  And, of course, piano playing.  With the festival in February, the kids had a very short turn-around time to learn all new pieces for the annual piano recital in May.  But they enjoyed the challenge.

They enjoyed having friends and family in the audience (though it made them a little nervous).

Clyde was the first soloist of the recital.  He played Our Great Savior by R. Pritchard and the Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven.  If you listen to the “Moonlight Sonata”, grab a cup of coffee or tea first, it’s about 10 minutes long.

Bonnie played Be Thou My Vision, arranged by Margaret Goldston and Avalanche by S. Heller.

Bonnie & Clyde closed out the recital with their foot-stomping duet, Rags to Riches, by Olson. We always chuckle when we watch them play together; the bickering is endless during practice, but on stage, they sure do pull it together well.

Both kids were both pleased to be recognized for the 200-club (they practice at least 200 minutes every week), and for all the books they completed this year.  Clyde was also awarded his teacher’s highest honor – best overall achievement for the year, which earned him a nice trophy and a cash prize that he’s already trying to spend.   Congrats to both kids on a job well done!

(Sorry, Mom, forgot to hit publish.)

As I mentioned yesterday, the kids have been practicing for the annual piano festival.   They each played two individual pieces, and then they had two duets to play. Since we’re not able to record the festival, we took a quick video of their practice session.

Clyde played Perpetual Motion III by Robert Vandall and Clementi Opus 36 Sonatina 1 Part 1.

Bonnie played the Streets of Hong Kong by Melody Bober and Ballade by Friedrich Burgmuller.

And the duet pieces were Follow the Piper by Shirley H. Mier and Aura Lee, arranged by Dennis Alexander.

There were a few small mishaps during the festival itself, and Clyde was worried that he had really blown it, but the scores came back fine, and they are both quite proud of the result.  They each practice at least 45 minutes a day, and it’s good to see that kind of practice and dedication pay off in a tangible way.

Well, it’s been a busy couple of months.  So, I’ll try to catch you up on things.

Bonnie and the girl scouts have been quite busy.  They prepared lunches for the local homeless shelter, have been involved in a country-wide postcard exchange with other girl scouts, and they’re preparing for the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts Thinking Day celebration.  Bonnie’s country is France, so she’s been having fun learning about the country.  Apart from all that, she’s in the middle of cookie sales.  She’s quite thankful for all who have supported her this year, and she’s looking forward to working a booth soon.  (I’m hoping that the weather warms up before our turn to stand outside!)

Clyde and the boy scouts have just returned from a ski trip.  Clyde took a turn in ski school, and then hit the trails.  He learned to wedge all the way down the mountain, and has realized that while the mind was willing; the shins were weak.  His troop is trying to sell mulch, which is an interesting prospect with the weather we’ve been having.  I can’t wait for mulch weekend – the husband and I have bets on how many bags of mulch he’ll be able to lift.

School-wise, there isn’t a whole lot new.  Most of our activities are year-long activities, and there hasn’t been a whole lot new.  But there are some highlights:

Our art co-op studied art in the style of Calder.  Each kid built a mobile, and not surprisingly, the subject of Bonnie and Clyde’s mobiles were their favorite football teams:

They also studied art in the style of Dali – creating dream photographs of outrageous and impossible subjects and ideas.  They enjoyed that and now I have a rainy-day activity that is guaranteed to occupy them for a few hours.

Bonnie and Clyde are still in the writing class, and didn’t put up a fuss about signing up for the next level classes next year.  Progress!

In science, the kids are just completing a class on the different systems of the human body – the digestive system, the nervous system, etc.  The teacher wasn’t quite brave enough to tackle the reproductive system, though.  Ah well.  That’ll be left for the at-home science teacher, I guess.

We’re about finished with the Civil War – the kids have wrapped up their Civil War lapbook, and we’ve finished reading Across Five Aprils.

In music, the kids have been practicing for the annual music festival.  They each played two individual pieces, and then they had two duets to play.  Since we’re not able to record the festival, we took a quick video of their practice session.  I’ll upload those tomorrow.

In the news, we got a  little bit of snow this week.

Just a few inches.

Of course, Bonnie had to make snow angels.

And an epic battle had to be waged.

And, we had to do a little school work.  Today’s subject?  Aerodynamics.

Truthfully, there were far too many good sledding pictures, so Bonnie & Clyde’s dad made a video of some of the best sledding clips.  The background music are two duets, played by Bonnie & Clyde this holiday season.  The first is “Deck the Halls” and the 2nd is “Santa Claus is Coming to Town.”  Hope you enjoy, and Merry Christmas!

Sledding on youTube

I often find it ironic that while I was a girl scout for about 36 seconds, and the Mr. was a boy scout for just a little longer than that, that we have been involved scouting parents for … what … 12 years?  Something like that.  Seems like we’re almost always involved in some scouting activity or another, and this week was no different.

The girl scout troop is starting to ramp up for GS cookie sales.  That’s right – it’s almost time for the annual stock-up of Thin Mints and Samoas!  Bonnie and the girls in her troop spent this week’s meeting practicing how to approach people about cookies, and deciding where they were going to donate their Gift of Caring boxes, and if they wanted to donate some of their profits (they do!).

While the girl scouts are working on that, Clyde and some members of his boy scout troop went on a two-night polar bear campout.

It doesn’t have to snow to qualify to be a polar bear campout, just be cold enough, but they got snow, as an added bonus.   They did some geocaching, hiked a battlefield, and learned that if you don’t brush snow off a tent, it will eventually collapse.  A good time was had by all, but I know they’re glad to be back home and will sleep well in their warm beds tonight.

I see that I forgot to finish updating this post, and hit publish.  Sorry about that!  This post was originally about the week before the week of Thanksgiving.  It was a catch-up week since Clyde was recovering from H1N1, and there were a ton of activities that week, too.  Busy, busy!

In the kids’ pottery class, they made coasters out of tiles, using shaving cream and dishwashing soap to create a textured design.  Those had to be fired, so I won’t have a picture until we pick them up after the next pottery lesson.  My sensory-challenged kid was able to do the craft; a big step for him!

Tuesday of that week, we learned how to sculpt in the style of Rodin.  The kids used sculpting tools made of paperclips and clothespin to whittle away their designs from the block.  Clyde created a tie-fighter and Bonnie went for a globe.  They still need to paint those now that the clay is dry, but they had fun creating a mess with the little pointy tools.

Wednesday, both kids went to scouts.  The girls learned how to crochet to satisfy the Yarn & Fabric Arts junior badge.  They learned both how to finger crochet, and how to use a hook to create a simple chain stitch.  I had to learn enough so that I could help the scouts, and in the process became quite hooked (no pun intended).  Since then, we’ve been having a good time checking out crochet patterns for napkin rings, hats, wash cloths, etc.  Thank goodness for the patience of several good teachers; they are all so much more helpful than a picture in a book.

The next week was mostly Thanksgiving prep.  One of Bonnie and Clyde’s grandmothers came to town, and the big kid came home from college, so we had a household.  Besides eating way too much, the kids enjoyed playing games and hanging out with family.  It’s going to be rough to get back to school!

(FYI, the IEW papers have been updated for both kids as well.)

Please add to the annals of  “Things that I never thought I’d say as a parent” the statement, “Why is there a salami sandwich under my couch?”

In more mundane matters, it’s been a busy couple of weeks around here.  Both Bonnie and Clyde took and passed another TKD test.  They were a bit nervous about it, but came through with flying colors.  The test was 3 hours long, though, and Clyde started feeling punky about half-way through the test, so he was quite glad he was able to complete it.  Neither kid has been able to wear their new belt, however, because that was the onset of the flu for Clyde.

It was about 9 days of symptoms for Clyde.  Once we decided it was definitely flu-like, we gave him oscillococcinum, which did a great job in knocking back the symptoms, but didn’t quite knock the flu out of his system (which was quite unusual).  His fever remained fairly low-grade, so we never saw the scary fevers that other friends experienced, but he couldn’t quite kick it until this past weekend.

The rest of the family seems to have missed it (knock on wood) and we hope that that’s our last run-in with the flu for the winter.

We were a bit concerned that Bonnie stay healthy as we were supposed to go on a Girl Scout campout this past weekend.  So, come Saturday morning, we packed up the car and headed out for 24 hours of Girl Scout fun.  It was a really wonderful time!  After many days of rain, we had beautiful weather and the girls enjoyed their time outside.  They went on hikes and learned how to recognize some different trail signs.  Bonnie enjoyed practicing skits and making SWAPS (Special Whatchamacallits Affectionately Pinned Somewhere) to trade with her fellow scouts.  In fact, she enjoyed the whole weekend.  When we got home, her comment was that it was, “the best camping trip I have ever been on, and it makes me want to cry.  In a good way.”  You can’t ask for better than that.

And the reason there was a salami sandwich under the couch?  That’s probably best left to the imagination.

Happy Halloween from Bonnie & Clyde!

Though it was quite drizzly, they had fun with the yearly run through the neighborhood.

This was a quiet school week, allowing us to get caught up on a few assignments that were giving us trouble.  Clyde worked hard on a descriptive paragraph that described his favorite ride at Disney World, and Bonnie tried another summarization.  This coming week won’t be as quiet; I might have to raid the kids’ candy supply for a little boost.

Hope all remembered to fall back, too!