Easter Week

Josiah was inspired by his own Rat Town Beatles picture, so he drew the real Beatles for his bedroom door.  Note the rules for his room on the left  - No comments (about the mess!).  

Josiah's class went to see the new Mario movie on opening day this week.  They are of the Mario Kart generation and have been looking forward to it for a long time.  Josiah caught a ride with a friend and I asked him if any adults stayed to watch the movie with them.  He said, No, we made decisions on our own.  According to him, all behaved.  A mom did snap a few pictures before leaving.  Josiah got a large popcorn because it came with a collectible Mario tin.  

At CC this week, we made egg protectors.  Next time we meet we have a fire truck scheduled to come and we're going to drop our eggs from the top of the ladder.  It'll be the last day of CC for the younger kids, so it should be a good one.  We have been doing orchestra this quarter, and this week we had a clarinet player come in.  He was quite good and I asked him afterwards if he played professionally.  He said he had the chops (and the confidence), but did not play professionally.  He talked about the clarinet, its history and its place in the orchestra.  Then he played snippets of 8 pieces for the kids - classical, hymns, patriotic, and jazz bits.  

After lunch, Henry's Essentials class presented on their Faces of History.  Henry had his typical presentation style - relaxed, conversational, and humorous.  The kids speak in first person and at the end ask the audience, Who am I?  He was Nicolaus Copernicus and joked about the length of the titles of his writings.  Copernicus was the first to publish that the sun was at the center of our solar system - the heliocentric model.  Before that, Earth was thought to be at the center.  And it was because of this, Henry's opening line was, "Have you ever thought why the world does not revolve around you?" Henry said it was fun to do and he's sad that CC is coming to a close.  This is his last year in Foundations and Essentials - he's moving up to Challenge A! 

There was Beethoven, Magellan, Akbar the Great, Copernicus, Marie Curie, Claudette Colvin, Catherine the Great, balloonist Sophie Blanchard, King Arthur, and Oda Nobunaga.  They all did a really good job.  

The day after CC, Caroline had an old friend come back to town.  This friend moved to Louisiana last year and they really miss each other.  They talk on the phone quite often and are always texting each other or sending each other funny videos they made.  We got to see them at a trampoline park where they played and talked the whole time.  We splurged on the rides.  First was the Frog Hopper which looks like a drop-type ride, but it only dropped them a few feet at a time.  Up 5 ft, down 3, up 2, down 4.  Then they tried the bumper cars and wished they had done that first.  Much more fun!  Caroline was quite the aggressive bumper car driver.  My neck hurt a little just watching them. 

Caroline had a good start to her week as well - another stripe in jiu-jitsu, another Crumbl Cookie run.  They were Easter themed this week, so she was happy to get her Robin Egg sugar cookie.  

Mid-week, our church did not have their usual activities, so Henry decided to do jiu-jitsu.  Caroline decided to come along and watch, so she wore her usual street clothes.  Once we arrived, however, she changed her mind and wanted to join the class.  A gi was borrowed.  All borrowed gis come with white belts, so she was a noob for the day.  The dark blue gi looked good on her though.  

Our church was closed midweek because they were getting ready for all of their Easter activities.  Friday night we went to Journey of the Cross where we walked from station to station.  They had a real donkey, which Jesus rode into Jerusalem.  They had a real crown of thorns to touch, myrrh to smell, weight to carry (half the weight of the cross bar).  At one station towards the beginning, we each picked up a piece of white cloth.  We were supposed to write a sin we struggle with on it.  Then we had to carry it around the whole time.  At the very last station, they had areas with water tubs.  We would dip our cloth in the water, scrub it a bit, and the sin we struggled with would be washed clean.  All of us did fine with it, but Todd's sin had trouble washing away.  He had to put in some elbow grease to scrub that sin away! 

We hurried home from church to make sure Caroline got to Awana on time.  At Awana, they also celebrated Easter with their He Is Risen lesson.  Typically they have an Easter egg hunt, but it has been raining cats and dogs all week, so they changed it up.  Caroline said they had all the eggs in little kiddie pools.  Each egg had a letter on it.  They were on teams and the leader would call out a letter, then a kid from each team would search for it in the pools.  Caroline said it was lame.  I thought it was clever.  On the drive home, she was counting out the candy she got, announcing the number of the different candies she had.  After it was sorted, she was a little quiet and then the distinct scent of chocolate filled the air of the car.  How many Kit Kats do you have now?    

We went to Saturday service since Sunday would be so packed.  We found our picture tree and documented the kids in their Easter best.  

At home today, we had our Easter egg hunt.  Josiah found his 18 eggs in record speed.  Henry doubled his time, which left all the harder hiding spots for Caroline.  Only certain candies would fit in the small eggs we had, so we had a candy exchange bar where they could swap out their Yorks and Almond Joys for Hershey bars, Reese's, and Kit Kats.  After our egg hunt, the kids wanted to do the same for Benson.  They sent him outside with Henry so he wouldn't see what they were doing.  Then Josiah and Caroline broke up a few of his treats and placed them around the downstairs.  They invited Benson (and Henry) back in and excitedly told him to go find his treats.  Benson was immediately excited, but had no idea what was going on until he found the first treat.  Then he started to get the hang of it.  All six spots were found.  

We did not have the traditional ham or lamb for Easter, opting for steak.  Henry and Todd did go out to a Mediterranean restaurant this week and Henry tried lamb shank for the first time.  He really liked it, so maybe next year we'll be brave enough to cook lamb.  

We have a break from CC this week, but it is always designed this way to give the kids time to catch up and for the memory master kids to finish their proofs.  It'll be a working week for sure.