school projects, oh how i despise thee

I hate school projects yet they are a part of my children's educational careers so I press forward with a smile (all the while grumbling under my breath)

Emily had to design and make a doll that represented a character from a book her English class read.  Don't remember the book or the character but trust me the doll was a good representation.

Nate's project was for Math.  The kids had to take an object and enlarge it using correct proportions.  My brother would be proud of Nate's choice...a lego.

Now I can sit back and only hope that there are no more projects for the rest of the year.

happy mole day! ya, I hadn't heard of it either

So apparently today is Mole Day.  Read more here.  

Since Mole Day is chemistry related it makes perfect sense to have high schoolers across this great nation sew stuffed moles - we all know that proficient sewers make better chemists. Besides, it  not like moms (that will obviously need to help their high schoolers) are busy with Halloween costumes or anything.  

On to the stuffed mole project...

The idea is to sew a mole (horribly written instructions provided) designing it to be something or someone familiar with mole in the name - that explanation was horrid, wasn't it? Examples...

eskimo/eskimole, Edward Cullen/Edward Molen, The Holy Grail/The Moley Grail, Millionaire/Molinaire.  You get the idea.

Here is Megan's contribution to the moley madness...

Any ideas? High fives for correct guesses.  Let's take a closer look at the photo and find some clues.  Mole is holding a wand that appears to be an exact replica of a 10' Hawthorne wood wand with perhaps a unicorn hair core - that's obvious though, I know you could all see that.

He (assuming he is really a he) is sporting a black robe or cloak of some kind underneath which seems to be a striped tie, quite similar to ties worn by British children attending boarding schools.  I wonder if the colors of the tie, green and silver, hold any significance.  Probably not.

I notice he is also holding a broom - maybe this mole is a house cleaner?  chimney sweep?  The broom doesn't help us much does it?  It looks as if there aren't enough clues to help anyone figure out who this mystery mole is.
Megan did a great job and I was impressed with her sewing/chemistry abilities.  I helped some with the project and a good friend, quilting guru, Teri came over when the before mentioned horribly  written instructions made no sense to me or Megan.  In addition to sewing, Megan learned how to attach the cool, beady eyes and had fun styling the slick yarn hair.  

Her mole turned out to be a cute little guy.

moon cakes

Not sure when baking became part of social studies but we went with it because Emily wanted some extra credit points.

Emily needed to make 30+ moon cakes to earn extra credit in her social studies class.  Baking with a recipe that we had never seen or tasted prove to be a bit of a challenge.  We started at the local Asian market to find lotus bean paste.  After some challenging conversation due to the language barrier a nice customer that spoke both English and Chinese helped us locate red bean paste since the market did not have lotus bean paste (that lotus bean paste is in high demand)

Emily and I worked together to get the dough made, stuffed, shaped and baked.  Our efforts looked nothing like a moon cake and we are not sure how they tasted, since neither of us tried them.  I'm usually up to try something new but was dealing with a not so settled stomach due to our dinner that night (that post coming next)

Although Emily and I did all the baking it really was a fun activity for the whole family.  The kids loved going to the Asian market.  The boys were especially intrigued by all the fish - alive and dead.  I do think Luke enjoyed seeing all the dead fish - eyeballs and all.

another costume?!?!?

The Monday after Halloween Emily had "Walk Through the Ancient Worlds" at school. The kids had to wear costumes (who planned that for a few days after Halloween?) As you already know I had hit my costume making quota so it was back to Costume Castle (I should buy their stock) to get a Cleopatra costume.

Emily had a great time. She got to eat a lamb sandwich for lunch. While most kids were chucking theirs in the trash, she tried it and found out that she liked it. Good for her!

shari lewis has nothing on me

may she rest in peace. Does anyone even know who Shari Lewis is? Megan used to watch Shari and Lambchop when she was little. Looking back I don't know how either of us could stand to watch the show - Meg was too young and was probably just happy that there was movement in front of her face and I was a new mom just pleased as punch that I could have a half hour of peace while Meg watched the show. I'm not sure I could tolerate Shari and her puppet if I was forced to watch it now but that's not the point of this post.

Nathan had his final economy day last week and so we had to come up with yet another "what's the best product to sell" idea. The cinnamon rolls and bag o' fun went over pretty well and we wanted to keep up the streak. Nate decided he wanted to sell sock puppets. Great idea but he wanted us to make all the puppets, umm no! I told him I thought sock puppet kits might be better - the kids would think it was fun to make their own and it would be a great craft activity for the summer. He agreed so we went with it.

Each kit contained...

• 1 sock


• 2 buttons


• 2 google eyes


• 1 pompom


• yarn


• red felt


• small container of glue


• pair if scissors

We packaged them up in cellophane bags with a ribbon and called it good. I realized looking at all the packages that the kids might not be super thrilled with the contents unless they could see what they would actually get to make so we made a puppet using all the supplies so that Nate could display it. So here is Fred, Fred? Is it Fred? Is that what Nate named him? I can't remember now but here he is...

Oh, I forgot to mention - Nathan sold out! I see a little entrepreneur being shaped.

yes, another school project or should we say our child is brilliant

I remember when Megan was younger we thought everything she did was brilliant. As a baby she'd coo "she's talking so young" we'd say. Her first steps would bring such joy for us knowing that she was so advanced for her age. The wonderment continued with the other kids but just not as much, since we had experienced the milestones before, but we we still had our proud moments....Emily learning to swim made us burst our buttons - "I bet she'll go the Olympics" we'd exclaim, Nathan going on a roller coaster at a young age made him the bravest kid ever in our eyes. But Luke, poor Luke...when you are the fourth kid to come along mom and dad have pretty much seen it all. Well, hold on a minute...Luke has surprised us and we are sure once again that we have brilliant kids and that Luke will be the next world famous artist.

Luke had a mammal project due for school this week. He chose to report on a lion and look what he did....

He drew this himself. Now be honest - isn't it the most amazing lion drawing you've ever seen from a 5 year old? You know it is! Derek and I were both rather surprised by his artistic ability. He used the cover of a lion book to copy and I think he did great. He added torn paper for the mane and the final project was amazing. We have our fourth genius! Man, Derek and I are good parents! :)

stepping back in time

I will upload more pictures soon but for now here is one I love. How cute is this of Megan and Luke? The Faire was for the middle schoolers but the elementary kids were invited to come for a shorter time (they share a campus) Luke was excited to be dressed up as a knight although we had a bit of turmoil deciding on the right type of knight (more on that later) He was thrilled to find Megan on the field and to be able to walk around with his big sister. Megan was happy to hold his hand and show him around and she never felt bugged or embarrassed by having her little bro tag along - it warms a mommies heart.

About the knight costume...Luke comes home from school with a note saying that the kids should dress up as a princess or knight. For a split second I think I will attempt sewing one but quickly decide against it - costume castle will work. So Luke and I begin talking about the costume. I ask if he would like a certain color, does he want a sword, shield, etc. His reply..."Mrs. Fish says we can dress as a Jedi knight - I want to be a Jedi knight" What? A Jedi knight at a medieval faire. Mind you, I am a huge "stick with the theme" kinda gal. I realize a good, nurturing mom might say "sure honey, if that's what you want to be" and then let her child go on his merry way secure in the fact that his mother trusts him to make decisions on his own. Not happening with me. The thought of sending a jedi to the faire makes my stomach feel sick - a theme is a theme. If you think I am over exaggerating my feelings on this - ask my husband. After more then a few discussions and a bit of crying (told you I wasn't nurturing :) Luke realizes that my mind ain't a changing and agrees to be a knight. If it makes anyone feel better he did love his knight costume and was thrilled to be wearing it. Had he shown up as a jedi I am sure that he would have been scarred for life and would have had a life long aversion to all things Star Wars. See, I helped him - maybe I am a nurturing mother after all.

watch out spielberg

the finished product

The gypsy costume is complete, here it is...


Since we posted the original pictures of the costume we have added...skirt trim, coin belt, leather belt, tons of jewelry and some sandals we picked up in Tijuana on one of our trips (they work perfect with the costume) We also added suspenders. Suspenders? Yes, suspenders. After I got the trim sewn on to the bottom of the skirt I realized that we had a definite problem - the skirt now weighed a ton. I took in the elastic waist 2 times but the skirt just continued to fall right of Megan. The suspenders work perfect and if Megan wants to change up the costume a bit she can be a farmer gypsy - that's sure to win some originality awards at a costume party.

We got a good laugh at about the skirt and how much it weighed so tonight we did a little experiment. Megan got on the scale with the costume on and then with it off. The grand total...the costume weighs 6.2 pounds - it's all that skirt and jewelry.

school project # 5,649

Another school project for Emily but this one required all of us and a friend. I took the kids and one of Megan's friends to the park this afternoon because Emily needed to finish up a book report. She read Bridge to Terabithia and for her report she filmed a scene from the book. The project is now being handed off to Derek so that he and Emily can work on the editing. Perhaps we'll try to download the finished masterpiece. Here are some shots of the kids dressed up as Terabithians...
Emily's shot is actually of her playing at the park after the filming. She was a great Terabithian however.

Wish we owned stock in styrofoam

It's time to play everyones favorite game...NAME THAT ELEMENT! Here is your picture clue...
Emily has been hard at work on her Atom model and presentation for science. She has had a lot on her plate with school and stake musical rehearsals (she has a few more projects due at school this month too) She is balancing it all really well but I'm sure she'll be thrilled when the her schedule eases up.

Economy Day Again?!?!

Nathan had another economy day at school. If you are unfamiliar with economy day you can check out our previous post regarding the big event. For those that read our blog you'll remember that Denise and Nate had the cinnamon roll fiasco preparing for the last economy day.

This time we decided to steer clear of homemade food and went for cheap plastic toys and suckers - what kid doesn't go for that? We created Nate Baker's amazing bag o' fun. Each bag had a sucker and one of the following games...mini (and we do mean mini) uno, rock 'em, sock 'em rings, or a wolly willy magnetic face thing-a-ma-jiggy. The bags nearly sold out and Nate only came home with 2 out of the 20 he went to school with.