Bill of Rights!

Professor Larry returns to teach us about the Bill of Rights.

Hard at Work

They keep disappearing from the larger group to work on their final project together.  Diligence - love it!

Basketball and Soccer

Great action shots from my Mom (thank you so much!)

Off the ground!

Great sprinting form!

A Thanksgiving Adventure

I want more adventures this year!  We spent the morning making a list - way too long to do in one year, as it turns out, but a great list anyway.  Most have to do with travel, but G wants to start her own brick-and-mortar bakery and K wants to see a World Series game played.  Me... all I could think of were travel adventures, things I've done but want to repeat with the girls and other things I haven't done yet.  After making our list, we took off for a mini-adventure, a hike along an area we hadn't hiked before.  It was beautiful and then dramatically gorgeous, going from a lovely riverbank in the fog to a dark and lusciously quiet and green rain forest.

Beautiful but deadly Amanita Muscaria (but more likely to cause disorientation than death, we learned)

She caught a Thanksgiving turkey!  Or maybe that's just Lola, who is glad in any case that we are vegetarians

Love this stripe of green trail and Puck and K running across it...

Second day in a row we found a California Toad.  Same one?  He looks more peeved than terrorized...

Love the lines in nature, straight up, curving across, and the contrasting colors...

And then an adventure we did NOT want:  the dogs found a small beach and started to play, chasing sticks.  Puck got fixated on a stick that was emerging from the water, part of a larger submerged tree.  It wasn't moving.  He wouldn't let go.  He started to submerge.  K volunteered to save him.  Mom encouraged her to dive in.  G got in too to help.  The water got deep fast and was really cold.  She broke off the stick and got out, but the shock of the cold water and the fear of suddenly being in so deep had really shaken her.  My poor kid who is always so tough started to cry.  She was cold, of course, and we stripped her wet layers off, substituting our outer layers. G was soaked from the knees down and shuffled all the way back in soaking shoes, having donated her sweatshirt to her sister.  Two brave girls saving their silly dog and then helping each other.  As K said later, "I guess I really AM a Griffendor!"  :-)

Gualala

Love the rain, love the day after the rain, love relaxing, walking, playing....  We saw a Bald Eagle; wow!  (G took the photo).  And she spotted the tiny toad, too.  Wonderful company, wonderful trip.

Photo by G

Mist over the Mendocino River as it meets the Pacific

The Tempest

Proud of these kids for an excellent show.  K is simultaneously taking an online course through a gifted learners forum on The Tempest, adding to her knowledge about it.  It was Shakespeare's last one and some think that the role of Prospero represented his "magical abilities" as the author to create and control whole worlds, his reflection on that power, and his intention to retire from that role.  Knowing this lent new meaning to the play, to her lines.  G both played Ariel and provided background music in one scene on her guitar, which impressed me... I didn't know she could play so well, nor that she was willing to do so in front of an audience.

We appreciate the really excellent, positive, energetic, bright, patient teaching artists that the kids got to work with this year.  Phil and Will were amazing - patient and flexible and knowledgeable and great at setting examples on stage and in class.

Ariel

Prospero

The cast

Scenes together

"I have bedimmed the noontime sun, called forth the mutinous winds...  "

"You are three men of sin, sin, sin!"

Nice to have a consistent fan base.  Thanks for coming, Mom and Dad!  (And Father Ken, not pictured.)

Engineer

Our headlight went out - again.  Thanks to my Dad for noticing!  At least now changing it is easy - I know how to look up the right size light at the auto store, what to unscrew, how to get the old bulb out... it seems simple in fact, compared to the difficulty of figuring it all out the first time.  (It helps that the screws are no longer rusted on!)  My engineer was very helpful, as she always is with all things creative or mechanical.

Job Interview

This is the silliest game!  They pretend to be interviewing for a job, then the interviewee does something extremely bizarre.  I think that the objective is not to laugh, but I'm not sure and it doesn't matter, really.  It was fun to watch!

Cousins

On the occasion of a new cousin's baptism, all of the cousins were together:

Their grownups, too

She first held his sister at her baptism (when K was only 17 months old), so she wanted to continue that tradition.

Anatomy

One of many cool practical lessons in G's anatomy (physiology) class.

Discovery Kingdom Homeschool Day

Sheer fun all day.

Crazy, crazy ride.  For me?  Never, no way, no thanks, absolutely not!

Excited faces as it begins to get higher

Ariels

Two of the Ariels pose in partial costume as they prepare for The Tempest

Hitchhiker

This gorgeous dude stole a ride from a class in Menlo Park all the way home...

US History: 13 Colonies Become One Nation

With each kid representing on of the colonies; learning in the park.

Basketball Fans

K's last game (they made it to the championship, then lost by one shot in the final five seconds) and a few of those who came to cheer her.  My sweetie nephew sat on my lap for a long time and seemed to cheer... he definitely did not want me turning him away from the action and would crane to see the court when I did (so nice to hold a baby!)

Saints Fair

K's Religious Ed class did a "Saints Fair" in which each student picked a Saint and designed a Facebook page for that Saint on a poster.  The results were really great!  K did St. Nicholas and of necessity learned a ton about him:  when he lived,  who is friends were, what miracles he accomplished... it got them thinking about the Saints' individual relationships with God, Jesus, and biblical teachings and was a lot of fun.  (Hat tip to Ms. Paula, from our OLMC days, who did a similar project back when sixth graders seemed so old to me.  I was impressed then and happy to model now).

One of the more impressive posters:  Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton

A partial view of the class with students and visitors mingling

Quilt from the Underground Railroad

We went to a wonderful celebration today of our friend, Father Ken Hamilton, who has been a priest for 40 years!  He showed us wonderful quilts sewn by women in his family, lots of different styles.  This one impressed me most - sewn by his great grandmother, he said that it was used by the Underground Railroad to signal that this particular house was a safe house for escaping slaves.  Fascinating and beautiful (and partially restored)!