Fun and Games

Ethan recently completed a project for his World Geography course that he especially enjoyed-- along with three other boys, he designed a board game. It has a South American theme:

Players in the game each choose a specific rain forest animal that has been displaced from its native habitat; the goal is to trvael through the forest and try to reach "home base". More photos:

Ethan put in a great deal of work drawing cartoons for the board and coming up with ideas for the game pieces, the questions, etc. Very nice work.

Lydia even wanted to play it (must be a good game!).

I am glad things went well with this project. Ethan told me that he had a less-than-perfect experience with the group project that he did this past fall; one of the other kids that was on his team never finished his piece, which left the project in an incomplete state. This time Ethan was a bit more careful choosing his partners (he also seems to have done quite a lot of the work himself, which I suppose also helps).

Home Sweet Bag

While this might look like an ordinary bag of bulb food sitting on a shelf in our garage, it turns out to be the home of a small bird of some sort (wren, maybe? I don't recognize it).

Amy discovered the "mom in residence" a couple of weeks ago; the bird flew out of the bag while Amy was placing some gardening stuff onto the shelf. I think both Amy and bird were startled. Lydia got the bag down briefly afterwards and looked inside-- we saw nest and eggs, then I made her quickly put the bag back up on the shelf.

Since then we've been careful not to shut the garage door, and I've done my best to avoid making a lot of fuss inside the garage. Wondering when the baby birds will start to emerge...

Mud

In this photo, I believe Lydia is saying something along the lines of "Dad! Come over here so I can give you a big hug!". Yikes...

As you can see, the weather has been pretty warm lately; good for "gardening". Time to man the hose...

Spring track

Ethan is now a committed runner, having joined the cross-country team in the fall and now the track team this spring. As with the fall, the participation level is amazing-- huge numbers of kids turn out for the team, which helps in many ways. Mr O'Brien, the coach for both spring and fall, has been excellent. Here is a shot of Ethan taking a jog to warm up before the last meet of the season:

Ethan did the 800 meter event for most of the spring, but on this particular day they had him running the mile. Here is the start. They run girls and boys together for this one, apparently.

Another shot from the race. Vintage Ethan race tactics-- glom onto the fellow in the lead, dog his heels until he gets tired, then zoom ahead at the end. I think this photo is with one lap to go.

Ethan made his break with about 150 meters to go, and was able to sprint past the guy above to win. Well done Ethan!

Spring soccer

The kids have both wrapped up another successful soccer season, Ethan with his U13/U14 travel team, and Lydia with her U9/U10 in-town league (which I coached along with another dad).  Ethan's team came in second in their division, which was a good showing. He did well this season; the coach played him for the most part as an "offensive" midfielder, so he was able to score a couple of goals and he racked up quite a few assists. [NB: sorry Ethan, no photos this post-- I've already posted too many sports-related photos of you on this blog].

Lydia's team went undefeated until the final game, which they lost by a whisker (oh well). Still, it was a fine season all around for them. I really enjoyed the coaching this spring-- the girls were a fun group, very cheerful and with great spirit & drive. Here are a few shots from Lydia's final game:

The soccer league at this level strongly encourages us to rotate the players from position to position, so everyone gets to play offense, defense, and keeper. Goalkeeper is not an especially popular position however, I have to say. Lydia played keeper in one half of this game; in the second shot here she doesn't look especially happy (I think the mosquitos may be getting to her):

Here she is playing defense:

All in all, a good season. I'm not sure if we will be able to reconstitute the same gang of players next year, since 4th grade is typically the point at which a significant number of the kids start moving to the travel leagues. We'll see how things go.

Let the performances begin

This was a big spring for music and art-- Lydia had a final performance for her "hip hop" class, and Ethan had both an orchestra concert and a viola recital.  Alas, I don't have much to show in the photography department. E's viola recital was held in a church, and it was difficult to get photos without disturbing the performance; for the other two events, there wasn't enough light (and we were told not to use a flash). Anyhow, here is Lydia:

Note that hot pink, shiny outfits-- good stuff. The dance performance included an astonishing number of groups and troupes-- our local rec center has just one small dance room, but they pack a tremendous number of classes into it (the performance went on for hours).  Many of Lydia's friends and classmates were there participating as well. There was one girl who plays on Lydia's soccer team who was part of a separate dance session-- at first I almost didn't recognize here, then I finally realized that it was because she had a big grin on her face (during the soccer games, she invariably had a grim expression).

Here is Ethan getting ready to perform at the orchestra concert:

It was a nice performance, although as usual with Diamond, the stage was about as filled with kids as you can possibly imagine.

Meanwhile, Lydia has declared her intention to play trumpet in the school band. This may be tricky to arrange, since the rule is that you are not allowed to begin band until you are in 5th grade. We'll see whether the school is willing to be a little flexible and take her on a year early.

ColoniaLydia

One of Lydia's big class projects this past spring was a unit in which each student picks a specific colonial-era person to research, write about, dress up as, and (eventually) impersonate during a classroom session. Lydia's chosen character was Mary Ludwig Hays McCauley, a.k.a.  "Molly Pitcher".  Here she is in her costume prior to the big event:

Lydia worked very hard on the skirt and apron, lots of sewing/stitching (there was of course some help from Joanie and Amy, but Lydia put in most of the work). The hat is courtesy of Lydia's teacher Mrs Barker, who apparently keeps a stash of colonial headware available for this purpose.

DeCordova

Here are some pictures from a visit that we took to the DeCordova museum back in May during my mom's visit. We had some really nice weather, so it was fun to spend time outside looking at the sculpture. By the way, the museum has apparently now changed its name from the "DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park" to the "DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum". 

 This piece has always been one of my favorites. Yes, it does look as though someone's internal organs have gotten up and gone for a walk, but I still like it:

More photos:

This next sculpture was an especially odd one. The "rust" on the surface is just a thin layer-- it's apparently made of fiber glass and other composites underneath. Also interesting was that inside the museum was a computer monitor showing an animated version of the sculpture with the various appendages walking/waving around. Very creative.

There was also a very extensive collection of sculptures (indoor and out) by Chakaia Booker. Her work uses a lot of recycled/repurposed tires, which gives it a very distinctive look.

Musica longa, Cartoon Brevis

Here is a very short Pancake Man cartoon that I did while sitting out the remainder of Ethan's viola recital.

Ethan played fairly early on in the recital, after which there was a long succession of other student performances, and I have to confess that not all of my attention was on the music.

More comics for girls

Back in January, I posted a grumble about how there weren't enough good graphic novel adventure stories oriented towards girls (e.g. with female main characters). Since then, I've found some more books that I think meet the necessary criteria.  First, "Smile" by Raina Tegelmeier:

Raina Telgemeier's stories are a little on the melodramatic side for my tastes, but I like them nonetheless, and but Lydia likes them a lot. The plots tend to revolve almost entirely around the social life of the main character: school, friends, parents, etc.  Ethan tried a couple but didn't seem interested. A second book is "Rapunzel's Revenge" by Shannon and Dean Hale:

I really enjoyed this one, as did both my kids. This is a retelling of the Rapunzel folk tale, with Rapunzel recast as a sort of strong, independent, female action hero. The plot is very good -- it's a real adventure story, and the artwork is fantastic.  There is a sequel called "Calamity Jack", but I didn't have quite as much fun with it. The last book is "Mercury", by Hope Larson:

This is cool little graphic novel featuring a female teenage character, set in Canada. The point of view of the novel jumps back and forth between the present day and the "gold rush" era in the 1860's. The artwork is not as spectacular as the Rapunzel book (it is drawn in black & white), but given the nature of the story, I think it actually works better with a more graphically minimalist approach.