My Pip Squeaks

January is the worst month of the year for yard sales so I've been trying to do other stuff on Fridays.  I happened to come across something that someone in one of my homeschool FB groups posted on Thursday about a a kids magic show happening the next day (which would have been yesterday). Calleigh received a magic set for Christmas and has kind of gotten into magic lately.  In fact, just the night before we had watched a bunch of clips on YouTube on people doing magic tricks and how they were done.  So it seemed like fortuitous timing!

The show was called Pip Squeak and took place at the Orlando Repertory Theater which we've been to a few other times.  We sat with the homeschool group, whom we didn't know from Adam.  We were only a few rows back which was perfect.  The show was fantastic!  It was actually about bullying.  The magician had been bullied as a kid so he felt compelled to talk about it as an adult using magic to get kids' attention.  Many times he would ask for volunteers from the audience and finally, he picked Calleigh who had been raising her hand and jumping up and down in her seat each time.  There were probably at least 200 kids in the audience so I was happy she beat the odds and got picked!  I'm sure she would have been happier to do something more "magical" but her job was to draw some hair and eye/eyebrows on a picture the magician had.  She did great and I got a video but no photo.



One of things I found most interesting was when near the end of the show he was looking for volunteers but they must have cell phones (he was doing a segment on how a lot of bullying is done by cell phones, computers, etc).  I was ASTOUNDED by how many kids raised their hands.  The six he chose were probably the same age as Calleigh and when he asked them when they got on stage if they had cell phones, they all shook their heads yes.  Wow.  I guess I'm out of touch.  These were not home schooled kids so Duncan pointed out that maybe they just had phones that were programmed to only call home or something if they were at school.  I don't know but it blew my mind.

I also thought it was interesting that they girls' names were: Harper, Emma, Ava, and Isabella.  I'd say that pretty much sums up the popular names of the last decade.

Colby did great during the show.  I was slightly worried that he might act up and I would need to take him out...I didn't want to leave the kids there by themselves since we didn't know anyone else there but fortunately he was fine.  In fact, he slept through the second half of the show thanks to falling asleep on the you-know-what.  Still comes in handy sometimes.

The show was right next to the Science Center so when we walked out, I said "Do you guys want to go to the Science Center?" Well, you would have thought I had asked them if they wanted to eat ice cream every day for the rest of their lives.  They were like "REALLY?""ARE YOU SERIOUS?" Apparently I need to be a little more spontaneous or something! As it turned out, they are having a big thing this weekend called "Otronicon" which is comprised of a bunch of vendors in the field of technology...robots, video games, etc.  There was a lot of neat stuff although we hardly got to look at any of it because if I put Colby down he would run off and if I held him he would start screaming. Not a good combination.  We pretty much stuck to the normal little kid stuff and they all had a great time.  We even capped it off with lunch at Subway which is on the first floor.  We were those people though.  The ones with the screaming toddler in the middle of the lunch room.  I had gotten a special beverage which may or may not have been Mountain Dew.  Colby saw that drink with the straw sticking out and decided he wanted it.  Can't blame him really.  But boy, did he go absolutely berserk when I didn't give it to him.  Yikes.  You do not need caffeine child.

There's a picture of an animal on this card and the robot is supposed to be able to recognize it but supposedly the lighting was bad.

Channel 13 was there interviewing someone and Calleigh was completely intrigued.

Brady informed me that he now likes characters.

Florida Hospital was there with their pediatric ambulance so we checked it out.

Brady made me laugh at one point.  There were tons of TV screens with video games going on and even big screens with it.  As we walked by this big screen, there was some kind of fighting happening and Brady says "Is this inappropriate?" It was funny hearing that come out of his mouth but I know where he got it from.  It's from watching stinking football live and all the terrible commercials that come on.  Duncan yells "Inappropriate!  Look away!" And the kids have to turn their heads.

This week has been interesting on the school front.  Calleigh has really been anti school since coming back from Christmas vacation.  To quote her, "I hate to write.  Anything that has writing I don't like to do." So that rules out pretty much....everything.  I've been torn on what to do.  I mean, don't most kids go through phases of hating school but they have to go anyway?  But I don't feel like forcing her to sit there and do something she's going to hate is the way to go about it (even though I don't think she truly hates it because once she gets going with stuff she does fine).  From research I've done, one of the most, if not THE most, important things you can teach a kid is a  love or a passion for learning and I don't want to destroy that with a bunch of book work.  I have our curriculum staring me in the face with the 34 weeks (or whatever it is) of stuff to go through but I am telling myself that it's okay to leave that for awhile.  So...this past week we've been doing a unit study on horses, which she picked, and learning all about them.  Amanda Bennett (google it if you're interested) has some really neat unit studies and I was happy to try one out.  It has a lot of great material and is five day's worth of work.  We've only made it through about the first 1.5 days but so far so good.  In addition to kind of stepping back for right now, I'm hoping to add a lot of fun stuff like field trips and have been researching that too.  We'll see how it goes!  Who knows...next week she may decide to just go back to rather schooling.  Either way, I'm going to be happy.

Working on a horse drawing.  Hmmm, that kind of seems like writing to me.

One quote before I close:

Calleigh uses the word "stupid" but I can't remember the context right now.
Me:"Calleigh, you can't say that word.  That's not acceptable."
Calleigh:"But my mouth just said it.  I couldn't control it."

So yes, it's her mouth's fault.  Not hers.

Some more pictures...

Found this book at the ABC.  I probably read it at least five times as kid and so loved it.

Brady fell asleep in my lap while I was reading it that evening.  It was so sweet.  Notice the pliers that are tucked in to the top of his pajamas!

Love my happy boys!

Brady falls asleep while girls are watching the magic stuff.

It was a really crummy week weather wise this week but it didn't stop the kids from eating their lunch outside.

Brady wanted to wear these shoes outside and I said "Brady, those are church shoes." And he said, "No, they aren't.  They're BOWLING shoes."

I forgot to mention that Brady fell out of the swing set last week thanks to an inadvertent nudge from Calleigh.  It's seriously a miracle that he didn't get hurt.  After that, Duncan attached this netting.

My peeps on a Sabbath morning.

Who needs drugs to get high when you can go to CVS and get all this for $5.37?  No lie. When I was at the register checking out, Colby let out a scream when he couldn't play with a pack of gum.  The manager, who was checking me out, said "I see why you need this Excedrin." Yup.

Got this at Publix and they owed me $6.61 for purchasing it.  Unfortunately I don't use Aspirin so if you know anyone who needs it, let me know!

 

Went bowling with a bunch of friends tonight. I can't get past the big balls but I had fun watching the others play.

Big game tomorrow against the Colts.  Go Pats!!