Pirates and the Chocolate Factory

A couple of years ago our school got a new music teacher. Mr. Gardner is a young energetic teacher who loves music and acting. Our school has been known to put on a musical every year for the high school, but last year Mr. Gardner decided the Jr. High needed one as well. It was a short production, only about half an hour to 45 minutes, but it was a cute one. Clarissa got to be the main character and really did a great job as the stow away. It was called Pirates. It was about a kid who wanted to be a pirate and stowed away on the pirate ship so she could sail with them. I love the costumes these kids put together. Props were very minumum and the play was simple.

This yearMr. Gardner got a little braver and let them do a longer production. It was Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. The Jr. High has a small group, but a very talented one. Clarissa got to play a couple of different characters, including an oompa loompa and a candyman kid. I was very impressed by these kids! They had all their parts memorized (Clarissa LITERALLY had the whole play memorized) and just did a great job. The pink boat is from our pond... it only took 2 FHE nights to paint the boat! Now we have a pink candy boat for the goats to play on. The costumes were a little better than last year and they had more props to work with. The kids had a blast!

I can't believe that next year Clarissa be freshman and going to high school. My how the time flies by! I love this kid. She is a whiz at rememebring things and can think so fast. I feel so fortunate to live in a small community that allows our children to grow and develop their talents and skills. My thanks goes out to all those who help with these productions. You guys rock!

History ROCKS!

Last week Kalityn did history rocks. What is history rocks you might ask? Why it's a day when all the 5th graders dress up like their history character and give a brief history of their lives and accomplishments. A couple of months ago I blogged about Kaitlyn being Harriet Tubbman. This quarter she chose Sally K. Ride. She was the first woman astronaut to go into space, er something like that.

Tuesday night Kaitlyn mentioned to me that her performance was Thursday. WHAT?? THIS Thursday? As in less than 2 days Thursday? I frantically racked my brain trying to think of a costume that would do Sally Ride Justice. Do I know anyone who has a space suit? No. An astronaut helmet? Again, No. I stewed about it during the night and finally decided that our best bet would be at Nana's. SO Wednesday we went to Nanas to see what we could find. After much searching we figured the black ski bibs with a black shirt would be our best bet. I also remembred that I had a princess wig from Halloween. It had wringletts and a braid atross the front, but with a little help it just might work! We searched the closet and came up with a pair of snow boots to complete the outfit.

Thursday morning I printed off NASA patches and a name tag and put em on her with zots.... I couldn't find the tape. I found an old motorcycle helmet in the garage. After adjusting the wig and tucking in the unwanted curls, this is what we ended up with. Can you see the resemblance?


Kaitlyn did a great job on her performance. She had her part memorized and was very animated. Aww, I love this girl!

Here is a group shot of all the 5th grade. What an awesome group of kids! LOVE History Rocks!

Thanks to them I just won $50,000 of pretend money on Who wants to be a Millionare.

Pardon me, but where did you get that hat?

Some animals are naturally smart. Some just aren't. For instance, we have a cat that is very efficient at bringing home treasures for us to see. Rabbits, birds, gophers, and mice are her specialty. Sometimes they are dead and sometimes they're not. She will leave them on the back porch, front porch, or when we REALLY want to impress us, our bedroom balcony on the second story. She is one smart cat.

We also have goats. We have 2 pygmy goats and 2 newbies. These goats are very good at finding ways to escape their pen, but still I wouldn't go as far as saying that they're smart. Let's take Doofy for instance. She's the black one. We named her Doofy because of her ears.... er lack of. She has already proven to us that goats CAN swim. She fell off the boat and into the pond a couple of weeks ago. We can always count on her to make us laugh. Today was no exception.

The wind was blowing like crazy and the goats were skittish with all the noises. I looked outside just in time to see 3 of the goats running as fast as they could from the back of the pond. Something had spooked them. I did not see Doofy. Finally I saw her come up from the back of the pond looking like this:

I think I would have ran away too if I saw THAT coming at me. Don't ask me HOW she did this or why, but that is one doofy goat!