This tied in perfectly with our new french videos. I'd purchased two volumes of Passe-Partout, a french series I watched when I was younger. This first series was all about springtime, and the first episode about sugar shacks (cabane a sucre) in Quebec, and how they tap sugar maples for syrup in the winter. How they can eat so many foods and put syrup on them (pancakes, scones, ham, eggs, potatoes). How the syrup starts out as just a mildly sweet water from the trees, and must be heated over long periods to evaporate the water and leave behind the tasty syrup.
And since it was snowing RIGHT THEN, we put some syrup on the stove to boil, collected snow in a frisbee, and poured the hot syrup over the cold snow. Voila! Tire-sur-la-neige. Snow taffy. Oh my it is tasty, there is no flavour like it. The Francophone Society of Victoria is putting on a sugar shack festival this weekend and we hope to get to it, even just to have more snow taffy. Mmmmmmmmmm.
Hannah is asking more and more questions, most of which I can answer. What are our brains for? How come if you whisper 'bee' it sounds like 'pee'? Who made space? Like I said, I can answer most of them. She wowed us all by effortlessly counting to 100 this week, and then tapped into her creative side when I unpacked the groceries. I almost always, always bring my own bags. But if I forget, I get a paper bag.
So Hannah made this:
Robert Munch's Paper Bag Princess. Wohoo! sShe stores it upright on her dresser, the crown and Leif's ring from the dentist perched on top. She's 'keeping the ring safe for Leifer". Okaaaay.
And to give our youngest one her due, here is the Paper Bag Sister:
Since soccer classes are over now, we took to the local field and did our own thing. We played games, practiced skills, and just got out there with our cleats and enthusiasm for the sport. Next week both kids are in a 5-day soccer camp for spring break, and they're very excited. Hannah asked if she could be in it, though it's for 6 and up. Her coach said she would easily fit in, skill-wise, so we'll see if she can actually last for the 3 hours a day it requires. I'll be sticking around the fields just in case.
Leif got a great surprise this week, and we had an important little chat. His paycheque for his new, bigger paper route was deposited in his account, and it was $50 too much! I told him I'd found this error and had called the paper company to correct it (partially true. I already knew why it was higher, but had never told him to expect this). He said 'Don't TELL them!". And so we had a chat. About how keeping the money if it isn't ours is stealing, and how they could likely find the error, he'd have to pay it back anyway, and then how woud he look for not reporting it in the first place? "Okay, you're right". But then I explained that the money was a bonus for having his route for 6 months. The paper has a high turnover because it pays pennies, and they offer this incentive for carriers to stick with it. I'd never told him because I didn't want it to be his only motivation to do and keep his route. They don't give it every 6 months, just this first time. Had he known about it he could just quit once he got it. It worked out really well as another learning experience about work, and sticking with it, and not expecting a reward simply for doing what you'd agreed to do.
Hannah had a different but similar chat with me this week as well. Unfortunately she spent most of it looking past me out the window, and really got nothing out of it. Oh Hannah. :) In a fit of discord with Leif, she tore a library boook in half down the spine. I explained that we'd need to tell the librarian and perhaps we'd need to pay to replace it. This brought on tears about spending her remaining bit of money and then having nothing left, and we talked about how not being caught is not the goal when such a thing happens. That she's not in trouble, she is just doing the responsible thing, to tell them what happened and find out how she can help fix it. In the end they simply taped the book back together and we took it home. Hannah was not really present with me to get this little life lesson, but now at least we have it in our history to refer back to when another such situation comes up. And since she's already acting exactly like me as a child, I know more suh situations will come up. :)
She spent the rest of her library time like this.
In a fit of culinary creativity, I made dinner sound appealing by giving it a Star Wars name. Woohoooo. We made Nabooo Nachos together, complete with Slave I ship and Hyperdrive Ring ship nearby.
Leif decoded Taro's note this week. I hadn't realised that Leif had spelled DUDE d-o-o-d in his letter to Taro. To Taro it made perfect sense, of course, so he used it in his reply salutation to Leif. "Hey Dood". Be still my heart. Taro's mom and I both grinned about it, and in our usual teaching method, we don't correct it at that time, as we know they'll come upon the correct speling over the next few weeks. It's a word they use because we use it often, and write it often. To us, it's more important that they carry on a written dialogue than have perfect spelling at this age. We now that reading and spelling are not linked in such a way that once you can do the former you also can do the latter. Spelling correctly comes much later.
In this same vein, Leif has developed a keen interest in being asked to spell words, like a speling bee. Sushi, avocado, laptop . . . this will be a fun one to pursue over the next few months.
In Leif and Taro's coded correspondence, they talked about their favrite species. Yes, species. this led us here in our house to discuss whether zebras are the same species as horses (which they are, Equus) and to take a brief, brief look at some different taxonomic classificiations. Zebras, horses and humans. Leif asked about all the h.sapiens and homonideae classes used in our own classification. I hope to expand on this interest with some good library books.
Next week our library books are all about spring, and ducks. We are seeing some lesser-known ducks at the beach these days, and need to get to know them.
I leave you with some beach shots. Leif spent our many beach visits throwing logs into the ocean, Hannah spent them collecting bigger logs and rolling them into the ocean, and Ivy, well, she just liked to lay all over the logs.
C
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