 This will be short and sweet as I am running out to visit my own babies in Victoria for a few days. Our youngest son has managed to get a couple days off work and will be joining us to visit his brothers. Because of the distance between us, and our conflicting work schedules, the five of us only manage to get together once or twice a year, which is far too seldom as far as I'm concerned. I remember being at the point in life you are at right now- those days when the three of them were making me crazy and I would have paid anything for someone to take them for a weekend (especially by the end of holidays). And now I sometimes pine for them to all be small and living at home and making me nutty- even just for a day or two- so I could hug them and squeeze them and love them hard. Thankfully Team Awesome helps to fill that hole. Enjoy your extra hug time with Team Awesome these next two weeks!
 Well, that sneaky little leprechaun foiled us again despite our cleverly hidden(?) traps. And not only that, but he also felt the need to have a campfire, complete with marshmallows, play with the farm and toy animals, and leave mucky hand prints and gold clovers all over our room. If I didn't know better I would say our resident compact green guy invited his friends and they had a big party and forgot to clean up afterwards. We were excited to find he left us a nifty poem stating that he won't be returning (Boo!) and part of his pot of gold (Yay!). Team Awesome was glad he came to visit us but sad to learn he won't be sticking around. We took our traps home in the hopes that we might catch a leprechaun there. If you do happen to catch one, don't forget they disappear in the blink of an eye- and please don't give him directions to our classroom. One leprechaun party a year is quite enough.  There were squeals of delight and excitement this morning as the children checked their leprechaun traps and discovered tiny green footprints spread around their traps and our classroom, as well as little shamrocks. But alas, no leprechauns. As we looked around we discovered the smartypants had had a sleepover in the tiny doll centre, complete with juice and snacks and had a bath in our sink. He also tried to hide some of our shiny necklaces under his pillow- no doubt he had plans to come back for them later. Cheeky cheeky fellow left us a note written in blocks on the carpet- "Thanks". We resolved to catch him tonight. To that end, we shared how our traps were supposed to work, why we thought they didn't, and how we could improve them and this afternoon we spent some time upgrading our designs. Some of us made totally new traps. Bigger and better traps. And we tried to be sneakier when setting them up- we put them in places the unsuspecting leprechaun is sure to go based on where he went last night. Our fingers are crossed that we will be luckier this evening than we were last night. May the luck of the Irish be with us!  As the children entered our classroom this morning they slowly noticed a wee bit of untidiness- books and blocks spilled, papers on the floor, pencils left on tables and things turned upside down. And as Mrs. Farber's class was talking yesterday about the cheeky leprechaun they were setting traps for, Team Awesome was already aware that a little trickster had been hanging around. And you know Team Awesome- they wanted a piece of that action pronto! Which led to a flurry of activity this afternoon during Free Choice time as the children built their own traps and Wanted posters to catch the little man. If you picked up your child at the end of the day you might have seen the posters hanging on the wall outside our room and the traps placed willy- nilly around the class. If we don't catch the leprechaun this evening we might have to revisit and revise our traps as many of them don't actually have doors that close. So while a few traps have some bait in the form of shiny things, fake gold and even bits of pompoms to lure the fairy creature inside, there is nothing to keep the leprechaun in the trap after he steals the bait and has a nap. And that's what scientists do- revisit and revise ideas if they don't work the first time! We'll keep you posted on our leprechaun adventures.  As part of our health and nutrition unit, we learned about brushing our teeth as a way to take care of ourselves this past week. Of course, this is a subject that Team Awesome is familiar with and they had a lot to contribute on the subject. We read some books, learned about bacteria in our mouth and plaque and did two experiments to bring home how important brushing and flossing our teeth regularly really is. Oh- and we listened to this song a number of times, but beware, it gets stuck in your head and will pop up at the most inopportune times and you just can't help but sing the chorus out loud. Crawford The Cat gave us a few pointers and we learned how toothpaste and tooth brushes are made as well. I hope that seeing why brushing is so important will help lessen the nightly arguments over taking care of our teeth. |
