Anya’s rock climbing class ends each session with a game of “Ninja”, in which the children strike vaguely martial arts-like poses in the process of trying to whack each other’s hands. The kids love this.
Sabriya’s ballet class holds their “Show Day” for parents. She loves Teacher Megan, one of the school’s owners.
Jan’s mom Lyn has returned to Seattle after spending three months in Tbilisi, Georgia. She comes over to join us for dinner. When Bree sees her grandmother through the glass front door, Bree lets out a piercing happy shriek.
Liya’s State Convention. The second grade always puts on an event at the end of the year as the culmination of a month or so of research into U.S. states. Liya researched New Mexico, and happily speaks about it with parents and K-3 graders who stops by her booth. Her visitors are happy to sample her state-themed snack of tortilla chips and salsa.
Ducks in hiding. We’ve discovered that Anya, concerned that we’re giving nearly all our Cozi rubber duckies away, has been hiding ducks around the house. Angela spotted a number of ducks in a second floor gutter. When she went to retrieve some more ducks sitting on a second floor roof (chained so they wouldn’t wash away), Angela discovered another ribbon of ducks hanging over the edge of the roof so they couldn’t easily be seen from an upstairs window.
Overnight getaway to San Juan Island. We leave the girls in the care of Grandma and Uncle Chris (who’s come up from S.F.) and take a float plane up to Friday Harbor. The weather’s great, and we stay at a place we’ve visited many times, Friday Harbor House. The meal’s great, although we have a flaky inexperience waitress. In the evening, we walk over to the town’s only cinema. Jan gives in to watching a showing of “Bridesmaids”.
The next morning, we rent a scooter from Susie’s Scooters. Susie herself recognizes us from the hotel restaurant the night before — we bond over stories about the terrible waitress.
We buzz on the scooter over to Lime Kiln State Park, a.k.a., “Whale Watching Park”. Jan’s been there at least twice before, and never seen any whales. But today we’re in luck! We meet two whale researchers who tell us some whales from J Pod have just gone by — and more are on their way. We settled in, and a short while later are rewarded with the sight of giant black dorsal fins (and a cute little juvenile fin). Something like eight whales go by. It’s fantastic.
We head back to Friday Harbor and enjoy a wonderful little croissant lunch at Cafe Demeter before taking the floatplane back home.
Liya’s ballet recital. Her studio, “All That Dance”, puts on a weekend-long series of eleven different recitals for the 1,000+ students. Liya’s recital on Sunday evening is the last one. She does a great job with her classmates dancing to “A Little Song and Dance”.
Uncle Chris and Grandma come to watch one of Anya’s spring soccer games. Anya’s team scores 4 goals – 3 by Anya, and on the 4th she had the assist!
“The Bead Tree” movie is finally finished! A simple idea during a carpool over a year ago — “Let’s make a movie!” — led a lot of work for Anya, Liya, and their schoolmate Kaila (with Jan directing):
• They collaborated on the plot. It was Liya’s insight to use beads.
• They drew storyboards for key scenes.
• They did a screen test to see who should play the lead. Kaila came out on top.
• Anya and Liya were at the camera for the majority of the camera shots
• Kaila worked tirelessly, performing 2-4 takes of each shot. Her mom, Megan, played the role of on-screen mom.
• Anya edited a portion of the movie, stitching together a sequence of video clips and clipping them for the result she wanted.
• Kaila and Megan re-recorded all their lines as dubbed voiceover, just like the pros sometimes do. Virtually none of the background audio from the video was used in the final movie.
• Anya recorded the piano soundtrack for the opening and closing credits. This was the last piece of the soundtrack to fall into place. Jan thought one of Anya’s current piano pieces, a waltz by Cornelius Gurlitt (Op. 101, No. 11), would be perfect, but Anya was reluctant to use the piece (even if Angela would play it). Anya finally relented when we couldn’t find a public domain performance that set the tone for the movie nearly as well as her own waltz did.
All this (plus five weeks of post-production) for a movie that ended up being just 3 1/2 minutes long! Jan is just happy we actually finished it. And just in time — the girls still have a couple of days left to share the movie with their classmates before the school year ends.
The Bead Tree on YouTube
Liya’s last literary unit for 2nd grade is poetry. In her draft book, she has compiled a list of metaphors to potentially explore in a longer poem. #15: “A sister is a live toy.” Angela is looking forward to seeing how that one turns out.
Last day of school! Anya says goodbye to her beloved third-grade teacher, Ms. Lord.
And Liya says goodbye to her beloved second-grade teacher, Miss Walsh.
We were supposed to take some family photos today at Pike Place Market, but it was too rainy. We make the most of it, and have a fun lunch at Maximilien in the market.
Today Bree (age 3) got some cash from her grandparents. Angela told her she would save it for Bree’s college. Bree then said, “I don’t want to go to college.”
“Well,” Angela replied, “You don’t have to go to college now. How about if you don’t go to college for a long time?”
Bree thought for a while, then said, “OK.”
After a fun Art Walk with school friends, Liya and Angela play and pick salmon berries at Discovery Park. What a yummy discovery!
More serendipity today…on the way to pick up dinner, Liya and Angela got to check out antique soup’d up cars at the Greenwood Car Show. Liya is practicing her showroom moves.
Jan takes Anya and Bree for a short hike at Twin Falls State Park. Anya whines a lot, but is mollified by the selection of candy we picked up on the drive. On the healthier side, we enjoy some wild salmonberries.
Jan, Anya, and Liya finish making a swing the magnolia tree in our front yard. Jan talked them through cutting the board, drilling holes, and painting it. All the girls agree it’s pretty cool to have a swing right outside the house.
We host a goodbye party for the Hillard family before they move away to New York. Angela had met Virany Hillard at a Mandarin playgroup for Sabriya. After dinner we corral all the playgroup kids together (along with Anya and Liya) for a group photo. Sabriya’s a bit puzzled by the concept that her friend Rowan and sister Nua are moving away for good.
As the Mandarin playgroup moms try to cajole the kids into smiling for a group photo, they make a pretty amusing group photo themselves.
Goldfish pizza!
Anya’s doing art camp this week.