Happy 4th of July, Everyone! We had a great week leading up to today's American Independence Day, including a pre-celebration complete with hot dogs! We must still split our time, having only 1/2 of our friends each day, and our air-conditioning was on the fritz for part of the week. But nothing got in the way of us enjoying, and being grateful for, our time together!
TUESDAY
We had an active day on Tuesday. After our dance warm up, we Zoomed with our at home friends, and then spent some time in the gym. The air-conditioning in our big room was being repaired, but Heike had outfitted us with several fans (two of them called "Tornado"), so we were comfortable all day. But the AC in the gym was on full blast, and it was a pleasant place to be more active. Patrick chose to shoot hoops.
Since it is July already, we worked on updating our calendar and adding more color to the room. Alexis and Patrick searched the internet for pictures, Sam glued details on the calendar squares, and Cameron worked on July 4th decorations.
After lunch we talked about folk tales, and watched a classic Disney video about Paul Bunyan. Besides being known as a lumberjack, he is widely credited with creating the Great Lakes, the Grand Tetons, and all of Minnesota's over 10,000 lakes! 😉
Then it was back to the gym for what we called a game of "socially-distanced" kickball. It was hard to get a good picture, and Sam is missing from this one, but he was in the lower right corner. The object of the game was to keep the ball in motion by...kicking it! Kacie (playing the middle of the court) had just sent it toward Kevin, who's getting ready to kick. The ball is partially blocked by Cameron, who was walking up and down his lane so he would always be in a good position when the ball came to him! We enjoyed this game, but decided we need to get a couple more of the big balls so we would each have more turns to kick.
Our last project for Tuesday was creating summertime crafts of ice cream cones and popsicles that will serve as more decorations in our room. It's hard to tell, but behind their masks the girls were cracking up because we were using miniature foam balls for sprinkles and they were going every which way except on the ice cream when Carol tried to "pour" them out. Static electricity got a hold on them!
Wednesday
We moved on to studying the 32nd state to enter the Union on Wednesday: Minnesota. From our United Tastes of America book, we learned that fishing is very popular in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. (But when we watched our video about Minnesota, we learned they actually have over 20,000 lakes!) Minnesotans are even known to set up icehouse villages on frozen lakes in the winter, complete with televisions so they can watch the Vikings play football!
Another thing we learned is that the Bundt cake pan was invented in Minnesota, so we baked a Bundt cake for dessert. We forgot to get a picture, but we'll have another chance on Friday! 😉
Laura worked diligently to color a picture of the flag of Minnesota to put on her folder. She thought the blue background of the flag was very pretty!
We also talked about July 4th, or Independence Day. We watched a facts video, and then successfully completed a trivia game about the holiday! We're so smart! For lunch, we had hotdogs (pig-in-a-blanket style) and were kind of shocked to learn that Americans eat 155 million hot dogs on July 4th! Everyone had to wrap the dough - after handwashing with soap and water - around their own hot dogs, as demonstrated by Kevin in this picture. We labeled our hot dogs on the baking paper, so everyone got the ones they wrapped when it was time to eat!
Charles Schulz, who created the 'Peanuts' cartoon, was from Minnesota, as was Prince, Judy Garland, and Bob Dylan.
We made July 4th necklaces using some beads and colorful straws we had on hand. Patrick concentrated as he followed the pattern for assembling his necklace.
We're planning to resume our yoga practice on Wednesdays and Fridays. Patti is no longer working with us, so we will tune in to Jaime and some other online instructors in the weeks to come.
Today, we joined Jaime in her latest video, "Yoga Disco." It was a great combination of yoga and dancing moves, and we had fun with it!
Earlier in the day, we got this video when we danced to a Beach Boys concert clip. We knew between the hot dogs and the cake, we would have to be extra active today! (We also had free time in the gym before lunch.) We took this video with the new video camera Sam's family gave us during the quarantine. We're still getting used to not moving too quickly when we film, but you'll enjoy our joy in the moment!
Before saying goodbye to the T/W group for the week, we masked up for a quick group photo op. Happy July 4th from (bottom row): Sam, Kacie, Laura, Kevin and (standing): Patrick, Liz, Cameron, and Alexis!
🎆🎇🎆🎇
Thursday
We welcomed the Th/F group on a warm and muggy Thursday morning, but were happy to discover that the air conditioning was up and running! When we Zoomed with our friends at home, we got this great video of the Th/F group dancing, and they didn't even break a sweat in our cooled off room!
After our Zoom with friends, we had to finish the July calendar. We are still just as busy as ever, even though we are on a modified schedule. Kate had found a picture for Kitten Day, and Carol was helping her remember how to resize it to fit our calendar square.
Devin was concentrating intently on finding pictures for Baked Beans Day, Chicken Wings Day, July 4th, and Yoga. He inserted and resized them like a pro, even though his mouth was watering thinking about all that food!
Drew and Xavier worked on July 4th pictures for our wall. We have so much wall space, we always need colorful masterpieces for decorating!
During gym time, Drew practiced hitting his shots. We are working with him at a lower basket, and trying to convince him to throw with a little less force!
Xavier took a break from shooting hoops to check in with Annmarie who was kicking the soccer ball around the gym. She got a lot of steps!
On Thursday morning a hummingbird was spotted at our feeder, but we didn't get a picture in time, and we didn't see it again the rest of the day. We hope to see it on Friday, and maybe some hummingbird friends, too. We did grab the camera in time to catch a quick picture of this goldfinch before it flew away. We had to zoom way in for you to see it. It was beautiful, and the first one we've seen this year as well.
This is how our day began on Friday (after our dance warm up, of course). Remember last week when we mentioned that if we outline a picture for Drew, he's making progress with coloring it in? Well, for various reasons, no one could assist him with the outlining this morning, so he was told he'd have to do it on his own. We reminded him that he's a smart guy and knows that the sun is yellow and sand is brown, and that he should use lots of different colors. He acknowledged his task and a few minutes later, brought us this. LOOK at his masterpiece!!! He was so proud, and we were proud of him! It should be noted, that Drew doesn't like coloring all that much, but he does his part to help when we need to decorate our room, so that makes this even more wonderful! 👏👏
We have posted our guys' masterpieces throughout the room, which is definitely updated from March to July now!
Not everything we make is a decoration! Just as the T/W group did earlier this week, the Th/F group also prepped their own pigs-in-a-blanket "masterpieces" for our July 4th lunch.
It was a masterpiece, indeed! Baked beans are a classic on July 4th, and they also allowed us to celebrate July 3rd as being National Eat Your Beans Day. We also had Caesar Salad, because its national day is July 4th. Did you know Caesar salad was created in Mexico by an Italian immigrant named Caesar?! 😋
Devin didn't cook the baked beans, but he helped clean up after we used the slow-cooker that was recently donated to us by his Aunt Sam! Thanks, Aunt Sam. The baked beans were so yummy today!
Here's a picture of the beautiful Bundt cake we made to honor Minnesota on Friday. Lexi has been enjoying this lemon-flavored specialty of Nan's her whole life. This week, all of us at the AoA enjoyed it! Thanks, Nan. It's was perfect for Minnesota Day!
When this group made 4th of July necklaces, Kate said she was going to give hers to her brother. How thoughtful, Kate! Hope he liked getting a little red, white, and blue on America's birthday!
That's a wrap on our 2nd week back! Happy Independence Day from Drew, Xavier, Kate, Annmarie, Devin, and Alexis! Enjoy your holiday weekend!
Here's what we have planned for next week:
Tuesday/Thursday: We will Zoom with our friends at home and have fun celebrating Kitten Day and Sugar Cookie Day! We'll also watch a Mystery Doug episode on kittens, and follow it up with some brain work. Lunch on your own.
Wednesday/Friday: We are resuming weekly yoga and turning to Jaime and others online for instruction, so dress to stretch. We'll also study the 33rd state, Oregon, and make birthday cards for the assistant principal of James River Elementary, Ms. Vallone. She'll be excited to find them waiting when (if?) she returns to her office! Tater Tots were invented in Oregon, so tater-tot casserole for lunch with a side of fruit and salad!
Have a great weekend, and stay safe!
Lisa, Carol, Nan, and the AoA Gang
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