This week we were excited to celebrate Cameron's birthday, the only one we have on the January calendar! We were looking forward to that, and also celebrating National Popcorn Day, because that is one of his favorite treats. Read on to check out Cameron's fun birthday week, and to see what else we were up to as the middle of January passed us by!
TUESDAY
What a fun time we had during Tuesday's Zoom with our friends at home! Our theme was "Snow," even though the forecast for this week was mild and sunny! It was great to welcome Michelle to Zoom for the first time! (Bottom row, left.)
We danced to a song called "Snow What I Mean" from GoNoodle, watched a video clip about how engineering (balance) plays a factor in successfully building a snowman, and ended with Snowman Bingo, which was fun as always and which everyone won! We forgot to take pictures throughout, but here's a picture of The Best Tees, which is the name of the two girls who sang our dance song, "Snow What I Mean!" UPDATE: As we publish the blog, we hear there is a chance for snow coming up on Thursday! ❄❆☃❄❆
Xavier's and our artist friend, Steve, shared this picture from 2016, when he had a lot of snow in northern Pennsylvania! This is a huge snow sculpture of his son, that took about an hour to create. We love seeing your creative works, Steve! WOW!
January 19th is National Popcorn Day so you know we celebrated! We not only nibbled on freshly popped corn, we also made the cutest popcorn snowman decoration with it!
We'll post a picture of our popcorn snowmen in the Thursday section, after our other group makes theirs. Here's a sneak peek with Sam and Nancy "introducing" their snowmen! Meanwhile, in the background, Birthday Boy Cameron was still trying to figure out why we would use 1/2 of our popcorn for a craft!! 🍿🍿🍿
It was another gorgeous Tuesday so we went for a morning walk. We stopped to talk about this magnolia tree on the school grounds. Nan told us about having a very, very large one in her front yard as a child...it would have dwarfed this one! By the way, can you spot everyone, including Sam, in this picture?!
No trouble spotting Sam, or Cameron, here, as they climbed to the top of these bars. And what a beautiful blue sky above them!
Back inside, we watched a short BrainPOP biography about the impact Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. had on our nation's history, since yesterday was MLK Day. We didn't have time to take the quiz at the end, but our guys knew all the answers. Throughout the video, if we stopped to clarify a term such as "segregation," "boycott," or "Civil Rights," they knew it!! 💡
During Lunch / Choice Time, Lilly caught up on classwork, Cameron focused on a word search about popcorn, and Nancy lined up two word search puzzles and a codebreaker worksheet to keep herself busy!
Our friend Christina, from the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg, recently gave us a set of wooden snowmen, and some supplies for making them "pretty." Kevin enjoyed showing Lilly his painting skills.
Alexis and Liz showed the "before" version of their snowmen. (Hmm...if you look closely, you get another sneak peek of our popcorn snowmen, too!)
And here is the "after" version! Sweet!
We went outside again in the afternoon on this mild day. Alexis got a W&M ring toss game for Christmas, which she brought to share with us. Fun!
At the end of the day, JRES Assistant Principal, Ms. Vallone, stopped by to show us pictures of her adorable grandson, Max. He was born in November and she is over the moon with joy! Her daugther, Ashley, is a friend of the AoA, too. She came one time and painted all the girls' nails! Ms. Vallone said Ashley can't wait for COVID to end so she can visit again, and let us meet Max. We can't wait, either! 👶
WEDNESDAY
This week's state study was on number 47, New Mexico. Since we were also celebrating Cameron's birthday (with his fave, pizza), we looked for a dessert food that would connect to New Mexico and we found biscochitos! It's New Mexico's state cookie, and they are the only state with one! It's highly recommended that biscochitos be made with lard instead of butter...so we had to have a lesson on what that is... Nancy had "heard of lard," so she agreed to pose with it for us! 🙋 More on the cookies later.
The state bird of New Mexico is the greater roadrunner. We learned that "greater" in this sense means "larger," as there is also a "lesser" roadrunner. We also learned that roadrunners are fast, and can run over 20 mph.
Since it was Inauguration Day, we were trying to keep an eye on the history taking place in Washington, DC. Plus, it was breezy and chillier outside than yesterday. So, we stayed indoors, and got our heart rates up along to a rocking video called "Pump It Up!"
Here's our birthday boy, Cameron! His official birthday is on Saturday, but we were happy to celebrate with him today and that meant...
Pizza for lunch! It's known far and wide that Cameron loves pizza, and we would like to thank his family for treating us for lunch today! Cameron, and his friends, were happy!
Here are the biscochitos, New Mexico's state cookie, in their traditional form. They are flavored with star anise and sprinkled with cinnamon sugar. They tasted a bit like licorice, and were a tad dry (even with the lard!), but we liked them! For Cameron's birthday, we each had one without the cinnamon sugar that we iced and decorated.
Here, we sang to him and even let him blow out a candle! Parties with friends are so much fun!
Meanwhile, even though our day was all about Cameron, we were keeping our attention on the Inauguration Ceremonies. Luckily, it was taking place during lunch and choice time, so those who weren't as interested (😉) could enjoy other activities. Our guys all agreed that it was historic to see Kamala Harris, the first female vice-president, take her oath of office!
Coming up on Sunday, the 24th, is National Compliment Day. This is a day we always like to "celebrate" by drawing a name and writing something thoughtful about that person. Alexis picked Kevin's name and wrote him a complimentary message!
Liz had Sam's name and she wrote him a personal, and kind note. Turns out Sam had her name, and he also wrote a thoughtful note for her, too! Our guys really know each other!
Another pair that chose each other's names were Patrick and Cameron. Patrick complimented Cam on being a great artist and also being very nice to all of us.
Cameron complimented Patrick on being very helpful to us all, which is definitely true!
After sharing compliments, we worked on map skills for New Mexico and then ended our day with a relaxing yoga session with Jaime!
THURSDAY
Kate stepped up for the first time to be our dance warm up DJ! It was perfect timing as we're celebrating National DJ Day (Jan. 20th) today during our Zoom session. She did a great job, taking requests and playing a variety of tunes! 🎵🎵
It seems whenever we Zoom with our friends at home, we get exciting visitors to our bird feeders, which distracts Lisa, who keeps looking out the window at them! Today, a bird we have not seen before, came to feast. We think this is a downy woodpecker and isn't he (she?) pretty?!
It may have been on Tuesday, but this group also celebrated National Popcorn Day! Here's Alexis decorating a snowman face for our room decorations, and, at the moment, resisting her popcorn snack!
Xavier, on the other hand, found a good balance between coloring his snowman and nibbling his popcorn!
We decided to put the Tuesday / Wednesday group's masterpieces on this wall...
...and the Thursday / Friday group's masterpieces on this one! They all look precious!
Here's our awesome intern, Lilly, working with Bette Faye (on Zoom), to complete a family support project for one of her classes. She's a hard working student!
She's also a hard working intern! During Choice Time she worked with the girls to paint birdhouses that the master gardeners gave us. As soon as we think we'll have a nice week, we'll book the vans and deliver these cute birdhouses to the Botanical Garden's fairy garden area at Freedom Park!
They will add a beautiful burst of color!
We also painted wooden snowmen today that we got from our Art Museums friend, Christina. Devin was explaining that he was going to make the hat orange, and add a purple scarf so his snowman would represent Clemson University!
Here are the finished snowmen from the week! We know Christina will love them! They are very, very cute!! (Clemson is in the center, near the back!)
The pleasant afternoon called us outside so this group could give ring toss a try. We moved the players a bit closer to the rings this time, and had some success. Alexis ringed one of her tosses today!
Xavier decided he needed to be even closer, and he was successful! That's ok. We support each other in making the adjustments they need! 💛
At the end of the day, we looked back at some photos from a few years ago. We like to take a "memory lane" stroll from time to time. Here's a throwback from October, 2017. You'll see some friends who have left us since then, and miss some who had not joined yet!
We also played a fun online game that Liz found. There is a cookie hidden under one snowman's hat, and he is revealed to us. Then, the snowmen move around and change places. The object is to keep our eyes on the cookie snowman, and determine where he ends up. It starts slowly and with 3 snowmen, and increases in speed and number of snowmen. We had fun playing it! Thanks for the suggestion, Liz!
FRIDAY
What better way to start a Fri-YAY than with a dance warm up, and the fellas were getting down this morning! Way to go, Abraham, Devin, and Xavier!
Xavier was also stylin' on Friday in a new shirt! Very cool!
The Thursday / Friday group also enjoyed learning about New Mexico's state bird, the greater roadrunner. Something interesting we learned today is that even though they can fly, sometimes it takes them almost too long to realize, such as when being pursued by an enemy. At the last second, the roadrunner remembers to fly away!
We hear the weather may be chilly, and possibly wet or snowy next week, so we were happy for another beautiful day to spend time outside!
Lisa, Carol, and Nan walked around the Grove Community Garden, while Kate and Alexis walked around the outside area. Michelle was interested in hearing about the garden. We told her that Rob, who founded it, passed away a couple of years ago, and that different people now take care of it. We'll be curious to see how it changes as the spring approaches. The dancing fellas from this morning were shooting hoops.
We discovered a way to paint with our hands, but not get any paint on them! First, we folded and cut paper plates into snowflake shapes. Next, we put them in a plastic bag and added a few squirts of paint.
After zipping the bag closed, we used our fingers to move the paint around. We were painting with our fingers but not making a mess!
After taking them out of the bags, we sprinkled glitter on them. They were so pretty when added to our popcorn snowman wall!
The best part of the afternoon came when we celebrated National Compliment Day, which is officially on Sunday. Everyone got a "secret" friend to write a compliment to, and the words they wrote were special! Alexis complimented Devin on being a good friend!
With Nan's help, Xavier wrote a note to Kate in which he complimented her on always giving us fun things, such as Bingo prizes, which she does!
Michelle complimented Xavier by writing him a "knock-knock" joke, and also saying that he is always happy and gets along with everyone!
In her message to Abraham, Kate said he is kind and helpful. That is definitely true!
Devin complimented Michelle on being nice and a good friend to all of her new friends at the AoA! 👌
Last, but not least, Abraham complimented Alexis by calling her "happy" and saying he appreciates her help with some of his work. Our guys don't need Compliment Day, because they are always saying kind things to each other. 💕 Still, it's fun to make a big deal out of it once a year!
It was time to end our week so we put away all the tables and chairs (so Heike's team can deep clean, as usual, on Monday) and set up our yoga mats. We followed a story/routine about a dolphin named "Popcorn" and then did a Peace Out session called "Snowman," both with our online yogi, Jaime. Namaste to everyone!
Then, just like that, our week was over!
Here's what's up for next week:
Tuesday / Thursday: We're excited to Zoom this week with not one, but two, special guest presenters! Tuesday's Zoom will be with our friend, Wisteria, from The Mariners' Museum. She will present a lesson on sea monsters that sounds quite interesting! Everyone will need paper and pencils/crayons for a drawing activity. On Thursday, we'll visit with our friend Christina, from the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg for a fun lesson about lions and tigers! Everyone will also need paper and drawing supplies for this lesson. Many thanks to Wisteria and Christina for helping us change up our Zoom lessons! Also on Tuesday and Thursday, we'll celebrate Opposite Day, Peanut Butter Day, and Have Fun at Work Day! Oh, yeah...we will be busy! Lunch on your own.
Wednesday / Friday: We'll have another busy day as we learn about the 48th state - Arizona! This is going to be a big study as Sam's mom, Coach Teri, and grandmother, Nina, have provided us with a lot of resources to use! Nina lives in Arizona and Teri grew up there, so they have us set! Thank you Teri and Nina for helping make this an awesome day! For lunch, we will have Cheese Crisps (an Arizona thing) and Indian Frybread Tacos! We'll add chips and Nan's guacamole, too. We'll also have activities for Backward Day (31st), AND we'll have yoga with Jaime, so dress to stretch!
Have a great weekend!
Lisa, Carol, Nan, and the AoA Gang
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