This week we're calling our blog "Zippity-ZOOM-Dah!" because we had two very stellar presentations during our Zoom sessions! We are grateful for friends like Wisteria and Christina, who bring high-interest, education, and fun to our program! We also had lots of other fun this week (check out Arizona Day!!!!), and we are thankful for all of it! Here's a peek at our adventures...
Tuesday
Wisteria, who is Manager of Interpretation and Outreach at The Mariners' Museum, was our first Zoom guest this week on Tuesday. That's her on the top row, left. We were also joined by Tracy and Liz from Parks & Rec. We love it when they are able to drop by!
Wisteria talked to us about maps from long ago, and the sea monsters and mermaids that used to be drawn on them. Her slides were filled with examples of artifacts at the museum.
She explained that sometimes the monsters would be drawn on maps by one country so future explorers, perhaps from another country, would be afraid to sail there lest the good fishing, land, or other riches they had found be discovered!
After we learned about the various monsters that were drawn on maps, we took a few moments to draw our own! Wisteria led us step-by-step, and it gave our guys all the confidence they needed to create some wonderful drawings!
Look how focused we were on creating our sea monsters! Thanks for the encouragement, Wisteria!
Our friends at home were also focused! Here, they were showing their drawings to Wisteria, and those of us at the center.
This is one of two sea monsters drawn by Laura!
Here is Laura's second one. We recognize the variety of colors she likes to use!
Devin did a great job, too! It looks like his sea monster is heading right off the page toward us!
Drew's mom told us he enjoyed our lesson with Wisteria very much! We love your sea monster very much, Drew...it almost seems to be dancing, maybe to "Uptown Funk???!!!"
Michelle also drew two monsters! She's calling this one "Jaws" and we know why!!
Here's her second one. The light and dark shades of red give it nice contrast. Good work, Michelle!
Here are the pictures from the guys in the Tuesday / Wednesday group who were at the center for this activity. We gave them extra time after the Zoom to color, and we're proud of their work! Top to bottom, left to right: Sam, Liz, Alexis, Cameron, Kevin, Patrick, Nancy
National Have Fun At Work Day comes up this week, so we decided to celebrate! We did a "cookie challenge" where the object was to place a little cookie on your eyelid, and then jiggle and scrunch your face to try to get it to move down and go into your mouth! Nancy gave it several tries, and she got the scrunching down, but it fell off just before getting into her mouth each time! (New cookie each time, FYI!) 🍪🍪🍪
Liz was ready if her cookie would have slid just a bit further south! She kept trying, too, but it's harder than it looks! 😜
Our next effort to "have fun" at work (make that "have more fun") involved trying to spear-throw pool noodles through hoops in the gym. This was challenging, too, and eventually evolved into most of the guys using the noodles to "whack" each other! Fun....is fun!
Another day that gave us something fun to celebrate this week was Opposites Day! Lilly put together some fun activities for us, beginning with a hilarious clip from SpongeBob SquarePants in which Spongebob drives Squidward more crazy than usual when he takes Opposites Day to the extreme!
Next, Lilly gave us cards with certain words on them and we had to find a friend who had the opposite word.
Sam verified that Carol had a match for one of his opposite cards. Some of them were tricky, but our guys are whizzes!
Yet ANOTHER day to celebrate this week (it's a great week for themes!) was Peanut Butter Day! We turned this one into a service project and made birdseed feeders out of pinecones. Kevin told Nan it was "hard" to spread the peanut butter on the pinecone, but she encouraged him to persevere. Next, he rolled it in birdseed and we'll set them outside tomorrow!
WEDNESDAY
It was finally time for state #48, Arizona! We had been looking forward to this one because of Sam's connection to The Grand Canyon State. His grandmother, and our friend, Nina, lives there, and his mom, Coach Teri, grew up there. Together, they decided to send us a lot of cool resources, as well as our lunch ingredients! Check it out...and check out Friday's pics, too...when we will do it all again with that group!
Nina and Teri sent enough books so each associate could keep one. There were coloring books, activity books, sticker books, facts books, and story books. In other words, something for everyone! Thank you, Nina and Teri, for these generous souvenirs!
The Tuesday / Wednesday gang couldn't wait to enjoy their gifts! Alexis and Nancy, in particular, kept "interrupting" Lisa all day to share tidbits of information as they perused their books. (Lisa didn't mind one bit!) 🌵🦎🌞🐍
We worked on handouts that came from some of the activity books in the collection. It was a change from the usual worksheets we do for each state, and it was fun!
"Mr. Arizona" (aka, Sam), modeled a beautiful bolo tie and pointed out Arizona on the map for us. We learned that the bolo (or bola) tie is the official neckwear of Arizona, AND it is the only state to have an official neckwear! Who knew....we do! (Jeopardy! alert!!)
Around mid-morning we took a brisk walk and hung the pinecone birdfeeders we made yesterday. There's a chance for wintry weather tomorrow, we heard, so we wanted to give the birds a little extra!
Argh! It didn't take long before the woodpecker helped himself to one of our pinecones! We think he's big enough to fend for himself pecking for insects... Hopefully the smaller birds will also get some!
Yum! We had two Arizona themed culinary delights today. First, Cheese Crisps, which is an "Arizona thing." It's a large tortilla toasted up crispy, then slathered in cheese and toasted some more!
We're pretty sure we couldn't bring ourselves to use as much cheese as Macayo's, but our guys enjoyed our version of Cheese Crisps all the same!
Next, it was time to make Indian Fry Bread for our Navajo Tacos. This is a traditional Native American staple, that is simply fried dough (flour, salt, water). Coach Teri sent us a mix, and we put Carol and Nan on cooking duty while we continued to work on our handouts. (It was a "sticky" situation!) Click on this link for a short lesson on its history, and how to make it from scratch: Authentic Indian Fry Bread
We learned that Fry Bread is not low in calories...and we discussed that once in a while it's okay for a treat like this. We rarely fry (and never deep fry) foods, but in the interest of authenticity, we wouldn't have it any other way. Each of us had one, and we topped them with healthy options (no meat)!
Mr. Arizona took his fry bread taco all the way, with refried beans, cheese, guac, salsa, lettuce, and tomato! The light and fluffy fry bread was the perfect vessel for holding those tasty toppings! We were hoping to try our hand at making sun tea, also an Arizona favorite, but the weather didn't cooperate. We made it on the stovetop instead, and it was also a fun treat today! Thank you so much, Nina and Teri, for providing our lunch and ALL of the wonderful resource books! We had a memorable Arizona Day!!
Oh, we almost forgot! We had a few pieces of fry bread left over, so we topped them with honey and powdered sugar for a sweet treat! Fry bread is enjoyed both savory and sweet!
One of our resident sports fans, Liz, gave us a mini-lesson on Arizona's NFL team, the Cardinals. She showed us their stadium and took us to their website, too! They play in Glendale, which is where Sam's brother Scott lives!
At the end of our busy day, we joined Bette Faye and friends from The Arc of Greater Williamsburg for the Arc's weekly Zoom session. Bette Faye has wonderful guests and programs each Wednesday at 2 p.m., but we usually do yoga with Jaime at that time. However, today, the Arc's yoga instructor, Anita, was the special guest, so we tuned in!
Anita is a fabulous yoga instructor, and her presentation, called "Less Stress, More Stretch," was amazing! Anita does yoga once a month for The Arc of GW during non-Covid times. She's calming and energizing at the same time, and very good at what she does! We enjoyed the Zoom session! For our friends who are safer at home (or not in the Wednesday group), check out Bette Faye's excellent Zoom sessions each Wednesday at 2:00. Just send her an email and she'll hook you up with the weekly links!
Ahh....nice ending to a wonderful day!
THURSDAY
We got the snow we've been hoping for! It was just enough to make it pretty outside, but not make the roads too dangerous for coming to the AoA. The birds were out in full force, grateful for our feeders. We snapped a shot of this beautiful cardinal as he rested before hitting up one of our feeders.
DJ D-Man (aka Devin) got our blood pumping with some great tunes this morning! He began with a little Carrie Underwood, one of the gang's favorites.
Today's Zoom was our second of the two fantastic sessions we had with our museum friends this week! Today, it was Christina, Manager of Gallery Learning, at the Art Museums of CW. She brought us a very interesting lesson on Big Cats!
Christina told us we would try drawing lions later in the lesson, but first she wanted to share some pieces from the museums with us. As we looked at this picture, she told us that it looked similar to the one we would try to draw. She also mentioned that it went back a few hundred years, to a time when royalty was fascinated by animals like lions and tigers, which they used to keep on palace grounds!
This wooden piece is a coat of arms. On the left is a lion and on the right is a unicorn. The royals couldn't get enough of large and majestic animals, real or fictional!
We have seen this toy Noah's Ark set at the museum! It was carved by a German artist, and Christina explained that the some of the animals, like the lions and tigers, may not look exactly as they do in real life. This is because lions and tigers don't live in the wild in Germany, and since the artist may have never traveled out of Germany, he would not have been positive about how they look.
When it was time to draw a lion, our guys were so attentive to Christina's instructions.
Drawing the lions was a little challenging, but we all gave it our best efforts, and it was fun. When it was time to go, we roared good-bye to Christina! Thank you, dear friend, for another wonderful time together. We miss you so!
Here's our pride of lions from the Thursday / Friday group! Nice work from all of them!
Next up, it was time to make pinecone birdfeeders. We knew the birds would appreciate it on a cold, windy day like today. Xavier carefully spread peanut butter on the pinecone and then we rolled it in birdseed.
Before finding places to hang our pinecone feeders, we took time to celebrate National Have Fun at Work Day by having a friendly snowball fight!
It was windy and very cold outside, but everyone got in on the action for just a few minutes!
Who are these masked creatures?! We quickly hung our pinecone bird feeders and grabbed a quick group shot, noting that in this freezing weather, wearing a mask was actually comfortable!
Nothing like a crackling fire to warm our hands after snowballs and freezing wind chill temperatures! It may have been some kind of subliminal messaging, but it seemed to help! 😮
Not long after warming our hands, we were happy to see this little fella having lunch on one of the feeders before the big 'ole woodpecker found it!
Xavier loves to work jigsaw puzzles. Today, during Choice Time, he took advantage of an unused table to get three going at one time! The table behind him is his assigned table, and you can see that he also has one going on it! Good idea, X!
Lilly wasn't able to be with this group for her Opposites Day lesson, but Lisa and Carol executed it almost as nicely! Here, Michelle, Alexis, and Abraham are trying to make opposite matches with their playing cards.
FRIDAY
As with the Wednesday group, this group was also delighted to receive an Arizona souvenir book from Nina and Coach Teri! Thanks again, Nina and Teri. It's so much fun getting unexpected surprises!!
And it didn't take them long to make good use of their gifts. After we watched a video about the state of Arizona, Michelle found a section in her book of facts that gave more information about the state bird, the cactus wren! In the background, Devin was reading about one of the famous people from Arizona in his book of biographies. What a smart bunch we are!
We bundled up and ventured outside for a walk again today, even though it was quite chilly. We were curious because the pinecone bird feeders we hung on the bushes outside our room were gone. We found some evidence that they had been taken down...here is one of them along with the piece of string we used to hang it. We aren't able to tell if it was removed by bird or squirrel?! One thing is certain, the seeds and peanut butter were eaten!
Meanwhile, in back at the garden area, several of the pinecones are still fully covered in seeds. When we saw them, we figured the birds hadn't found them yet.
Then, Devin observed that this pinecone, hung on a nearby tree, was missing some seeds. That led us to conclude that birds were at least in the area. We will check back with Tuesday's group to see how things look after the weekend.
Back inside, we began enjoying our Arizona-inspired lunch. First, we made the tasty Cheese Crisps, but didn't get any pictures because we had removed the memory card so we could look at pictures of Sam in his bolo tie when we worked on that part of our work. After we cooked and enjoyed the Cheese Crisps, and "took" a few pics, we realized the memory card was still in Lisa's laptop. 🙀
We "fixed" the camera in time to get a picture of Abraham, Michelle, and Devin checking out the fry bread table, where Nan and Carol were cranking out the main part of our Navajo tacos. When he first saw it, Abraham thought we were having fried chicken! Funny thing is, Kevin thought the same thing on Wednesday! Nan's touch left the fry bread a beautiful golden brown, so we can understand their confusion!
The refried beans we put on top of our meatless Indian tacos were so tasty! Coach Teri said these came from Amazon, but she said they can also be picked up at grocery stores in the OBX, where they are less expensive! She added that we need to convince our local stores to stock this brand. We agree! Again, we say thank you to Teri and Nina for treating us to a unique, and delicious lunch.
We invited Heike and substitute custodian, Karen, to join us on Friday. They really enjoyed trying something new, and so did we!
Here's a happy fella! We used corn tortillas for Xavier, since fry bread is not gluten free. He was able to enjoy the refried beans, guacamole, salsa, lettuce, and tomato toppings. He loved it!
The guys agreed to use half of their Choice Time for additional fitness today!
Fry bread is really yummy, but it calls for extra calorie-burning!
During the second part of Choice Time, Xavier made use of the sticker poster "book" he choose from the Arizona souvenir choices. When he was finished, he had created a neat desert scene.
Carol made a run to Eaton and picked up some work for us to do next week! We're excited about having that job! Thanks, guys, for quickly unloading Carol's van!
After wiping down and putting away NINE tables, our guys were ready for yoga with Jaime! Abraham, Xavier, Kate, and Devin felt the stretch with cat and cow pose.
After yoga, Jaime led the guys through a calm and quiet Peace Out session. It relaxed them, and got their weekend off to a great start! See you next week, guys!
Here is a look at our plans for the first week of February!
Tuesday / Thursday: We'll welcome February with lots of fun activities this week, and in the weeks to come. On Tuesday's Zoom, we'll check out National Serpent Day! Yikes! Snake lovers, you'll like this one! Thursday's Zoom will be less "scary," as we'll celebrate National Bubble Gum Day and make Super Bowl predictions. Also on these days, we'll update our February calendar and begin new decorations for the room (already?!), complete some Eaton work, and have fun with Groundhog Day. Lunch on your own.
Wednesday / Friday: Wow, we are on to state #49 - Alaska! We will learn about our largest by area state and try our hands at making Baked Alaska! Homemade Soup Day is this week, so for lunch we will make Vegetable Beef Soup and Peanut Butter Toast. We'll also study National Women Physicians Day and National Weatherpersons Day with educational lessons! We'll try to squeeze in a couple of football themed activities for Super Bowl, too. AND, we'll have yoga, so dress to stretch!
We hope everyone has a great weekend,
Lisa, Carol, Nan, and the AoA Gang
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