Yearly Archives: 2010

Social Media

Expanding my hairdo horizons via the internet

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Poppy's bun, after 2 hours of running around and playing tag backstage. Oh, and after a little rehearsing, too.
Poppy's bun, after 2 hours of playing backstage. And a little rehearsing, too.

For the next three days, Poppy is going to be an angel. That’s not just wishful thinking: She’s in her ballet studio’s production of “The Nutcracker.” We moved her from the “arts center” ballet class to a place that’s actually called the Works-for-Me Wednesday“ballet conservatory,” which should be enough to tell you that they kind of mean business. Poppy’s class is required to wear a certain color leotard (light blue), and the older girls have to have their hair in a bun for class. Note I said “older girls” there, meaning I haven’t had to do anything more intricate than a ponytail for my girl.

Until now.

The standards are higher for “The Nutcracker.” She’s required to wear her hair in a “ballet bun” for the performance, and that gave me about 15 minutes of panic every time I thought about it. The only buns I’d made before very, very recently were of the cinnamon variety. And then I remembered the internet. You can find anything on the internet, right? Pretty much. Up to and including a really nice video tutorial on How to Make a Ballet Bun. Behold:




Thank you, fiabeauty. You totally saved this ill-prepared mom’s day. (She also has a video on how to make “Disney Princess Hair.” Awesome.)

What’s the most recent thing you’ve learning from the internet?

Screen time

The Detroit Lions are improving, and Perry Mason can prove it

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Detroit LionsIn 2008, I graduated from law school, moved 640 miles from home, passed a bar exam and began my legal career. You know what I remember most vividly about 2008? The Detroit Lions attained a perfect 0-16 record. On September 25, 2008, as the Lions continued to skid, something happened that gave the Honolulu Blue masses hope: William Clay Ford announced that he had relieved Matt Millen of his duties as President and CEO, “effective immediately.” We all knew without a doubt that our troubles were over.

One MM was replaced with another. With Martin Mayhew calling the shots instead of Matt Millen, Rod Marinelli was fired as head coach and replaced with Jim Schwartz, a defensive coaching dynamo from Tennessee. In the 2009 draft, the Lions took franchise quarterback Matthew Stafford, a solid tight end in Brandon Pettigrew, a stud safety in Louis Delmas, an outside line backer with some serious upside in DeAndre Levy, and a wide receiver to take some attention away from Calvin Johnson in Derrick Williams. And that was just the first three rounds. Oh yes, we were on the move. And then the season happened, and we went 2-14, winning two games in less than convincing fashion.

But Ford stayed the course. Mayhew and Schwartz stayed on, and Lions fans looked forward to yet another off season. Wow, what an offseason it was. In the draft the Lions took the freak defensive tackle that is Ndamukong Suh, whose name literally means House of Spears. They followed up that pick with speedster running back Jahvid Best and high-upside corner back (now safety) Amari Spievey. The Lions then brought in free-agent wide receiver Nate Burleson, defensive end Kyle Vanden Bosch and defensive tackle Corey Williams, all excellent additions. With a defensive front four now including Vanden Bosch, Corey Williams, Ndamukong Suh(nami) and speed rusher Cliff Avril, opposing quarterbacks were already shivering at the thought of playing the second coming of the Silver Rush.

Fast forward to today, December 13, 2010. The Detroit Lions are 3-10 (or 4-9 if you count the Week 1 debacle in which the guys in stripes decided to give the Chicago Carebears a win). At that pace, we finish the season 4-12. Not exactly the improvement we were hoping for. Naturally, rumblings that Coach Schwartz should be fired and that these are the Same Old Lions are starting. Given that some of my favorite childhood memories are listening to my uncles complain about this team, I’m more than preconditioned to jump on the negativity bandwagon. But I decided first to look at the stats to really see whether any improvement had occurred. I was amazed at what I saw:
The Lions are improving
In summary, from 2008 to 2010, the Lions have drastically improved their First Down Ratio, 3rd Down Conversion Ratio, Total Yards, Rushing Yards, and Passing Yards Ratios, Completion Percentage Ratio, Sacks Ratio and Turnover Ratio. In other words, the 2010 Lions handily beat the 2008 Lions in every single stat category necessary to winning. The Detroit Lions are improving, and I can prove it.

Homeschool

Homeschooling in the infirmary

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home/schoolMy little guys have been sick since Monday, so this week’s theme was Things That Didn’t Require Much Energy. Our “Five in a Row” book was “The Salamander Room,” and it was the first in quite awhile that Poppy was really enthusiastic about. It isn’t that she doesn’t enjoy the FIAR books anymore, but this one? She asked for it every day, several times a day. Since she was under the weather, though, we didn’t do many of the suggested activities.

(PS: A downside to homeschooling? No sick days unless you’re way sick.)

Poppy did a little bit of copy work this week — a line from the “Wonderpets” theme song, and the first stanza of Robert Frost’s “Dust of Snow,” which was also her memorization piece this week. We finished reading “Betsy-Tacy” (and Poppy immediately asked for the next book in the series, so I guess she liked it!), and Poppy read several books for her December BookIt challenge. I upped her page-number target to 200 this month, since she knocked out 100 pages so easily last month, and she’s about 60 pages away from the goal.

We finally got our DSL line up and running again, so Poppy was able to play some games at NickJr.com and PBSKids.com. (We switched to a Verizon MiFi last year, and it was woefully inadequate in terms of bandwidth availability. But the cancellation fee was astronomical, so we had to stick with it.) I also signed up for a free trial of Dreambox Learning, which is a web-based math curriculum. Poppy tried it yesterday and thought it was a blast. I don’t know that I’d use it exclusively, but it would be a nice supplement. It’s kind of expensive, though, and homeschools don’t qualify for their school discount unless there are 24 students. (To which I say: Why didn’t you just say “no discount for you, homeschoolers”? Well, I guess you could sign up as a co-op. But still.)

Anyway, I’d appreciate your prayers regarding this “viral crud” — that was the doctor’s diagnosis — that’s taken up residence in my house. Poppy is supposed to dance in “The Nutcracker” this week, and I’m not sure they’ll want a sick, hacking angel in their ranks. She’d be devastated. Petey hasn’t been able to fully shake the fever that accompanied his “crud,” and I’m coming down with it now, too. So far mine is just the stuffy/runny nose and the sore throat, but I’d really like it if that went away or at the very least didn’t get any worse.

What to know what other homeschoolers are doing? Here’s the Weekly Wrap-Up at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers. I’m linking up there, and lots of other homeschoolers have, too.