Monthly Archives: November 2012

Bandwagons, Family matters, National Blog Posting Month

How to throw a Star Wars birthday party and turn a bunch of kids into Jedi knights

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First things first: Today is my sister-in-law Chloe’s birthday. Happy birthday Chloe!

Secondly: Today is also Pete’s 5th birthday party. He wanted a Star Wars party, so that’s what he got. I had big plans to make a Death Star cake or something extravagant like that, but I ended up ordering a cake from the grocery store instead. And guess who doesn’t make Star Wars cakes? The grocery store. So I ordered a pretty plain cake and added some of Pete’s “Star Wars guys” to it.

My (slacker) plan for the day was to let the kids play in the backyard and then eat some cake. Pete somehow remembered that I’d mentioned doing a Jedi Training Academy party some six months ago, though, so instead of being total slackers this morning, Rockford and I made about 20 storm trooper balloons for our Imperial Guard. Here’s what the kids had to do to earn their honorary Jedi status:

The Jedi Training Academy obstacle course

  1. Five jumping jacks.
  2. Run through the Dagobah swamp.
  3. Leap out of the swamp.
  4. Do a somersault. (Not, as Poppy feared, in midair.)
  5. Climb the tower of the Imperial Palace.
  6. Secure a light saber.
  7. Leave the tower via escape pod.
Light Saber 101 with Rockford.

The young padawans’ light saber training

Rockford led the trainees through a series of very impressive moves with the light saber in our Jedi training grounds. I had no idea he had such skills.

Elude the Imperial Guard

This is where our storm trooper balloons came into the game. We strung them from the monkey bars on the playset — only two of them popped before the party guests arrived — and the kids had to “battle” through them with their light sabers in order to get to their final task.

Defeat Darth Vader

I printed out a couple of Vader heads and taped them to the tether ball. And then we set the little Jedis loose on it.

The kids had quite a lot of fun battling the Imperial Guard and putting a major hurt on Darth Vader before and after cake.

Homeschool, National Blog Posting Month

I think we did more than math and reading this week

Yesterday I wrote 1,908 words on my NaNoWriMo project. I’m not sure I have the brain power to stick to both of these initiatives. Anyway, here’s a very brief summary of our homeschool week:

Math

I seem to have misplaced Poppy’s Teaching Textbooks discs, so she hasn’t been doing that for a few weeks now. The kids are both still enjoying their McRuffy curriculums, though, so there’s still math happening around here.

Reading

We finally finished “Anne of Green Gables” this week. Poppy’s final assessment: “It didn’t care for it at first because it was kind of boring, but then I liked it.” I’ll agree with that, and I’ll even admit that the tears flowed freely in one particular chapter near the end. You “Anne” fans know what I’m talking about, I’m sure.

So after one million weeks of “Anne,” it was finally time to pick a new read-aloud. Poppy has been adamant that she didn’t want to read the “Harry Potter” books, on the grounds that they would be “too scary.” Pete wanted to read hear it, though, so I picked up “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” to read to him and “A Wrinkle in Time” to read to both of them. Poppy ended up listening to “Harry Potter” with us anyway, though, and by bedtime last night we’d read six chapters.

I am almost out of words already. Uh-oh.

  • We went to our homeschool co-op’s Halloween party, and it was chaotic.
  • Poppy’s handwriting is improving very nicely.
  • I have not done a great job keeping art projects in our plans.
  • I need a bigger bowl of words.
    • Bandwagons, National Blog Posting Month

    There are a billiondy-three words on the horizon for month eleven

    So I’ve signed up for National Blog Posting Month and National Novel Writing Month again this year.

    This will be my fifth year of NaBloPoMo, and I think it’s the third of fourth time I’ve attempting NaNoWriMo. I’m relatively confident that I’ll complete NaBloPoMo, and I’m equally as confident that I will not complete NaNoWriMo. The question is just how many days I’ll make it before I throw in the towel.

    Anyway, just so you’ll have an idea of the sort of gems that await you this month, here’s a look at some of my favorite NaBloPoMo posts from years past:

    An Interview with My Dad (2011)

    On his first job: “I was supposed to empty a drip pan under the walk-in freezer every day, which must have been a pretty important thing. Because I always forgot to do it, and I only had the job for about a month before I was fired. Or maybe I was fired for helping myself to gas or a six-pack on the weekends.”

    Elementary Civics (2011)

    Poppy on the president: ” ‘He wears fancy ties,’ she said, ‘and he speaks very proudly.’ ”

    An Interview with My Kid Brother (2011)

    On his favorite film: “Re: Teen Wolf. We did not have a large collection of VHS tapes. This was one of them. I watched it a lot. And Michael J. Fox turns into a werewolf, and then his dad does too. And then they surf on a van and play basketball.”

    The Suggestions of a More Exciting Life (2010)

    This note reference here is still on my wall.

    A Rootin’ Tootin’ Interview (2009)

    It was when I internet-met Rootie Toot!

    So Hooray for November! Let’s hope I don’t resort to live-tweeting breakfast by the end of the month.