Happy leap day! After presentation club the GS troop got together with our HS group and we had a frog themed leap day party.

There was food (including frog lollipops and frog candy), games (elefun, Mr. Mouth) an origami frog making table and a note table (where you could write yourself a time capsule note to open in four years.)

Hannah had fun eating and playing with her food.

Bethany thought the mini corn was kind of hard to eat.

The Mr. Mouth game was a lot harder than I remember; I only got 2 flies in his mouth. Hannah gave up and was just throwing them in when the mouth opened. The elefun game was a bit easier for her, though she still had trouble catching the butterflies.

The girls were sporting the green shirts they got yesterday from the Capitol, hair things, shamrock glasses and green ties from Grandma Carberry (an early St. Patrick’s Day gift, neat how we got to use it for the leap party too, yeah green!) Bethany made a few origami frogs and then sat down to write her note.

I’m so curious as to what she thinks she’ll be doing in 4 years (probably eating candy was in there.) We had frog tattoos too, Hannah thought 3 was better than 1.

It was a very fun time for the girls and their friends. Wanna have some fun tonight?

Step 1: Grab some paper and envelopes.
Step 2: Write down what you want (or think) you will be doing in 4 years.
Step 3: Grab an oatmeal container (or shoebox, zip lock storage container, etc.) clean it and decorate it as your time capsule.
Step 4: Put your paper (in the sealed envelope, no peeking!) in and maybe a photo or newspaper from today and seal the top.
Step 5: If you’re adventurous bury it, otherwise put it somewhere that will be out of sight, but not forgotten.
Step 6: Wait 4 years and then open! Have fun!

Bethany’s presentation today is on our cats. Here is Zoe our Maine Coon cat:

Note the distinctive ‘M’ on the forehead. Here is Sampson our Ragdoll cat:

Note the distinctive fat cat belly, here is Grace with him:

Here is Maisy with Bethany’s ‘Spot’ a wire haired fox terrier doll:

We went to the cyber-schools day at the Capitol today. There were four main on-line schools represented: COVA, Hope, Branson and Connections. COVA had the most people there though, something like 400 people. We brought our poster board and lap- books to show what we do with the K12 curriculum using COVA. The lady for COVA wanted to use it at the expo because it shows how flexible the curriculum can be (or how flexible I can be using it!) We set up and got our lunch tickets and then listened to the welcome speech. There was so much difference between the 2006 day and this one. I was so embarrassed at the 2006 day at the Capitol. It was utter chaos and confusion. Kids were running around unsupervised, there were no classes, and there was no help for getting tickets for tours or meeting your representative. This year things were much different. Everyone had green shirts supplied by the coalition, there was an introductory speech by the heads of the various schools, there was a state govt. class, the tickets for tours were well placed and I already knew which Senator we were going to meet.

After the intro. seminar we stayed in the old courthouse room for a lesson on state govt., a COVA Dad was teaching it. Grace got to be in the Pike troop and walk around the room and reported back on what she saw in the Wild West (alligators, she must have been in the southwest!)

We found out the original name of Denver was Montana city and gold was found in Denver which started the gold rush here (I thought Arvada was where it was first found.) After the session we went out to talk to teachers and see the house floor. At 11 we had a quick meeting with our Senator, Ted Harvey. He had just come off the floor and was going to a committee meting. He used to HS his 2 children and I talked to him about how we used to HS, but now we are in a charter public school. Also, how I wanted to make sure that while I still consider myself a HS’er, the laws for virtual schools would reflect only virtual schools and not HS’ers. Technically I’m not HS’ing under the law, and that’s ok, I just want the definition there so HS’ers don’t get anything tacked onto their laws because of us. There is now a committee that oversees virtual schools, so that is good. Joel gave him his paper on the prairie dogs in Highlands ranch (the Senator lives here too.) He’s running for Congress, who knows we might have been in the office of a future congressman!

Future statesmen of America?

After our meeting we had lunch (and all my kids ate the lunch!) provided by the coalition. Then we gathered our stuff and headed home. James had been watching Hannah at home and it was a good thing I left her. She was kind of grumpy and had a little fever. We rounded out the night by going to Chuck E Cheese (groan.) Some kids were running after Chuck E trying to attack him, he ran behind the counter and the kids were yelling, ‘Awww, Chuck E don’t run behind there, we can’t go back there to get you!’ Yeah, sucks to be a guy dressed up in a giant mouse suit (must be why he needed the smoke break when we were leaving!)

The wait is over, our trip today was to the……coroner’s office. We went there for a tour of their offices and the morgue. It was actually quite interesting. No one in my family is a budding pathologist/coroner, but we did find out that CSI is a little truth and a lot of fiction.

First, we went by the reception area. See the giant monitor, I’m jealous!

They don’t write on the whiteboards anymore, it’s all on the computer. Then we went down the hall, more offices and down into the basement to morgue room 1.

The officer checked to make sure no one was in there (but the coroner wasn’t there so I doubt he would have left a body on the table.) Fiction #1: you get to come in and see the body and identify it. Nope, sorry. They identify the body from fingerprints, dental records or DNA, and then they call you. You never come to the office (unless you are picking up personal effects.) The funeral home is the one that actually picks up the body. Fiction #2: the bodies are stored in file cabinets that slide out. Again, No. There is a big walk-in refrigerator and the bodies are stacked on shelves. So the kids (and adults) all had their pic taken in the morgue room next to the table (yeah, I know fuzzy, crappy camera still here remember?)

Here is the overhead camera that lets the office staff observe the autopsies.

Then we moved into bay 2. They used to have two tables in that room, but they re-did it and broke it up into 2 separate rooms. Fiction #3: the morgue smells. Actually it didn’t smell good or bad. There wasn’t an antiseptic smell in the air, it just smelled….normal. This room had all the tools neatly labeled, very organized. That’s our guide talking to us in the pic.

Next we went into the receiving bay. They had a scale that was already set up to a negative number so that when they roll the gurney onto it, they don’t have to recalculate (or take the body off the gurney.)

Next we went outside to see the truck that the agent drives. It’s a heavy duty truck because this office responds to calls on dirt roads and up in the mountain as well as here in town.

Here is the fingerprint scan door that opens to the evidence area. No, they didn’t show us how it works.

After this we went back upstairs and the kids got some bracelets and pins. We went over a few more things like how this office responds to other counties and the coroner is responsible for 14 counties, yikes! She said they have had 168 deaths since Jan. 08. Also, she talked about how one would become a death investigator or pathologist or coroner. Each county has their own requirements, so she couldn’t say for sure what one would actually need to do in a specific county. We bid her goodbye and left the justice center glad that we didn’t actually have to go to the morgue on business.

Oh, my gosh….is it Monday again?? We woke up, did schoolwork. Went to Wal-mart. Went to dance. Went home, ate dinner. Went to CAP. A friend babysat so I could go to a co-op on lap-booking. Got the girls, picked up Joel, stopped at Sonic and then back home. Whew!

Joel had an elluminate (that’s a thing offered by our virtual school where they have a teacher on-line giving a class. The kids can talk or type to the teacher during the class.) math session today with his favorite teacher Mr. Tomko, he is so funny. He’s always singing over the computer or saying really crazy things. Today they were practicing on some CSAP math stuff. It really got Joel thinking (and that’s a good thing.) Mr. T (not the gold chain Mr. T) wrote a problem like this: Lin got $900 in her paycheck from work. Her boss took 1/3 of the check for taxes. Lin bought a CD player with 40% of the money left over. How much money did she have left after that? Now Joel started off wrong by saying well, the boss took $300. Then he took 40% of that and subtracted it (that was almost the right part) from the $300 and got his answer. Joel is usually first to type in his answer, so he did, but it was wrong. Mr. T told him to look at it again. Ahh, Lin had $600 left on her paycheck, then 40%, then minus that from the $600. Big difference in the answer. Mr. T said he wants to know why Lin can’t figure this out herself! Another time Joel had the right answer but the teacher wanted to show everyone the wrong answers. So, Joel kept typing in n=2, n=2, n=2, n=2. Finally I told him to stop it; yes, you’re right, now quit annoying the teacher! I wish they’d have a video link so the teachers could see Joel with his legs all over the place spinning around in his chair while he ‘pays attention’ to them. Hah!

Grace was having a hard time this morning after waking up wheezing and with runny eyes. It took me a little bit to figure out that the culprit was her pillow. She had it on the floor last night (I don’t know why) and was sleeping on a pillow covered in carpet fibers that she’s allergic to, yep that’ll cause an allergic reaction. So I gave her 2 breathing treatments, an allergy pill and eye drops. She was not happy. She did school until the tears from her eyes were dripping all over her writing tablet, now that’s a trooper! I washed all of her sheets, blankets and pillow cover so that should get rid of the problem. I wish I could tear up that carpet. James might go out of town one week and come back with plywood floors showing (I’m kidding dear.)

We went to Wal-mart to procure items Joel needed for SARS at CAP tonight. Gosh, I’m becoming a regular walking abbrev. lady. I go to CMA dance, drop Joel at CAP for SARS training, I HS and am a SAHM and I am in the CCHFS HS support group. LOL! ROFL! JK! He needed an orange vest, flashlight, canteen, knife and compass (that isn’t crap.) (SARS is search and rescue something….not really Something, but I can’t remember what the last S stands for…oh, maybe it’s Squadron.)

I dropped Joel off and rushed to dance. While Bethany danced Grace worked on her whale lap-book. I must say there is a lot of information there and she knows it all. Also because I have neat file folders, library pockets and mini-folders, it rocks! As soon as my camera returns, fixed, I will take pics of it. When Grace went in I had a chance to talk with the other moms. They thought Grace’s lap-book rocked too and they want me to bring the rest of ours next week. How cool!

I dropped Joel off early (for SARS remember?) and thanks to my friend Kim was able to leave the kids with her while I went to the lap-book co-op. My friend Maura was doing it. She had a stack of their books. I love looking at others stuff and getting ideas. She had neat folds and things coming out of them and pics in ziplock bags and oh, it was neat. We were inspecting them asking well, how did you do this and where did you get that. I showed mine and she got some ideas from them, isn’t that neat how we share information and others can take advantage of it? Lap-books are so neat because they are so personal. You can have 4 kids working on their own with the same subject and you will get 4 different lap-books. That’s because the person who is making it will put in their own ideas and things to make it their own. I love the way lap-books help kids review material and of course when anyone asks, ‘so, what did you do today?’ there are the books waiting to be expounded upon. Unlike poster board stuff and papers, these don’t get thrown away. They are small and compact and a lot will fit in a magazine holder. Now that I have templates from here and here, we’ll be doing more.

Anyway after I left Borders it started to snow. I got the girls and drove to pick up Joel. At times with no streetlights and the snow coming right at the windshield it was scary driving, but the roads weren’t bad. We’re supposed to get 3 inches and flurries in the morning, we’ll see (it’s still not enough to sled darn it!)

I’m not going to tell you where we’re going tomorrow (but if you’re in my HS group you know.) I’ll just write tomorrow and tell you, dang I wish my camera was fixed!

We went up to Lookout Mt. for Buffalo Bill’s birthday today. I think this was our 4th time up there. We got there just as they were about to sing and cut the cake.

Every year there are the same Cody impersonators, this year there were a few extra people included in the Buffalos Bills, Hickoks, Oakleys, Indians and some I didn’t recognize.

A few ladies had beautiful dresses of the era and looked great. After we sang the Happy Birthday dirge (ever notice how no matter how many people you have, it’s always off key and sung like it’s a funeral?), we ate our cake and ice cream and headed up to the grave site and took some pics.
Hannah wasn’t too sure about the cake.

His wife is buried beside him.

* Did you know that he died in January, but wasn’t buried until June? That’s the first date they could get to come up to the mountain (snow on the roads and wagons/old cars don’t make for a good mix.) Also think about how hard it is to dig a 6 foot hole in frozen ground…

Next we went into the museum and made some crafts. The museum is really cool. It has Cody’s outfits and guns, ammo, posters, pictures, saddles, rope, and wild west artifacts. There are Indian baskets, vest, boots, and stirrups on display. There is a stuffed buffalo and cow hides and a plastic horse for the kids to practice roping a calf. Really cool stuff about the west and Cody and his friends in the 1800-1900’s.

A rope bracelet and a pinecone bird (or fish depending on how you look at it) were the items for the day. Grace waited forever to do the bracelet, I was like hurry up or we’ll miss the buffalo chip tossing contest. Yep, buffalo chip tossing contest. Why not? James at a rattlesnake last time we came up. The kids were all grossed out, but hey, I’m a mom. I’ve been delving in poop for 13 years off and on; one poop is pretty much like another! Hannah wanted to throw poop too, I told her fine (as long as she didn’t eat it.) She got nowhere near the red pole, but it was a good try.

(Sorry, Joel moved and the pic is kind of flat.) I was in third place though and I had to have a plop off with another guy who tied me. Yep, plop off. The chips were kind of plopping and then breaking apart. Anyway we tried again and he hit the pole dead on. Maybe next year……

As always a fun trip, now we need to make it up there for his death party in June. They open the gravesite (the marker) on that one day so you can make a rubbing of the marker, neat! Interesting things you may not have known about William Cody:
*He left home (in Kansas) at age 11 to herd cattle and drive a wagon train.

*He was into gold mining and joined the pony express in 1860.

*He served in the civil war.

*His name Buffalo comes from the days he was an Army scout and had to provide the train workers with…buffalo meat.

*He found Annie Oakley in LA (Louisiana silly, not L.A.) where she auditioned for his Wild West show (her name was Phoebe Moses.)

*The word cow-boy was an insult in the late 1800’s, but after people saw real cowboys and cowgirls in Cody’s show, they dropped the hyphen and the word became the ‘cowboy’ we have today.

*In 1887 the Wild West show was to be the main American contribution to Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee celebration. “Buffalo Bill’s Wild West” was the hit of the celebration, visited by nobility, commoners, and by Queen Victoria herself. The show was credited with improving British and American relations.

*Buffalo Bill on the Indians he fought: Wild West show posters frequently portrayed the Indian as “The American.” Buffalo Bill stated in 1885 that “The defeat of Custer was not a massacre. The Indians were being pursued by skilled fighters with orders to kill. For centuries they had been hounded from the Atlantic to the Pacific and back again. They had their wives and little ones to protect and they were fighting for their existence.”

And a parting shot, Maisy with her new pink shirt. Yes, she hates it, but it’s really cute and also very funny to watch her try to take it off! (No animals were harmed in the taking of these photos, slightly irritated, maybe…)

Well, let’s see how much I did that I said I’d do. We went to the Foothills art center in Golden. They have such neat kids stuff there (although they didn’t have the Christmas crafts this year.) Anyway it was free day (yeah, I know, I’m cheap; that’s how we get to do cool things like worship dance and fly airplanes, I don’t pay for stuff like this!) Actually we have a tax here in Denver that goes into a fund that pays for free days at the museums and zoo, it’s pretty neat. Here’s what Joel did while we were gone (art isn’t his thing.)

The exhibit today was ceramics in art. Here are some examples of what they had.

We went upstairs and the kids made animals out of model magic. Here’s another tip: make your basic shape out of foil and then roil the dough out and wrap it around the foil. The figure weighs less and you use less dough. Hannah made a cat, at least that’s what she says it is.

The lady kept asking her if she was finished and Hannah kept saying, ‘No.’ Can you blame her? There was dough, markers, sequins, beads and all kinds of little things to stick in the dough.

Grace made a whale, of course.

Bethany made a cat.

We managed to get the figures home without too much damage.

Then I put them up to dry (takes a day.) Hannah put her cat downstairs and Maisy broke it, not too bad, but the tail fell off. I might be able to fix it, we’ll see.

After we dropped off the figures we went by the library. I signed Grace up for the bark for books program. It’s where they bring in trained dogs and the kids read to them. I know we have a dog, but she would tear up a book if it got near her! I also signed up Bethany and Joel for the space program, I know Joel will balk, but I’m sure he’ll come out of it with some extra knowledge. Then we went home, ate dinner and went swimming. Not bad, tomorrow is Buffalo Bills birthday bash in Golden, yeehaw! Here is a picture Joel took of Maisy with his camera.

We woke up early this morning (that means before 7am) to take James to the airport. He’s going to Utah for 6 days for SME’s annual meeting. We would have gone, but…….we had this and that and the dog, so we’re here. We were in such a rush this morning that we loaded the kids in the car and forgot his suit coat at home (which of course we didn’t realize until we got to the airport and he was taking his stuff out of the car.) So now he’s coatless in Utah, I was going to fed-ex it to him, but he said don’t bother, he’ll just wear his suit without it.

During school we had Hannah letting the dog in and out of the house, going outside herself (in the back), the dog trying to chew up her pom-poms and me telling the other 3 to shut-up and do their work. There was lots of gnashing of teeth today (mainly mine.) I know it’s because the father figure has left the building and it will get better, but in the meantime we plod on.

I took the girls to a dentist co-op today, mainly because Hannah is about to go to the dentist and I wanted her to see the stuff they use. We saw a full mouth x-ray, dental tools, the super-hot microwave oven they use to clean the tools and got to wear gloves. This dental office had TV’s in the ceiling so when you lay down you can watch movies; pretty cool (I bet you pay for that in your checkup price though!) After the tour the kids all got bags with toothbrushes, toothpaste and floss in it. Hannah smeared her toothpaste all over her legs before we got home (no, I don’t know why.) Her big thing at the dentist’s was to point to everything and ask, ‘Wha dat name is?’ The toothbrushes are the kind with the suction cup on the bottom so I had 3 brushes stuck to the windows of my car.

Maisy dog is getting worked on; we’re teaching her sit and down. I hope to have her trained very soon (especially on down.) She’s not bad; she’s just a puppy and likes to jump. But, when she jumps on Hannah, Hannah freaks out, but Maisy think she wants to play so she keeps jumping. I’m thinking of getting one of those clicker things just for the down training. We’ve been practicing with food for her to sit and that works pretty well, but I think down is harder. Also I don’t think she can see very well in the dark. When I took her for a walk the other night she ran right into the light pole. I also told the kids don’t leave your shoes on the floor, now they know why. She loves to find shoes and drag them around chewing on them. She also likes to take clothes out of the bathroom that are on the floor. The kids think its funny, for now. We might take her to the dog park tomorrow that way she can run off leash.

Tomorrow we’re going to Golden to see some art at the foothill art center and do some kids art activities. That’s my plan. That’s it. Just one thing. Well, and maybe the dog park and maybe swimming. Oh, and I need to go to the library. Well, that’s not too many more things.

Today we saw Ann Lincoln at the library. She’s the one who inspired Joel to start juggling clubs last year. She went through her routine juggling balls, clubs and knives.

Then she started the magic part of the show. She had the kids cracking up with her antics.

She had Pete the dove and Hopper the bunny in her show. Here is the flaming pot trick with bunny appearing.

How did she do that? It’s magic! Joel had her dice trick figured out though….he may want to add that to his routine, it was good.

After the show we went over to the Aurora history museum. I was so bummed that we missed the exhibit Hollywood Colorado (it had posters of movies that were filmed here.) But, we did catch this interesting exhibit on Varian Fry.

He was just a reporter who was sent over to Germany to report on what he saw. Well, the date being 1938 you can imagine what he saw. He heroically helped political and intellectual refugees escape Nazi-controlled Vichy France in 1940 and 1941. A Harvard graduate working as an editor in New York, Fry volunteered for the Emergency Rescue Committee’s project to bring 200 individuals from the French port city of Marseille to safety. Despite opposition and no governmental support, he was able to save 2,000 people. Since we like Casablanca the kids could immediately relate to people trying to get out of France (Casablanca was French controlled) and the Germans coming in and the Vichy in control. All I had to say was ‘Hey, you know Rick in Casablanca and how people were coming to him to get passports out of there?’ Suddenly it all fell into place for them. The Germans in the bar singing and the occupation, the girl tying to get the Capitan to give her an exit visa, the letters of departure being stolen off the dead body; who says TV can’t be educational?

Anyway this guy, Fry, went into Marseille with a few thousand dollars and some passports to get people out.

When word got around that an American with money and passports was in town, he had many refugees show up at his hotel. Well, he couldn’t take all of them then. So, he started a cover organization in France that used illegal activities to help get people out (like fake passes and visas.) It’s a case of doing wrong to do a better good. He was sent in to get 200 people out, but eventually he managed to get 2,000 people out. He may have thought he could have done more, but given the resources he did an awesome job. (In the picture of the people on the boat, the one by the boy in the back was a student of Picasso.)

It’s amazing to think of such a time and how one person made a difference in the lives of so many and we don’t know anything about him. Thank you Varian Fry! (BTW the FBI kept tabs on him when he got back to America. Probably because of the illegal activities in France or maybe because the French govt. kicked him out for being an anti-Nazi supporter. He died in 1963 surrounded by his book and mementos. The French govt. gave him an award before he died to commend him for his activities during the war. He was never honored by the US. The Holocaust museum has an exhibit for him and this is part of the traveling exhibit that we saw.) Here is an excerpt from his book:

Again, you say? Well, they are very good and when the college or theater is paying for them, it’s free to me! It would normally cost $500 to have them come and perform (we asked them last year.) Gil (the founder of the group) told us about a performance at an elementary school, but the school didn’t want HS’ers there.

So, when I see that they are at the Fox Theater or the college then I say ‘field trip’ and we go.

Grace and Hannah brought their drums with them to show Gil after the show. We sat down and started listening to the beats of
Djembe’s

Djun-Djun’s

talking drums

conga drums

and shakers.

Then Denise showed up.

Up until this point we were just sitting and clapping, but I knew she’d make us get up and dance. Now I wanted to dance, but she makes us shake and makes me out of breath! Remember last year when we went to see them at the Fox and they asked the teachers to get up on stage and dance? And I said, no. Then I saw how much fun it was and thought if I ever get the chance…..well I did 2 weeks later and it was fun! So, now when she says get up I do and it is fun (but I’m still embarrassed.)

So we danced 3 times and then sang a song ‘Bongo, bongo’. I wish I could remember the words (but I’d spell them wrong anyway!)
Here are Bethany and a friend looking over the shaker they got.

Here is Hannah with hers.

After the show the kids showed off their drums to Denise and Gil, they were impressed at how good a balloon can sound. Then we went to eat at the hospital café (I got a gift card for my troubles. Remember I didn’t actually eat there when Grace was in the hospital due to the employee luncheon closing down the café.) It was pretty good food and I still have money on the card. I don’t mind going there to eat if no one is actually using the hospital!

Tomorrow we have a magic show and a trip to the Aurora history museum.