October 2006 Archives

So this years pumpkin entries have arrived. We got a good deal on some huge pumpkins from a local plant place, and the kids did MUCH more of their own pumpkins than ever before. Katie pooped out after about half of the doggie, but Ellen poked and cut and did a really nice job on hers. So, without further ado, Katie's terrier, Ellen's owl, and my portrait of the kids:

it's interesting. As I was carving mine, it just seemed to be coming out terribly. In fact, I considered giving up about 1/2 way through because it just wasn't looking right. But, after I was done, and put the light inside it, suddenly the kids just popped out and I was pretty pleased. This was the first time I've actually made a template myself and here's the template:

This is an example of why my 8 1/2 year old is so special. While reading stories tonight (we're reading "The Amber Spyglass", part 3 in the "His Dark Materials Trilogy" by Philip Pullman), we get to a part where one of the characters meets up with an alien species of things like deer. Ellen thinks they're larger than they are and says they're like Wooley Mammals, but I say they're smaller, "Sort of like Mamlets". Then I say, "Isn't that a Shakespeare play?" and she says about 2 seconds later, "No, that's Hamlet...Maybe it's Hackbeth!" I don't know where she got the "hack" part, but how she knows Shakespeare plays, I have no idea. So I tell her it's "Macbeth" and then joke, "Actually, there's another play called PC Beth", making a Mac/PC pun. She gets it immediately and laughs, asking if it's "Virusbeth".

She just gets things. It's amazing sometimes how quick she is.

This report comes from Kim, via Katie's teacher. Apparently, there's a new girl in Katie's class--Dinaye (or something like it), who speaks very little English. So the other day, Katie's music teacher notices that every time that she says something to the class, Katie turns to Dinaye and says something. She listens more closely and Katie is saying "bla blee blu bla blal blal bla" to Dinaye--e.g., complete gibberish. When questioned, Katie reports that she is "translating" for the girl, as she doesn't speak English well. All of Katie's teachers think this is so cute that they refuse to tell her to stop her translating, even though poor Dinaye probably is so confused that she must think English is the most bizarre language ever.

Katie writes it off as "no big deal--it's just Gibberish."