Monday, May 6, 2013

Spring Break 2013



There we go, it has been seven weeks so it must mean that I am on a break!
Let’s see, what has happened since February…  I am still very much a handful, well make it two while you are at it. The way I see it, is that it keeps the parents busy and up on their toes. 

Since rewards did not work, since removing privileges did not work, they decided to try a new approach with me. They read this book from Dr Jane Nelsen called Positive Discipline. No more rewards, no more removal of privileges? Really? I wonder how they are going to pull that one off.
It turns out that I am also in charge of making some decisions in the family and we end up meeting every Sunday morning to make those decisions. I decide on my own consequences and I am sometimes harder on myself than my parents would be.
Of course, like with any system, I am pushing on it hard, very hard. I still try to turn it to my advantage because, after all, I am King Noah.
Luckily, I am much more than that and hopefully, when I figure all this relationship thingy, there will be less power struggles…

In March, we had a great Summer day and Maman and I spent a leisurely day riding our bikes, having a picnic and enjoying a sun time on the side of the river Willamette.
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In April, it was Tina’s birthday and I worked super hard on making a project for her. I was really proud of what I did and Tina seemed to like it too!
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Then, it was finally time for a little break. En route to Seaside we went. End of April, at the Ocean, in Oregon? Not much chance for sun and warmth you think. That’s what we thought too, but this was the sunniest Spring break in a long time and it was warm enough to be in shorts and t-shirts at the Ocean.

On the menu for the 3 days: reading ( yes I still do that A LOT), 
eating, but mainly playing on the beach, getting wet in the salty water of the ocean, 
 finding sea anenomies, building sand castle, getting more wet in the water and playing games with Papa and Maman.   

The bonus was also the fact that the place we stayed at had an outdoor pool open year round and boy, that was fun! It was even warm outside on the last morning of our stay.
Pictures and videos will speak for themselves. ( There are some weird kinks in the movie but Maman has spent too much time on it already and does not feel like redoing it- sorry!)



On Thursday, it was take your kid to work so Papa took me to his work. 
 There were a lot of talks before hand to make sure that I would behave well. But, come on, this place is the heaven for physical sciences and I LOVE physical sciences.
There were a lot of kids there but we were about 20 in each group, moving from one lab to the other. Since you can come only when you are 6, at 5 ½ years old, I was one of the youngest and was surrounded by kids that were up to 10 years old.
I was super interested by all the things they showed us and as you will see in the video, parents and other kids in my group seemed to be quite impressed by what I knew. Most kids were quiet, but I sure was not, making surer to try to answer every question, raising my hand high.
“Do you guys know the name of a gas?”
“Carbon dioxide” said I, the first answer that got heads to turn to me and my small stature and high pitched voice.
“You guys know about acids, but do you know what the opposite of acids is?”
I gave a few seconds for others to interject but since nobody jumped in I said: “Bases”.
Parents looked at each other surprised and the other kids kept looking at me with a “who is this kid?” kind of look. Turns out that even Maman did not know the answer to that one.
At the electromagnetic lab, they were trying to help us learn about electricity and I was unstoppable on the subject. At some point the guy was showing wires and a battery and I raised my hand high to say: “If you hook those wires to the battery and make a circuit, it will wear out the battery pretty fast and make a short circuit. That made the parents chuckle this time because I was probably beginning to sound like a know it all.
Anyway, I had a good time there and it made the P’s wish that they could find a school that is just about Sciences because I clearly enjoy that stuff. 

Now we are back to old school time schedule. Although the weather still feels like Summer... which was great this week-end as I got to baby sit 2 of the chicks that hatched 3 weeks ago in my classroom. Lemon and Cookie, that's how I call them. Sure it was fun having them around but they did not seem too interested in going down the slide or playing soccer with me.
That's all for now. Seven more weeks and then Maman and I will get ready to leave for our trip to France. 
A bientôt!