Historical Heritage

Julia,

I had the pleasure of working with you on your first historical heritage research project! You chose to be Iulia Aurelia Zenobia...Queen of the East!

You read about her in one of your books and immediately fell in love with her because...well.. because her first name is pretty much your first name.

But then we learned more about her- and she's a quite obscure figure- and you were impressed with how she conquered different countries and stood up to her enemies!

And in doing your project, you conquered your fears too! The day before your big presentation, after so much work went into your costume with Miss Holly and making the research cards with Miss Emily and Miss Adrienne, you came home in complete devastation. You were trying to decorate your note card (your report) and put on too much glue and the entire thing got disintegrated into a pile of mush! But, you and Mama figured out a plan, and you cut out a page from your notes that you and I had taken, and you turned it into your card! Problem solved! And you were a Queen at your first Historical Heritage!

Aidan, last year you chose to be Neil Armstrong. But, you had a close second. Mommy and you had discussed several options and you were super psyched about one. You weaved a web of tale in your class last year, and luckily Miss Gwyn followed you the whole way.

"I could be that guy...you know...the girlfriend is dead and bleeding and the guy gets on top of her and kills himself!"

That's right... William Shakespeare! And this year, to be or not to be... you were the bard himself!

Spotlight On You

Yesterday Holly's boss generously gave us some tickets to see a Shakespeare play at the new theater downtown. Taking full advantage of not needing a babysitter and doing things on the whim, as we've been doing lately, we decided to go check it out and take you to your first work by the bard: A Mid Summer Night's Dream. You've really gotten a lot of culture recently!

And considering that, now at Week 22, you pretty much hear everything we hear, you've gotten quite an earful of iambic pentamter, opera and music as of late.

While the spotlight wasn't shining on us, you were kicking and squirming. The play was a lot of fun and well-done, but yours and your Mother's favorite part, by far, was probably during the intermission when she got to tear into that King Size Snickers that was burning a hole in her purse. I had to beg to even get a tiny bite! But, it's probably better that way, I had way too much candy over the weekend with Halloween and all (don't worry, I'll show you our awesome costumes later this week).

Later that night we had to put the spotlight on you to test something we'd read in one of the baby books. Apparently at week 22, although your eyes are fused shut and it's incredibly dark in the womb, you can still see some light-- and will react to it as well!

So, I warmed up the end of the Maglight, clicked it on and placed it on your Mom's belly.

Once we found you with the light, it almost felt like you were trying to punch it out! After a few kicks, though, you WHOOSHED to the other side of the belly. Your Mom giggled when you moved to the other side...it must have tickled.

I turned the flashlight off and was about to put it away, but then Holly took it from me. She wanted to feel you kick and move some more! So, the light went back on and you kicked and punched a few more times.

Eventually, though, we think you either found a good hiding spot or just decided to fall asleep in the light beam.

How many people get to say they shared the spotlight with Shakespeare?