Firequest

Last night APD experienced Firequest - a graduation / coming of age ceremony through the Wilderness School he attends. He stayed up most of the night alone in the woods tending a fire that was originally started with a bow-drill. How cool is that? He's so tired now, it's 3PM and he's still asleep. In fact, I better go wake him up, or he'll never sleep tonight!

Meeting Jane Goodall - March 2007

Part 2 of my "Cool Stuff Happens" series. RMD did a biography book report on Jane Goodall in 3rd grade. I figured RMD would like Jane and I was right. After her report was completed she told me that one of her life goals was to meet Jane Goodall. So of course I got on the web to do a search on Jane and what do you know - Jane Goodall was speaking at a presentation at Washington State University 3 weeks after that search! We were so excited - we immediately made plans to go and see her. RMD's teacher did not mind at all that she would miss 2 days of school, and the school librarian actually gave us the library copy of a Jane Goodall book and asked if we could get it signed! We drove 5 hours to Pullman, WA and lined up at the Coliseum early - there were no advance tickets and we did not want to miss Jane because all the seats were taken. Jane's talk was mainly about her then new book "Harvest for Hope". As I had read it prior to going to see Jane, her talk was particularly fascinating to me. After we saw her speak, we lined up to have the books we purchased prior to the talk signed. The line was VERY long, and it was about 10PM. We were resigned to stay, though - this was a once in a lifetime chance. We were even having fun in line - having met the mom and daughter right behind us. This little girl had also done a report on Jane Goodall and even brought it to be signed by Jane. While we were chatting with them, an usher came around, looked at RMD and grabbed her out of line. Apparently, he was looking for really little kids to get them to the front of the line so they could get to bed! Because RMD is so short he grabbed her too. Well, we grabbed our new friends and whizzed off to the very front of the 2 hour line! Jane signed our books as well as the library book for the school. She signed our friend's book report too. I was able to snap a few blurry pictures, but it was so worth it! Afterwards we went to have dessert at Denny's with our new friends and then we hit the hay at the Holiday Inn (which, by the way, was where Jane stayed as well!) What a COOL adventure! And, I now check Jane's website every once in awhile. I'd love to see her again!

Oh, and guess what? Jane Goodall was homeschooled!

Cooking up some science

In February, 2008 Rachel was really into cooking. She loved making omelets for me (she doesn't like to eat them). One day she found an egg that just wouldn't crack. How cool is this?!! I had never seen a raw egg peeled before this day. We ended up hard boiling it.

American IDOL Concert 2007

Every once in awhile, really cool things happen to us. Here's one that I have wanted to scrapbook, but since I am 3 or more years behind, I've decided to blog it instead. After watching the American IDOL season for the first time in 2007, the kids really wanted to go to the IDOL concert. Hearing that tickets can sell out in the first few hours, I went online when sales opened and purchased what were supposed to be "best available" seats for the July concert in Tacoma. Well, once we got to the Tacoma Dome, we found out we had really lousy seats. Off to the right of the stage and on the 2nd level. We couldn't see very well and the accoustics were terrible. But, it was still alot of fun and we were happy to be there. At intermission Pat went down and ended up talking to an usher who mentioned that if we happened to move into some of the empty center bleacher-type seats, nobody would really notice.... So we moved! Our new seats for the 2nd half of the concert were great. After the concert ended, we headed back down to the floor to exit, when I noticed that my brand new, pink Razor cell phone was missing! We figured I had dropped it by our old seats so Pat headed back up there to look. While we were waiting for him, a woman came up to us, asked how many people we had in our group, then asked if we wanted 3 back stage passes and practically dropped them in our hands and left before I could even thank her! While this was going on, Alex had headed back up to our new seats to look for my phone, and actually found it! We used it to call Pat to come back down and then we headed to the back stage entrance with our 3 passes. Once we got to the entrance, the usher wanted to see our passes and questioned the fact that we had 4 people and 3 passes. We started to try and negotiate a little girl (Rachel!) coming through with no pass, when the usher just waved us through! (Otherwise, Pat was willing to sit out, while the 3 of us went in.) It was amazing! The kids were able to meet and get their pictures with every Idol except Haley, who left early. Rachel had her program book autographed and Alex had his shirt signed! The highlight for both kids was meeting Blake. (Although he was swarmed - since he is from Bothell, WA). What a cool experience!

Lesson of a Lifetime!

Alex first met David in 2006

Today Alex had the best piano lesson ever. He had a 1 hour private lesson with Grammy Award nominated artist David Lanz! Alex has been playing music composed by David Lanz for several years. (Behind the Waterfall - grandma's favorite!, Cristofori's Dream, A Path With Heart). He's also met David at several concerts and special workshops given by our old piano teacher. David rarely does private lessons, though, so it was quite an honor to be given a personal lesson, right in David's home! Alex played his two current compositions and was given tips by David for some improvements. He told David that he wants to incorporate Jazz into his compositions, so they worked on that as well. David also gave him tips for relaxing during performances. One of my favorite parts was when David said Alex has a gift for music and that he should always strive to use his gift to make the world a better place.

Alex's task for the next few months is to work on compositions and techniques, so that we can arrange a second lesson with David. Amazing!

Here's a video of Alex's second workshop with David Lanz - last year.