Happy New Year and some writing stuff

Starting anything new makes my stomach twist like wringing out a wet rag.  It’s an uncomfortable sensation, but also oddly satisfying.  I feel this way with any new endeavor, and the stronger the wringing sensation, the more I know I’m getting into something good.
I committed to posting on my blog at least once a week for the entirety of 2016, but I felt like I needed a boot camp of sorts, so I joined Think Kit—a group of bloggers that wanted to flex their blogging muscles. Each day this January, Think Kit will provide a writing prompt for the group to use to get the creative juices flowing.  I will post each day here using the prompt (or one of the “lifeline” alternative prompts.) This is exciting and a little scary—so I must be doing something right!  Geronimo!
Today’s prompt is:

First Line

Pretend you're writing your autobiography. Give us your first line, a first chapter, or even just an image. What's the story of you?
Socks.  I think about them quite a bit, because I absolutely must change my socks three or four times a day. I carry clean socks in my gym bag (naturally) but also in my purse, in the console of my car, and even in my coat pockets. I don’t consider myself an obsessive-compulsive personality. In fact, I’m pretty fast and loose with housecleaning and hairstyles and noise and just about everything else, but in order to feel right with the world, I must be wearing clean, dry, comfortable socks.

This post is part of Think Kit by SmallBox.

Never stop learning, even on “spring break!”

My three oldest kids sing with Cantus Youth Choirs, a phenomenal community choir that serves the Treasure Valley of Idaho, and this year, they got to go on tour to Anaheim, California. The Cantus tours are always a blast and this one was no exception.  Julio tagged along with the kids on a couple of them before and since this year’s tour included Disneyland, we decided we’d ALL tag along and turn it into a family vacation.

We packed up and left a few days ahead of the Cantus tour buses, so we could squeeze in some extra time in California and see some friends and family.  We threw the kids in the mini-van and drove to Anaheim in a single day. Yes, we are insane.

Prior to the trip, Julio had told me about a TED talk by Navi Radjou about the concept of jugaad—a Hindi word for creative problem solving within extreme limitations, and how the corporate world in the West can benefit from this principle of doing more and creative things with less. After watching the talk myself, I really wanted to buy Mr. Radjou’s book.  It arrived the day before we left, so I brought it along and read it aloud to Julio as we went.  It’s funny how when something is on your mind, you find it everywhere. 

As we were reading this book, we had a couple of opportunities to come up with some jugaad of our own—first, the sun was glaring down into the car, making Neenie very hot and uncomfortable. We used a blanket pinched between the car head rests (and later, a different blanket pinched between the windows and doors) to make a sunshade. Jugaad!

Then, the rubber gasket for the windshield came loose on the driver’s side and started flapping.  Julio tried first to fix it with electrical tape, but the tape was no match for flying down the freeway.  Since we were in the middle of nowhere, Julio had to roll down the window and hold the windshield in place until we could find somewhere to stop and fix the stupid thing.  Since it was coming onto evening and we were only halfway to California, Julio stopped in at a truck stop and bought some yellow duct tape. It held!  Jugaad!

 

Our first couple of days in California involved a trip to the beach and a day at Knott’s Berry Farm.  The kids and I had never been and Julio had told us it was full of roller coasters, but I wondered how much fun it would be for the little kids because they were too small for most of the rides.  I was kind of grumpy about going at first, because I was afraid I’d get stuck having to sit with the little ones all the time while Julio and the big kids got to go have fun on all the crazy rides. I’m so immature and selfish, I know. But, of course, Julio had already scouted the place and made sure we did a lot of swapping kid duties—and it turns out KBF has some fun rides for the smaller set, too. So everyone got their roller coaster fix!

We expected the place to be packed, as it is “spring break season” but the crowds were thin—enabling us to go on our favorite roller coasters again and again.

This was Neenie’s first time at the beach.

The kids had a ton of fun splashing around and playing in the sand. We brought most of the sand from this beach home in our clothes.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…*

I love my little punks. They have just (re)discovered the literary drollery of Lemony Snicket’s  A Series of Unfortunate Events. Calvin has even taken to reading it aloud to his siblings in his best Tim Curry impersonation. This makes story time SO much more interesting. The series follows the misadventures of the kind, pleasant looking, wealthy, but terribly unlucky Baudelaire orphans and their evil uncle, Count Olaf, who tries to steal their fortune. It’s absurd and witty, and in my case, beverage-snorting funny.

It always amazes me how quickly and deeply we are affected by what we read—thanks to ASoUE, we have acquired a corn snake, which we named Montgomery Montgomery, after the Baudelaire’s Uncle Monty in “The Reptile Room.”

Monty is the most low maintenance critter in our entire household and for this, I love him. He eats once a week. Granted, he eats a mouse that has to be defrosted and warmed to room temperature, then wiggled in front of him so he knows it’s feeding time, but that’s why I had children—to make them do such repugnant tasks.

Thanks also to “The Reptile Room,” there has been a resurgence of Dinovember. I admit, during the ACTUAL Dinovember, I had more fun than the kids staging the dinosaurs’ escapades, but now the kids are into it---and well---the dinos are getting into some pretty shady dealings:

These are not the sauropods you’re looking for.

 

The dinos’ illegal casino was shut down within hours of opening.

 

The dinos attempt to rehabilitate through education.

 

After a few days of dinosaur mayhem, we decided to make a trip to the Boise Aquarium, to see—more reptiles? There are a surprising number of them at the aquarium.

We also managed to crash a preschool field trip---inadvertently disrupting a puppet show about fish and sharks while oohing and ahhing over real, live fish and sharks.  Oops. 

After a couple hours at the aquarium, I was starting to crave sushi, but the kids vetoed that idea, so we settled on burgers and fries at Red Robin, which is probably my favorite place to not have to cook. Because BOTTOMLESS FRIES.

Our server wanted to know what was up with the Viking helmet. When Blythe explained that it was Thursday, the poor guy just didn’t seem to understand. Everyone knows that Thursdays are Viking Days. Unless it’s Wednesday, which is also Viking Day. As is every other Saturday, unless Blythe forgets, in which case, both Sunday and Monday are Viking Days.

A highlight of each homeschooling week is the library’s “Fun with Science” class. I have no idea what goes on during these events—because when I go to the library, everything around me drops away except for the shelves and shelves and shelves of glorious books. The kids must fend for themselves. Fortunately, they are cute and have mastered that inquisitive, hopeful puppy dog look that librarians can’t resist, no matter how obnoxious the kids are.  LIFE SKILLZ.

The kids tell me the theme for the class was “All About Air.” They made bubble sculptures.

Has anyone figured out how to make square bubbles?

Who knew that Lemony Snicket books could inspire such a week of learning and fun?

*The title for this post was inspired by the following quote from ASoUE Book 2: The Reptile Room:

“It is now necessary for me to use the rather hackneyed phrase "meanwhile, back at the ranch." The word "hackneyed" here means "used by so many writers that by the time Lemony Snicket uses it, it is a tiresome cliche." "Meanwhile, back at the ranch" is a phrase used to link what is going on in one part of the story to what is going on in another part of the story, and it has nothing to do with cows or horses or with any people who work in rural areas where ranches are, or even with ranch dressing, which is creamy and put on salads.”

Plan with Rigidity, Execute with Flexibility?

A few months ago, my husband had the opportunity to serve at the Boise LDS temple re-dedication.  He was part of the Spanish translation team for the broadcast of the re-dedicatory services.  He spent all three services (or sessions, as they’re known in Mormon-ese) in the basement of the temple, in a small utility room, the only place where the microphone wouldn’t pick up extraneous noises from the broadcast equipment and crew, who were also set up in the basement. Between translating at each session, my hubby got to chat with the security personnel who were charged with keeping things running smoothly.

The LDS prophet, President Thomas Spencer Monson, was at the temple that day and my hubby got to speak with the director of the prophet’s personal security detail.   President Monson’s frequent travels take him all over the world, and apparently, he creates quite a stir wherever he goes--stopping spontaneously en route, to visit at hospitals, homes of members, or to just greet interested passersby.  This behavior requires “on the fly” changes in security plans.

The director commented to my husband that, “We have learned to plan with rigidity and execute with flexibility.”

I have been thinking about that a lot lately.  I started out this school year with high ideals and intricate plans—and they have largely fallen by the wayside (again.)  It’s hard not to beat myself up about this—but I think I (and many others) underestimate just how much “life” happens to throw off the best laid homeschool academic plans.  When I first noticed this, I thought I just needed to plan better, be more rigid, demand more out of every minute: HERE IS MY PLAN AND BY GOLLY, WE WILL STICK WITH IT!
But it never works.  Ever.  So I keep trying, and keep getting frustrated when things go awry.



Because I’m a slow learner, I recently bought myself The Ultimate Homeschool Planner from Apologia.  It sounded awesome, and I loved its set up. “Use me,” it seemed to say, “and all your scheduling and planning issues will be solved! With me, you will reach your goals, your children will be studious and focused, you’ll have a clean house, and maybe even lose ten pounds!”

I thought for days how I was going to organize our hours, days, weeks, and months using this planner.  I spent several hours last week working up THIS week’s schedule for my two older kids.  I sat down with them and went over the plan.  I even made a meal plan for the entire week.  I was pumped, the kids were pumped.  We had a PLAN! We were going to ROCK next week!

Ahem.

Nothing has gone according to plan.  NO-THING.  The night before this awesome plan was going to work it’s magic, the dishwasher broke and flooded the kitchen from UNDER the wood floors.  The sub-flooring was soaked, the wood floor was warped, and there was water under the house.  Oh, and I had two days’ worth of dirty dishes that weren’t getting done.  The water had to be shut off, along with the electricity in the kitchen so we could fix the dishwasher.  We had no kitchen, and no water for 24 hours.  And then, when the water was turned back on, it came in one temperature: scalding. (I’ve heard of people having no running water, or no hot water---but no cold water????) I couldn’t shower or bathe my kids, or even work on Mount Dishmore because the water was TOO hot,unless we filled up the sink and tub and waited around for an hour or two---which just DIDN’T JIVE with my schedule…


(Keeping it real, folks. Really real. This is what my kitchen looks like when I fall behind on dishes—and don’t have a dishwasher. Or cold water to counterbalance the boiling water from the faucet.)

Okay, so the world’s tiniest violins are playing for me—really, this was just a minor inconvenience in the grand scheme of things, but it THREW my schedule—my PLAN!—out the window on the very first day.  Sigh.

I had also forgotten to include in my plan the fact that we had dentist appointments and a book club meeting on the first day.  AND, I didn’t account for a last minute change in schedule to my kids’ piano lessons.  My eight year old missed her dance class. Oh, and I misplaced the meal plan, which included my grocery list.

I was in the depths of despair until the mailman arrived with a package from my best friend from childhood, full of paper for school and art projects AND three notebooks we wrote back and forth in throughout the ninth grade.



The note enclosed said: “I included some ‘historical texts’ you might enjoy!” (Thanks, Cathi! I love you!)

So, all was not lost—I may not have had the perfect “DAY ONE OF THE NEW REGIME” but this made up for it!  I was ready to attack the rest of the week (oh, and my dishwasher and water issues were resolved that evening—a definite morale boost!) We also took the kids to Chuck E. Cheese so I didn’t have to cook and the kids could eat pizza, slurp soda, and generally run amok.

Day 2 was spent partying and dancing the Samba at our homeschool co-op (which was ON THE PLANNER! Woohoo!), resurrecting the house, and catching up on dishes and laundry. And showers.

However…

It is now Day 3 of my grand weekly plan---and while I tried to start the day with optimism and a degree of grace, I have already yelled at my six year old for not doing his language arts worksheet, threatened to turn a timer on for the big kids who are dilly-dallying instead of working on math, and abandoned school for the 8 year old entirely for the day. I let the kids eat Girl Scout cookies for lunch. And the baby is careening around the house in nothing but a diaper, a runny nose, and two stuffed unicorns under her arm, shouting “Twilight Sparkle! Twilight Sparkle! Twilight Sparkle!”



Okay, that IS pretty cute.

But back to today. The lesson in all of this, I suppose, is that while I managed to plan with rigidity, I also tried to execute with rigidity.  This has merely resulted in a stress headache. And an alarming lack of Thin Mints.

My day—MY LIFE—seems to go better when I PLAN with flexibility.  I have often been told by my Type A husband and friends that I fly by the seat of my pants. My lifestyle makes them a little crazy. Even my religion touts order as the ideal. And I admire that, I do.  I aspire to it.  But, maybe my sense of order---as disordered as it feels to others, is still order. It works for me, until I start looking around at how other people are ordering their lives and I think, “Hmm. They seem so put together, maybe I should try a different method!”  It’s comparison, of course, which doesn’t do anyone any good—unless perhaps one is shopping for a new dishwasher.

The truth is, I’m pretty put together when I do things my way. My way takes a lot of big swoops and nosedives. I sort of catapult through life.  To mix metaphors: I’ll never be accused of missing the forest for the trees.  My house is cleaner, my kids and I are happier, we get more accomplished, when I’m NOT trying to adhere to a rigid, intricate plan.  If I make a rigid plan, I feel the pressure to execute it in the same manner.  And no matter how many times I tell myself “execute flexibly” it just doesn’t happen, because I’ve set up the expectations with my “plan with rigidity” mindset.

So, again, I’m going back to flying by my seat. Over the forest. The view is great up here!

Meridian ATA Martial Arts: A Love Story in Fits, Starts, and Parts

I am sure my instructors and classmates would cringe at the title of this post, but folks---this IS a love story.  I write it here on my homeschool blog, because if it weren’t for my Meridian ATA family, I wouldn’t be where or who I am today. This post is my start.

Once upon a time (five or six-ish years ago) I was a stressed, out of control, insecure, crappy mom to four young kids. I can’t even explain how lousy and negative I was.  I yelled all the time, I was scared all the time, I reacted to everything in a temper. I felt paralyzed at the prospect of making simple decisions about anything. Everything freaked me out and I was totally overwhelmed and struggling to mentally and emotionally to “keep my head above water.” I could fake it for awhile, but inside, I was not awesome.

During this time, my son Calvin was in kindergarten and was struggling.  Academically, the kid was off-the-charts-smart, but he was having a hard time finding a place to fit in at school and at home. One day, he came home with a flyer advertising “Karate for Kids” and I thought we’d give it a go.  I remember my brothers’ involvement in martial arts when they were kids and how confident and focused it had made them.  I enrolled Calvin in a six week introductory class.

Calvin at his first rank test.

 

I was blown away by the awesomeness that is Meridian ATA Martial Arts.  Calvin’s instructor, Mrs. Heather Neitzell, was (IS!) amazing. It was as fun to watch her in class as it was to watch my kid.  Calvin thrived under her instruction. Mrs. Neitzell was everything I was not: positive, consistent, calm, encouraging, and kind.  I found myself taking mental notes about how to handle kids while watching Mrs. Neitzell teach Calvin’s class.  Calvin gained so much confidence and I was so impressed with Mrs. N that I decided to sign my two girls up for her class as well.  And then, in the hopes that some of Mrs. N’s awesomeness would rub off on me, I enrolled in the evening adult tae kwon do class that she taught with her husband, Mr. Jim Neitzell.

I was a squidgy ball of nerves at my first class.  I was overweight, hadn’t really exercised in years, and had just donned a white uniform that was cut for someone broad of shoulder and narrow of ass, not the other way around, like me. And the fabric had no give. I felt like an idiot. An idiot with a wedgie. 

Despite my wardrobe issues, I stepped onto the mat and was greeted by Mrs. N and a couple of teen male instructors who reminded me of Power Rangers, only without the dorky helmets. I thought I would die, and I was sure the instructors would burst out laughing at my doughy vastness.  But the instructors were encouraging and positive as I bumbled my way through the warm up and learned a bit of the first form of Songahm tae kwon do.  At the end of class, Mrs. N tied on my white belt while I was coached to holler “I want to be a black belt!” I left the first class feeling giddy.  I had survived. No one had laughed at me, and people were actually telling me they looked forward to seeing me at the next class. Maybe I could actually do this!

Here’s me in my uniform. I just passed my first rank test. I still had a wedgie.

The next three or so weeks of classes went the same—I started out terrified and feeling like a doofus, was patiently and enthusiastically taught basic techniques, and left the class feeling like a million bucks. I worked with many different instructors, of all ages and from various walks of life.  That was thrilling, and humbling, too.  Each of them were happy to tell me how they themselves got into tae kwon do, what it had done for them, their successes and failures, and lessons learned.

A note here about me: I grew up fairly active, if not particularly athletic. I ran a seven minute mile in high school, I took strength training and fitness classes in college. But after I started having babies, I became sedentary and put on weight. Taking up tae kwon do challenged my body in ways I never anticipated. It actually frightened me, discovering what my body could do, and seeing power and strength in my strikes and kicks. I cracked and broke boards. My newly discovered body also cracked open other things, too.

One day in class, I was working with a young male instructor. He was a nice guy, an excellent instructor, but I was intimidated by him. It had nothing to do with him personally. But he resembled a person from an ugly part of my younger life.  At that point in my tae kwon do classes, I hadn’t yet learned to speak up when I was uncomfortable with something---and I tried to manage my unease by reminding myself that my past was my past and it was over.

We were working on a kick drill I found particularly taxing—I was already uncomfortable working with this instructor and I was wearing down and stressing out. In an effort to keep me going, he lunged toward me—and I panicked.  I started kicking at him and screaming and crying all at the same time.  I was desperately out of control.  Fortunately, Mr. Neitzell was nearby and managed somehow to maneuver me to a bench to recover.  I was a wreck, and I was horrified by my behavior. I had caused a scene, disrupted class, and was screaming like a crazy person.  Mr. N sat down by me and tried to talk me down.  I don’t remember his words, but I do recall he reached out to reassure me, to pat my shoulder, or something---and still panicky, I snarled at him to leave me alone. Mr. N immediately backed off. (Understandably.  I’m sure he didn’t want me to go all bat-s#&* again.) What struck me, even as I was not in a good place, was that Mr. N respected me and gave me space to get myself together.  He didn’t get in my face or continue to try to touch me or talk. He didn’t hover over me. He got up and walked away.  Maybe I scared him. (I’d certainly scared myself.) Maybe he went to grab the phone to call the loony bin.  I don’t know.  But I felt very grateful that he had LISTENED to me when I told him to leave me alone. I wish I could express what that meant to me. Because he listened, I knew I could trust him.

Of course, when I had recovered from my horrible display, I was mortified. I went and hid in the restroom because I was closer to it than the exit.  I could never show my face in class again.  Everyone had seen me and everyone had heard me.  I was a freaking nut job.  I couldn’t face my instructors or Mrs. N or Mr. N or anyone---I decided I’d leave and never, never come back.  I was trying to figure out how I was going to get out of the building without anyone seeing me (an impossibility given that the restroom was on the far end from the building’s exit) when a young female instructor walked into the restroom.  Her name is Ms. Lisa Strader.  With genuine concern, she asked if I was okay.  I told her I was horribly embarrassed and apologized for my actions and told her I wouldn’t be coming back. This young lady, all of 17 years old, hugged me and spoke words that I have never forgotten, and absolutely clung to in hard times.  She looked me in the eye and said: “It’s going to be okay. We’re a family and you’re safe with us.”

There.  Now you have my start (and a fit) in Meridian ATA Martial Arts. I’ve come a long way.  These people, my ATA family, have been so patient with me.  So loving. So encouraging. I’ll post more of their awesomeness soon, because this story is only beginning.

Almost Alice

I love Alice in Wonderland.  I was fascinated and a little horrified by the Disney film as a child.  I had to write a report on Lewis Carroll in college and I was so intrigued by the Alice books, even though they didn’t make much sense to me until I picked up The Annotated Alice.  Ever since then, I’ve been a little obsessed with the zaniness of Wonderland…and it shows in my penchant for garish colors, flamingoes, and Tim Burton films.

But—that aside, I’ve been bored and a little burnt out since Christmas came and went.  I need a party. I need some kookiness to stave off the blahs.  Since Harry Potter month was such a huge hit with the kids back in October, I’ve decided to do an Alice month in May. 
I’m already gathering stuff to decorate the house and for various activities.  Oh, and prepping myself.  Since there’s a bit of chess in the Alice books, I thought it was about time I learned how to play. This is significant, because I have always avoided chess because it scared me. Only the math nerds in school played chess.  And even though I was a nerd, I was not a MATH nerd. 

My kids enjoy chess, which is great, but I have no idea how they even learned—but they can hold their own against other people who know how to play.  Calvin once tried to teach me but I got frustrated, and howled like a five year old when I lost. “I HATE THIS GAME, I’M NOT PLAYING ANYMORE!”  I may or may not have shoved the table, causing the board and pieces to fly every which way. 
This time around, Calvin has provided a cheat sheet for me, which has been more helpful than any of the chess books (for kids or adults) I’ve ever read.  I know there’s a vast deal more to the game than this:

But, hey---baby steps, right? I’m still learning not to call the knight the “horse.”
Back to our Alice in Wonderland month---I’m trying to come up with ideas to implement—maybe one activity or recipe a day—with a big Mad Hatter/Unbirthday/Red Queen Tea Party at the end, complete with costumes, herbal tea, and flamingo croquet. Here are my ideas so far:
1.Make a giant chess set  (made out of soda and water bottles—we’re saving them already!)

2. Poem memorization and art work. What DOES a Jabberwocky look like, anyway?
Oh. THAT’S what it looks like.  Ew.  Cool!
3. Riddles. My kids love riddles—and the classic “Why is a raven like a writing desk?” is only the beginning…
4. Botany—I always loved the scene in the Disney movie where the flowers sing—and since we’ll be coming up on springtime and planting time, I figure it’ll give me an excuse to splurge on some fun annuals like snap dragons, pansies, and zinnias.

Oh, and I just found this picture---I think I love it.  Cute, and slightly creepy. Zombie flowers, hahahahaha! (Okay, I am having WAY, WAY too much fun with this!)

5. Flamingo Croquet—I got the idea from Pinterest—we’ll see how it goes!

I saw another one of these sets that had pink feathers glued onto the handles.  Hmmm….how into this do I want to get?  (VERY!)
6. a little kitchen chemistry for the “eat me” and “drink me” goodies that Alice consumes.
7. lock picking.  Seriously.  Gotta get through those little doors (and learn a valuable skill to avoid getting locked out of the house or car---or start up your own robbery operation!)
8. Cake decorating.  Why not? Who doesn’t love an excuse to play with cake and sugar?

9. Movie nights---there are several Alice films---it would be great to watch them and compare and contrast---also, a little film history can be thrown in!
10. Read the Alice books, or excerpts of them, anyway.  They are a bit hard to follow because they were written over a century ago for a very specific audience---so the inside jokes would be largely over the heads of the kids (we’ll supplement with The Annotated Alice)
11. Learn about Lewis Carroll and the Victorian era, including the British monarchy. 

These are just the ideas off the top of my head.  I need to keep reading to see what other fun stuff I can dig up.  Stay tuned….

Notes from “Professor McGonagall’s” Journal: Harry Potter Month 2012

My kids and I are avid Harry Potter fans. J. K. Rowling’s series about a downtrodden orphan who discovers he has magical powers is chock full of things a family can learn about or talk about—Greek myths, botany, astronomy, Latin, friendship, integrity, loneliness, overcoming or succumbing to pride, the hero’s journey, hero and villain archetypes, good vs. evil, how to handle handicaps and prejudices, social justice, politics, setting goals, sports, animal biology, and even knitting!  And that’s just the CONTENT of the books.  There are so many things you could pursue in language arts by just looking at how the  books are structured---grammar, formula, literary style, symbolism as a device in literature--I could keep going!
A couple of years ago, I read the Harry Potter series to my oldest two kids and they fell in love with the series as much as I did. We were feeling a little burnt out in school and decided to shake things up a bit with a Harry Potter Week, wherein we would turn our house into Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and incorporate some Harry Potter themed activities into our days. We started small (really small) and renamed our classes and chores:
World History became Muggle Studies
Math became Ancient Runes
Gardening became Herbology
Taking care of pets became Care of Magical Creatures
Cooking became Transfiguration
and so on. 
We decorated the house.  We turned the TV into the Mirror of Erised and hung paper stars from blue yarn in the kitchen to create the ceiling of the Great Hall.  The kids had a few stuffed toy owls, so we perched them on top of the piano and called it The Owlery.  It was fun, and silly, and the kids wanted to do more—after that first Harry Potter Week, we decided that next time, we’d do a Harry Potter Month—full of Harry Potter themed activities and foods and décor!   October seemed to be a good time to do this, what with Halloween and all it’s attendant costuming and decorations.
We haven’t yet managed to make it a full month, because we’re still figuring things out and I’m trying to decide how much Harry Potter we can actually handle and still accomplish schoolwork and the rest of real life, but we’re getting there.  This year was the grandest of Harry Potter Months so far, and we anticipate next year being bigger (and more organized!) and even more fun.
Here’s a sampling of what we did this year (and my thoughts for next year, so I don’t FORGET!)

This year, the kids wanted to dress up. I rifled through the Halloween costume racks at thrift stores in search of things to use as the Hogwarts school uniform. I think my favorite finds were the graduation gown  that Gloria is wearing and the black “crushed velvet” robe that Ellen is wearing.  I had the kids put on white dress shirts and dark pants, and put the “robes” over top.  One of these days, I’ll get ties in the appropriate “house” colors.  Ellen and I originally intended to crochet scarves and hats, but both times we tried that, it just didn’t work out.  I anticipate Harry Potter Month becoming a longstanding tradition—so I’ll probably just break down and buy suitable items rather than make them.


We surprised the kids with “official” Hogwarts acceptance letters.  I found a Hogwarts School Crest online and we copied it.  Then, I typed up Harry’s acceptance letter, including his school supply list, and addressed one to each of the kids.  Notice it’s in green ink—just like in the first book!  The letters were then delivered by "owls” made from helium balloons.  (Thank you, Pinterest, for the idea!) I bought the balloons at the local party supply store, and used sharpies to create a Snowy Owl, Barn Owls, and a Great Horned Owl.




I am ridiculously pleased by the Snowy Owl (and the girl holding it!)
I also made House “hour glasses” that we filled with glass “gems” when the kids did something to merit praise or a reward. The idea was to fill the hour glass to the top with the gems and the first student with a filled jar got a prize.  Unfortunately, I didn’t get any photos of this project—but we used standard size quart jars for the “hour glasses” and I bought colored glass gems from the craft store—red for Gryffindor House, green for Slytherin, blue for Ravenclaw, and Gold for Hufflepuff.  (Hufflepuff really should have been yellow, or even black—but those were ugly—the gold glass was much more striking.)
Last year, we filled the mason jars with colored candies, but it only provided even more of a sugar overload, considering Halloween was around the corner.  We decided this year to go with something we could use over and over again.  I had the jars on hand already and used craft store coupons coupons to get the colored glass. (Love those Michaels and JoAnn’s 40% off coupons!)  Next year I’ll take pictures.
We made wands this year.  I bought a couple of wooden dowels, cut them to size, and spray painted them brown. I had big plans to decorate them with swirls of hot glue and plastic gemstones the way it's done here, but I couldn’t find my stupid glue gun and decided to just press ahead. The kids didn’t care, and in truth, I was relieved I didn’t have to worry about someone’s wand bling falling off if the glue relaxed or got brittle.
A few weeks ago, I was going through a container of my grandma’s old art magazines and discovered that many of them were wildlife magazines with pictures or paintings of different kinds of owls.  I let the kids cut out the owl pictures and paste them onto poster board—this became our Owlery (where Harry and his friends go to post their letters) and we hung it on the wall upstairs over a weird shaped ledge that was perfect for the kids to line up their toy owls on!


Some of our activities this year included:
Making popcorn as part of a “transfiguration class.”  We made it on the stove after reading the book Popcorn by Tomie de Paola.  There is a killer recipe in the back of the book for stovetop popcorn.  My kids have only experienced the microwave and air popper kind—so, making popcorn on the stove was a blast. Literally.  I was pretty liberal in adding the corn to the sizzling pan—and the popping kernels lifted the lid as they popped and sent popcorn flying everywhere.  It was awesome.  Calvin thought it was so funny he couldn’t stop laughing and jumping around.
Holding a Tri-Wizard Tournament.  In the book, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Harry is entered in a competition called the Tri-Wizard Tournament, wherein three wizards/witches are each expected to complete three dangerous tasks.  They are judged on performance (and their success at staying alive!) and the winner receives the Tri-Wizard Cup—a high and historical honor in the “Magical World.”  The tasks include fighting dragons, solving riddles, retrieving lost or stolen items from the depths of an enchanted lake, and navigating a labyrinth full of dangerous creatures.
In our Tri-Wizard Tournament, we made dragons out of air-dry clay, with the intent to paint them once they had cured for a few days. (Unfortunately, the dragons all fell apart, much to the kids’ dismay.  Next year, we’ll have to come up with a better medium—papier mache, maybe?)  I let the kids take turns having a bath in the soaker tub (which we otherwise rarely use), so that was a real treat.  The final task—the labyrinth—was a trip through the corn maze—which we would have normally done at this time of year anyway, but it was fun to add a Harry Potter twist to that tradition.  Fortunately, we didn’t encounter anything more dangerous than shoe-sucking mud.
We spent a couple of evenings outside looking at the stars.  I had every intention of getting hold of a telescope for these nights, but it didn’t happen.  At this point, though, the kids were happy to just get to stay up late with mom and dad, outside.  Earlier in the month, we had gone to a local-ish planetarium and the kids had learned about what constellations are in the sky at this time of the year in our end of the world, so they had fun looking for those.
We made a few Harry Potter-esque treats, too.  I had way more recipes than I had time to try.  I tried a recipe for apple muffins, which I had decided to call Cauldron Cakes, after a confection from the books—but the muffins turned out so badly that we decided not to eat them.  I wanted to make Pumpkin Pasties, which I interpreted to be like an empanada, filled with pumpkin pie filling—but ran out of time.  We substituted Starbucks Pumpkin Scones, which no one seemed to mind!  I have a couple of large stock pots that are wider at the bottom than at the top—one is shaped like almost like a cauldron—I made chili in it one night—and the kids thought it was hilarious.
I had many, many big plans for other activities, but we didn’t get to most of them.  At first, I was feeling frustrated and discouraged that my vision for our Harry Potter month wasn’t coming together exactly as I had hoped—but the kids didn’t even notice. I was basing MY expectations not only on what I’d read in the books, but what I’d seen in the Harry Potter movies.  I wanted to really decorate the place based on what I’d seen in the movies, but I didn’t have the time, and in some cases didn’t have the knowledge of how to do it---so I was frustrated that the place didn’t look (and therefore feel—to me, anyway) more “magical.”  For instance:
In the movie, the sign for the train platform that Harry goes to to take the train to Hogwarts looked like this:


Or at least like this:

I kept meaning to make a sign like one of those, but it was one of those projects that got shunted aside for other things (like laundry) so the kids took over and Calvin made these signs and hung them up:

This was not at all what I had in mind, but Calvin was thrilled at his own handiwork.  Here are the other nearby platform signs he put up.  Notice all destinations are in North America rather than England, where the series takes place:




Seeing Calvin excited about his train platform signs made me realize that I could take a step back and let the kids sort of run the show—they didn’t need everything to be movie-set perfect.  This made me relax a little, because as much fun as Harry Potter Month was, I was starting to stress out about making it “perfect” as I saw it.  I was getting carried away with what my vision for the event was, rather than letting the kids just do their thing.  Once I realized the kids were much happier running on their own imagination than on what I thought they should be doing, things got really fun.
In order for Harry to get to Hogwarts, he had to go to King’s Cross Station in London and walk through a brick wall barrier to the proper train platform to take the train.  The barrier only allowed “magic folk” to pass through—regular people (known as Muggles in the books) couldn’t get through.  We made our own “brick barrier” by hanging a red block-weave shower curtain in the hallway on the way to the garage.  Anytime we needed to take the “train” (our car) to go somewhere, we had to walk through our barrier. 
There were several regular school related things we did that I decided to assign “Harry Potter” names to, so I wouldn’t have to re-invent activities—in our homeschool co-op, we were studying desert ecosystems and made a desert terrarium with cacti and succulent plants.  Prior to doing this activity, I told the kids we were going to have “herbology class.”  They just used their imaginations and started calling the cacti and aloe vera plants by the plant names in the series---Venemous Tentacula, Mandrakes, Gillyweed, etc.  We had a good laugh over it.  They also insisted we purchase a carnivorous plant in honor of the herbology class—I’m such a sucker---I did it.  We are now the proud owners of a baby Pitcher Plant.  I don’t have a terribly green thumb, so we’ll see how it does.  Maybe next year we can try a Venus Fly Trap!
All in all, the kids and I had a lot of fun, and we are already planning for next year.  The kids wanted each day to be entirely devoted to Harry Potter stuff, and while I would LOVE it, that is unrealistic, so I told them perhaps we could do ONE Harry Potter thing a day (some things are merely a matter of re-naming a regular activity, and others will require more planning.)  We ended on a high note this year with the Tri-Wizard Tournament.  And after Halloween, we hit the Halloween clearance at a few stores and picked up some fun things for next year (like a trio of Gargoyles for Hogwarts Castle!)
The kids did some brainstorming for activities for next year.  They are included here:
Harry Potter Month Ideas:

• Acceptance letters (delivered by helium balloon owls)
• Decorate “Hogwarts” with the owlery poster and toys, house color crepe paper streamers, hang stars from the kitchen ceiling, candelabra on the kitchen table, train platform signs and shower curtain “brick barrier”
• Draw Moaning Myrtle on the bathroom mirror with soap (Calvin did it this year, but she was steamed off from of a month of showers before I thought to take a picture!)
• make book covers for school books---with the proper subject titles on each
• have a Potions Class (science experiements with goopy stuff)
• Have a House Sorting Ceremony—get a hat for this!
• Game of Quidditch! (need multiple brooms and hula hoops and balls!)
• Make Honeydukes candies: chocolate and peppermint frogs, butterbeer, etc.
• have a feast in the Great Hall
• Transfiguration Class (make popcorn or popovers or some other recipe where the initial ingredients radically transform!)
• Tri-Wizard Tournament (find different stuff to make dragons…) include going swimming and a trip to the corn maze
• Herbology—make an ivy topiary
• Care of Magical Creatures Class—go to Boo at the Zoo—a great excuse to wear the Harry Potter school uniform costumes!
• “Spell”ing---(which is really just studying Latin roots.)
• Herbology—plant a terrarium
• Have a dance party
• Read favorite passages from the books by the fireplace
• learn to knit or crochet something (can use this as a service project, too!)
• Read some Greek myths
• Play chess