A Star Is Born

The second weekend of May was a busy time for our budding star, Olivia.


On May 10th, a slightly feverish Olivia had her big school Spring Sing Concert at the High School gym.  The theme this year was Wishes coming true.  She was excited to be in her concert as all the family was there in attendance.  She started not feeling well mid day of school.  A temp of just over 99 degrees crept up by the time the bell rang.  I rushed her home, gave her some Tylenol and had her nap.  She woke refreshed and raring to go.  First she had her last dance class of the year and then it was rush to the high school for the big show.

It was a huge success!  The kids all did awesome.  They also learned the end result of their hard work in a fund raising effort they did to help build a new home for a family in the Phillipines.  The goal was $2000 to make this family's wish come true.  The announcement came on that the children raised over $3000 dollars!

Mia watching her big sister at the concert.

After the concert she was still feeling great, so dad decided to treat everyone to Dairy Queen.  Well, around 3:00 A.M. she came in my room not feeling well and running a fever.  Andy stayed home in the morning and I took the afternoon shift.   She wasn't running a fever in the morning, but I didn't want to chance it.  She had her dance dress rehearsal that evening and the big recital that she's worked for all year the next afternoon.  When I came home at lunch, the old Olivia was back.  Tons of energy, with no sign she'd been under the weather.  We did some running around, then around 2:00 she fell asleep on the sofa.  Part of me thought this wasn't a good sign, but maybe she's just catching up on sleep from being sick.  When she woke up she wanted to take her clothes off because she was hot.  Oh no, you guessed it, her fever was back.

Another round of Tylenol, sitting in what I dubbed as the quarantine section of the auditorium, and we were doing alright.  The theme for the recital was "A Night at the Movies."  All songs were off soundtracks to hit films over the years.  Olivia's tap class did, "I Like to Move It," from Madagascar, a favorite song in our family.

She smiled through the entire number, never looking off stage at the instructors.  She had her routine down pat, and was outstanding!

By the day of the real recital she was feeling great and no signs of fevers were ever seen.  She had a huge number of audience members cheering her on, and received and absurd amount of flower arrangements, seven total if I remember correctly.  We litterally had to go buy more vases after the recital to put all her boquets in.  I joked that our home looked like a florist or funeral home.

 

The weekend, besides the fevers was terrific.  It was Olivia's time to shine, and boy did she ever!

A Mad Scientist Among Us

Olivia loves science.  It's never been my favorite, but she loves it.  So when Congress School announced they were having an optional Science Fair, there was no option for this parent.  She had to develop a hypothesis that she could test.  This proved more difficult than I imagined.  She wanted to test what the most preffered type of dog food was, but I wasn't buying that much dog food and rounding up a dozen or more dogs to test it on.  Then, she wanted to determine which type of light bulbs lasted the longest.  I had to explain that we didn't have that many years.  Finally, with a little prompting from me, she decided she would see what happened when she soaked an egg in vinegar.  Her hypothesis was that the shell would break off.  She didn't think anything had happened at first, until she stuck her finger in the vinegar and touched the rubbery egg.  She was amazed to find the shell disolved in the vinegar.

Posing with her "rubber" egg

Let's see what happens when we shine a flashlight on our egg in the dark.

Look!  It glows!


After the experiment, we had to type everything up, print pictures, put it all on a trifold presention board, and take it to school.  Then Olivia was called in front of the judges and had to explain what she had done, why, and her findings.  All the students were scored on a rubric based on having all the complete information, following the scientific process, oral presentation, and being able to answer questions asked of them.  Olivia was one of only two kindergartners who got all 100 points!  She had so much fun doing the science fair.

For Easter, the Easter Bunny brought Olivia some science experiment kits.  One being a tube you attach to a Diet Coke and slide in the pack of mint Mentos.  Then you pull the pin and watch out!

It sprayed pretty darn high!  The girls had a riot watching the pop spray everywhere.  It even has different tops to screw on top of the tube, to change the way the pop sprays.

Mia running for her life. 

So as much as I have been averse to science all my life, it is now a part of it.  Olivia loves it, and I am thrilled she does.  Mia seems to be following in her footsteps.  She loves most things that her big sister does.