17 May 2015

It's time for the end of the school year activities. We spent 4 nights this week at special presentations, awards nights and a recital.  We started Tuesday with an art show at the elementary school.  Gibson had 2 projects on display.  One was a model of a flower with all the flower parts labeled.

The other was an abstract design. Gib wanted to be sure we saw the yin yang sign he included.

The older grades did engineering exhibits instead of the art show.  Each class worked on a different project.  Helen's class engineered aid projects designed to drop in remote locations following a natural disaster.  Each group in her class built a container with the goal that it could be dropped from a ladder without breaking the bow-tie pasta inside the container.  Their project simulated what would happen if an airplane dropped a much bigger container, with the pasta representing the emergency supplies.  Helen's group filled their container with foam, wrapped it in foam and added a parachute with paper wings.  The pasta in their container did not break.

Wednesday night was Sofi's high school awards dinner.  Sofi made the Principal's List for her excellent GPA.  This is a photo of all the juniors attending the dinner with a GPA of 3.75 or higher.  We've noticed the list gets shorter every year.  By comparison, there were 24 freshmen who made the list this year.  Sofi has known most of these kids since grade school-- they're a super group.

Abe's awards night was Thursday.  Abe got a certificate and a pin for Academic Excellence.  He also received the "Solid as a Rock" trophy.  This award is given to 10 students in each grade who demonstrate respect, responsibility, accountability, integrity, honesty, self-esteem, patriotism, loyalty, work ethic, social responsibility, empathy, self-motivation and self-restraint (seriously, why did the committee limit itself to just 13 character traits?)  When we moved here, our middle school was struggling with low test scores and a poor reputation.  Thanks to a great principal, some fantastic teachers and involved families, they are now the top ranked middle school in our area.  Over a third of the students received at least one award.  They all looked as nice as Abe, too, with ties for the boys and dresses for the girls.

Sofi played in her Spring piano recital on Friday.  Becky stayed home with Gibson, who was sick, so Helen made notes about the songs she liked best to share with Becky after the recital.  Can you guess which was Sofi's? Traumerei by Robert Schumann (not William Schuman as listed on the program.)  Helen gave it 6 smiley faces and 9 exclamation points.  Sofi also played a duet with Joey, Hungarian Dance No. 5 by Johannes Brahams, a fast, fun piece full of fireworks.

Brandan installed a standing desk in his office this weekend.  The desk raises and lowers so he can sit and work if he prefers.  The big red ball under the desk is the exercise ball Brandan uses as a chair.

 Our stake held its Mormon Prom for teenagers on Saturday.  The kids are encouraged to dress formally.  Sofi thought the DJ at the Mormon Prom was much better than the DJ at the high school prom.  Better DJ = better dancing.  Sofi wore her skirt from prom with a Harry Potter t-shirt she made a while ago.

 Our friends, Emily and Aaron, invited us to their gender reveal party Saturday night.  Emily is expecting their 5th child.  They have 1 girl and 3 boys.  At her ultrasound appointment, Emily's technician wrote the baby's gender on a piece of paper and sealed it in an envelope.  Without looking, Emily gave the envelope to the band and asked them to choose an appropriate song to reveal the gender.  The band played great music all night.  Towards the end of the night, Emily gathered everyone together and we waited for the band to give us a clue.  After an extended musical fanfare, the band broke into Van Morrison's "Brown Eyed Girl."  We're excited for Emily and Aaron and delighted they invited us to share their happiness.