Learning About Diwali

I took Zach, Kate, and Noah into Zoe's classroom this afternoon to watch her presentation on Diwali...India's holiday. Her class has separated into groups to study different countries and how they celebrate Christmas. Zoe hasn't had a lot of homework during this project because she was supposed to be doing a project with her group or on her own. Her project turned out to be me going to Walmart with my mom and picking up dried fruit. I'm surprised Zoe didn't put more effort into the homework part of the project. It will be interesting to see what grade she gets for her homework portion of the project. Anyway, the kids and I sat through 3 presentations, one of them was Zoe's group. It was stressful. Zach was not super quiet like I asked him to be and Kate wandered around. After the first presentation, Mrs. LaLonde encouraged her students to focus on the presentation and not on the little ones. Great, we're a distraction here. When the first group got up front to do their presentation over again because a grandparent had showed up late, I took the kids out into the hall because I just could not sit through another presentation. This turned out to be a bad decision because the kids still needed to be quiet, but weren't, and now they had the hall to run up and down. We then had snacks when the presentation was over, which was also stressful because cups of rice pudding were given to Kate and Zach. I was expecting a huge spill at any moment, but they did very well and only dribbled on themselves. Minor. I was so ready to leave when the kids finished their snacks. The grandparent who arrived late turned out to be a huge help when we left. When he saw me rounding up the kids to leave, he helped Kate with her boots and coat and then he offered to carry her out, which at first Kate looked at him like he was crazy, but then she held her arms out to him. He walked with me to the car and after I got everyone in the car along with myself, I was glad the adventure was over and vowed never to go anywhere again with the kids...until tomorrow morning for a play date, but that's different. An outing like today just makes me appreciate more our lazy winter days at home. After I told my mom about my afternoon, she offered to take the day off next time something comes up at school like that, and I think that's a great idea! Zoe did a great job on her project with her group. Mrs. LaLonde said Zoe's class has done the best work on their projects than any other class. I wonder if she says that every year.
Here is Kate trying to get Zoe's attention before her presentation.

Here is Zoe during her presentation

and here is me letting Kate play with my camera to keep her happy and quiet.

There are 4 more pictures like this, but I won't bore you with them.

On a different note, I stopped by the library on our way home to drop off some books and Mrs. Spooner gave me "The Christmas Sweater" by Glenn Beck to read. I had asked Emeric, who also works at the library, about a month ago if they were planning on getting a copy of Glenn Beck's book, so he wrote the title down. I had forgotten I had asked about it, so it was a pleasant surprise when they brought it up. Matt read it this evening and said it was good. I am currently reading "The Santa Letters" by Stacy Gooch-Anderson, which is very good. I thought it would be my last Christmas book of the season, so I was taking my time reading it, but now I will finish it and read "The Christmas Sweater" in the next week. I read "Christmas Jars" by Jason F. Wright and that is a great book! I highly recommend it. It made me want to start my own Christmas jar for next Christmas.