After the Break, we noticed many new items in our room.
Evan entered the room, saw a new puzzle, and said, "I want to do this!" He sat down and completed the puzzle without any assistance. Then he went to the Art Table to investigate the supplies. Caleb sat there, too.
"Morah India," Caleb said, "Can you write my mom's name on my paper?" As Morah India writes it, we tell him how to spell it: L-I-S-A. Yannai then arrives at the Art Table and begins to work with the group.
Sammy also sits at Art table. She creates a three-dimensional structure with toilet paper rolls taped to a piece of paper. The Morahs think it's the first time Sammy's made something like this in class. Annabelle tries out the new plastic stencil, and immediately she's successful with making designs.
Lily sat at the table with our new porcelain ceramic tea set. The Kitah Gimmel children had painted the set during Winter Camp. Anslee and Sammy join in, too; there's always room for more. Lily called out, "We're having a tea party! Hey, this is a mango. I'm pretending this is a mango!"
Later, Lily and Maddy went to investigate the new wooden dollhouse. Our new Kitah Gimmel girl, Natalie, joined them. Earlier, Caleb and Evan had warmly welcomed Natalie, giving her a tour of our room. Now she joins the group at the dollhouse. There's room for three at this table. With three children working together, there's plenty of good conversation--and plenty of room to move around the pieces to dramatize a good story.
"Can I do this?" Natalie asks the Morahs.
"Sure," we tell her, "You can use the spoons or forks in it."
"I don't want the spoons or forks," Natalie tells us.
We tell her, "That's okay, feel free to use your hands." And she does--it's messy, but fun.
Annabelle gets involved with the goop, too. "What's this?" she asks. "Goop," we tell her, "with some rocks in it." Morah Susan reminds Annabelle about the tiger-eye rocks that they played with during their home visit in August. "These are also rocks, but different than the tiger-eyes."
Becker sits at the table with Natalie. He's working with two small glass bowls, some colored liquid and a pipette. "Look, I got it to the top!" Earlier, he had practiced squeezing the pipette to transfer the liquid from one bowl to the other. It wasn't all that easy filling up that little bulb at the top of the pipette. Now, Becker does it like a pro.
Morah Donna then arrived. She was delivering mail to our room! Several weeks ago, Anslee had mailed us a postcard from her trip to South Africa. Finally, the card is here. We look at the pictures on the card. Caleb wonders if that's a tiger on the card. Evan asks, "Where's the cheetah?" Sammy asks Anslee, "Did you see any monkeys?" Anslee tells us that her mommy had colored the little drawing of the airplane on the back of the postcard.
Lily and Anslee head off to the Painters' Porch. Lily paints a flower, a sun and a park. The Morah labels her picture with the words, and Lily calls out: "F-F-F-Flower!" Later, she tells us, "I made green! I mixed blue and yellow together!"
Anslee drops her brush by mistake. It falls to the floor and makes quite a puddle. What can we do? Anslee fetches two paper towels--she doesn't need the Morah to help! Natalie comes along. She also wants to paint. The Morah asks, "Natalie, do you need Anslee to stand here for a minute while you get settled, to make sure you don't stand in the paint puddle by mistake?" "No," Natalie tells us, "I'll be fine, I'll be careful."
It was an easy-going morning. Some of our friends hadn't come back from vacation yet, and we miss them. Ezra comes back the following day, telling us about his trip to Disney World. Yinon went skiing, and he saw the President in Washington, D.C.! Annika wasn't feeling well, so she was home.
Annabelle is the Bikur Cholim helper this week. She reminds the Morah, "Call Annika!" We do, but she's sleeping. We leave a message for her, we sing our Get Well Quick song:
Refuah Shelemah, Refuah Shelemah,
Get well, quick--don't be sick,
Refuah Shelemah, Refuah Shelemah,
Get well, quick--don't be sick.
At the end of the day, Evan asks if we can do the Maccabee March, Everyone Can be a Maccabee. This, along with Drey, Little Dreidel, were favorite movement activities during Chanukah. It's no longer Chanukah, but Evan has asked so sweetly, we can't help but agree. So we stand, Evan takes the lead, and we do the Maccabee March.
We're happy to be back!
Morah Susan, Morah India and the Kitah Gimmel Yeledim
so sweet - thanks for painting the picture of their days
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