Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Rock Star, Roll Star, Baby

This morning Camille and I enjoyed some time by ourselves. Caleb was at school and Rob took Chloe with him to run errands. When I put her hair in a ponytail, she told me she wanted a high ponytail so she could be a rock star. Since she thought she looked like a rock star, she needed to act like one too. She grabbed this toy guitar we have kicking around (the guitar, plus the battery-powered amp and a microphone, came from a yard sale a few weeks ago for $4) and started acting like one. She likes to make up her own songs. This one went something like this:

I'm a rock star, I'm a roll star, baby. Can't take me away. I'm a rock star, I'm a roll star, baby. Can't take me away. I gave her a brief lesson on components of a good song - you need both the chorus and several verses to really make the song work. We spent some additional time writing some lyrics to the song. It's really quite a lovely one.

Without further ado, here is our rock star, roll star, baby!






She was so cute that I had her call my sister and sing to her. Auntie Su told her that she was so good that she should go to NYC and sing with her band. Camille told her that she needed to practice first so she'd be ready!

Playdates

This weekend Caleb had a friend over to play. The kids had a blast. Now we're so ready for summer and the opportunities to spend time with friends during the week.

Picking Flowers

Camille is our resident floral arranger. She is always finding flowers and other foliage in the yard to make pretty bouquets for us to enjoy. Here she is picking flowers with our neighbor.





Tip toeing through the tulips. Or maybe just some clovers.

Who's So Cute?


Saturday, June 13, 2009

India?

This week was very rainy so I got a bunch of movies from the library for the kids to watch. One of the videos was from the Kidz Bop series. I guess I thought my kids (who like to dance) would dance along with the music from the movie. Yeah. Not so much. They enjoyed watching it, but it wasn't the active experience I had anticipated. Anyway, the video had the song lyrics running across the bottom of the screen so Caleb - who can read - could learn the words. One of the songs was that one that goes "I'm coming up so you'd better get the party started." There's a line that says "I'll be your operator - you can call anytime - I'll be your connection to the party line."

Tonight while the kids were eating dinner I was singing that part of the song - which, unfortunately, was the only part of the song that I could remember. Caleb wanted to know what an operator was so I tried to explain about old fashioned telephone systems needing an operator to physically connect the wires to connect the call. I explained that we don't really have operators like that anymore.

Camille: There are operators.
Me: There are?
Camille: Yes. They live in India.
Me: India? How do you know?
Camille: I went there.
Me: You did?
Camille: Yes. With my Nana and Papa. When I went to stay with Nana and Papa we took a really fast train all the way to India and I didn't even have to sit in my car seat!
Me: Really? What was your favorite part? The food?
Camille: No. They didn't feed us any food.
Me: How come?
Camille: They were too busy chasing us.
Me: Who was chasing you?
Camille: The Indians. (*Miming being chased by someone with a bow and arrow*)
Me: Why were they chasing you?
Camille: Because they could tell we weren't Indian.
Me: How could they tell you weren't Indian.
Camille: (*looking at me like I'm absolutely stupid*) Because we weren't wearing Indian clothes.

I just love what Camille comes up with...she says the funniest things. She just about had me in stitches with that first part. "There are operators. They live in India." She just might be right, though it sounds like we need to have some discussion to explain the difference between Indians from India and Indians who are really Native Americans.