It’s been a long time coming, but Ludi finally took the written driving test and earned a learners’ permit.
Watch out! Ludi’s on the road
Renaud winter performance wrap-up
In early November, Josie made her high school acting debut in the role of “Sissy Clemm,” the teenage bride of Edgar Allen Poe, in the musical “Nevermore.”
She, and all the STEAM High actors, gave a wonderful performance. Poe’s life is pretty depressing, but Josie did a great job of showing Sissy’s lightness and spark. She looked at home on the stage.
A few weeks later, Ludi performed for the final time with Miss Kathey’s Academy in the “Christmas Is…” shows held in Orlando and St. Louis. She’s been part of MKA for seven years, and has grown enormously in her confidence and stage presence each year. It was bittersweet to see her on this stage with these folks for last time, but we’re thankful for she’s been able to have this amazing experience.
Ludi the conductor
Last night Ludi was one of several student conductors at the STEAM High spring concert. It was pretty amazing to see her lead the orchestra, waving the baton.
You can watch and listen here:
Corona chronicles: Violet lemonade
Violets in mason jars
Violets in mason jars
We poured hot water onto the violets, and immediately the water began changing to blue.
This is the final lemonade.
Ludi tells the story:
One of my favorite creations I’ve made so far this year was Violet Lemonade. I first saw it when one of my friends posted about it on social media. It looked really cool and we had all the materials to make it.
To start, I picked enough violets to fill a mason jar. Later I made a violet syrup. Once I mixed the syrup into a pitcher of lemon water, the color changed and it was a pretty purple.
It tasted very good, just like normal lemonade with a hint of… I don’t quite know how to describe it. I almost want to say it had a hint of watery ground pepper.
It was very good, very pretty, and very time-consuming but overall it was very fun to make.
Little Creek camp
Editor’s note: this summer, Ludi attended three different camps at Little Creek Nature Area. She learned survival skills, worked with animals, and all sorts of things. Here are some of her memories:
One day we were canoeing, searching for a certain kind of frogs (I believe it was the American bullfrog). That day Ranger Bob — my favorite ranger — had a fishing hook that looked like a fly. He said it was something bullfrogs were attracted to. We saw several frogs and he put it out in front of them and they would hop around objects and get close to the hook-thing.
We did lots of fun things in the survival camp, like build a fire, learn how to make shelters, and learn what kinds of food we can find in the wild. We went to different areas like the pond, grasslands, and fields. They’d tell us what insects, bugs, mammals we could find, and how to catch/hunt them. I have a notebook full of that stuff so I can carry it with me when we travel.
We learned if you want to cut down a tree, you need to have a sapling to plant in its place.
My favorite day at Little Creek camp was activity day where we played water games, rode bikes, went canoeing, went kayaking, did archery, and made pottery all in the same day. I was really good at canoeing because I had done it before.
When we did archery, the first time I wasn’t so sure I could do it because the bow felt really heavy. The arrows would slip out, so I gave it up the first week. But the second week on the next adventure day, I tried it again. It was the same guy, and he encouraged me to try again with a different bow. It was so much easier. The arrow only slipped out a couple times. When I shot the arrows, one of them was close to a bullseye.
An All-American Christmas
Ludi got her first taste of the theater this year. We enrolled her in a new program at church called “Miss Kathey’s Academy for the Performing Arts.” She spent the last several months learning dances and songs in preparation for a big Christmas production.
No training wheels!
I can report that today Ludi finally learned to ride her bike without training wheels. She is the first of the kids to do it.
I am a very proud dad!
UPDATE (Sept. 20, 2016): I was so proud that I tried making an ANSI art portrait of Ludi. Read about it here
Our great summer: Ferguson swim team
This summer we embarked on a new adventure: Ludi joined the Ferguson Swim Team.
The space explorers meet the Borg
On nights when I am home from work, I tell the kids stories before bed. Because they are divided among two rooms, I usually tell two stories.
The first story is for Josie and Joseph, and usually involves me making up something about the two of them as “space explorers,” visiting new planets or meeting aliens or trying to escape from black holes.
The second story is for Jadzia and Ludi, who prefer to have an improv-style story in which they each pick a character for the story (like “a good dragon” and “a bad lamp”) and I have to make up the rest.
Occasionally, though, the older girls will overhear the younger kids’ story and ask me to repeat it for them. Tonight was one such night.
First dance recital
The girls first dance recital was a major production.