Week 3 – Moana Results

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Week 3 went quite smoothly with both virtual school and home school, minus a weird hiccup with google classroom not giving a link to the actual class. The teacher was able to fix it up quite quickly, though, so barely any time was lost. Dragon willingly spoke to the teacher several times during the day, which was great.

Dance

I kind lost track of how many times we did ballet this week. Essentially, I do this whenever she stops sitting still, so more often on some days than others.

Music

No piano learning yet (my mom has said she will teach her, but my mom is very busy with her own life right now, so this might take a bit of time). We listened to a bunch of French music. Coeur de Pirate was the favourite yet again and I am thrilled because it is a beautiful album.

Crochet

We managed to get a few more stitches in on Friday. This is definitely the category we do the least, as it involves me not crocheting on my own project in order to help her with her own.

Basic Information

We have played with the days of the week and have finished cutting out the months of the year. We’re storing each of them in their own separate envelopes (French and English together).

Printing words

Note to self, try to avoid words that involve combo letters. I felt like coeur was an important word to learn, though, so I kept it in for this week.

  • Words
  • More words!

Counting objects/math-type activities

Her numbers have really improved in the few short weeks since we started doing this. I’m so impressed and love seeing the progress!

  • Counting
  • Writing numbers without looking!

Draw x number of coconuts on a palm tree – this was cute and fun. We used the image from the above counting sheet in order to draw a palm tree, and then I had her put a certain number of coconuts in the tree and a certain number on the ground and then had her count them.

  • 3 coconuts in a tree + 5 coconuts on the “ground” = 8. Sorry about the printing in the background – we’re reusing old dot matrix paper.

Count and talk a bit about the planets (before going star gazing!) – I printed out planet worksheets for her to colour and count (and then explained about Pluto not being a planet). Sorry I didn’t include the link for the one image – I couldn’t find it again! 🙁 She’s getting better at remembering the name for 5, but still needs practice for that and for 7 (in French, she has no trouble in English).

  • Planets!!!

Storytime

One of the books that were gifted to us was an under the sea create your own book. Dragon made the octopus one this week.

  • Colouring
  • More colouring
  • Putting it together
  • THreading it through
  • I made a book!

Activity

Star gazing – We went out on Monday night to use my old telescope (my dad came to help, thank goodness! My telescope is very beat up and hard to use). We started by looking at the moon, to give Dragon a chance to figure out how to look through the telescope (genius idea of my dad’s). She got VERY excited when she finally figured it out. I got a picture of the moon through the telescope lens! Then we shifted it over to look at the incredibly bright Jupiter, and were able to see 3 of it’s moons as well! I also got a shot of Jupiter through the telescope, although it just looks like a bright spot. Dragon says she saw it, but I’m not sure she did… And then we shifted over to see Saturn, and WOW! At first it just looked blurry, but then I pulled my head back a tiny bit and BAM! I saw it’s rings! No picture, sadly, because we lost it and couldn’t find it again. But overall, I would call star gazing a success! I’m even considering ordering a new telescope – one that connects to my phone to make it easier to see what we’re trying to look at.

  • Grand-dad helping Dragon look through the telescope at the moon
  • OMG I see the moon!
  • The moon through the telescope (what!?)
  • Trying to find Jupiter
  • I think I see it?
  • Jupiter through the telescope
  • The moon through the telescope again
  • The moon through the telescope again (2)

Bake with coconut – cookies – Papa and Dragon made no-bake peanut butter and white chocolate balls. The coconut was put in the melted chocolate. Dragon learned how to melt chocolate properly, and was able to comminucate this to my mom and sister (video call for the latter) a day later. She also understood how many 1/4 cups are needed to make 1 cup and how many 1/5 cups are needed to make 1 cup. Pretty cool combining baking and math!

  • Melted chocolate!
  • Taste test
  • My cookies!
  • Yum!
  • So yummy!
  • Chocolate-y hand!

Objects floating in water – we had a lot of fun gathering the objects, guessing at whether they would float or sink, and dropping them in the water. Then she cut and glued them onto the page…she was very excited when she realized that the objects on the paper were the same as the objects she had dropped into the water earlier that day.

  • Will it sink or float?
  • Will it float or sink?
  • Pushing the floating object around in the sink.
  • Cut and paste
  • All glued on! (The duplo sank, but it was supposed to float…?)

Advent Calendar Deadline for October Shipping

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Hello Coffee Lovers,

You have until this Wednesday (September 30th) to order your advent calendars for shipping in mid-October.

Here are the options for this year:

  • 24 Bags at 1oz each ($50)
  • 12 Bags at 2oz each ($50)
  • 24 Bags at 2oz each ($100)
Each Advent calendar will come packaged in one of the baskets and the 24 packet 2 oz will require 2.

This is a pre-order for our Advent Calendars. Flavours will be picked from our current selection and a few experimental flavours.

There will be two sets of pre-orders.
Deadline to order first wave September 30th – Orders will ship mid-October.
Deadline to order second wave November 9th – Orders will ship mid-November.

ALLERGY If you have allergies please email us at JenEricDesigns(AT)gmail.com to let us know your specific allergy.

Pre-orders are open now

Thank you,

Éric

Muppet Treasure Island – JenEric Movie Review

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How This Works – Read Other Reviews

Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 1996 Muppet Treasure Island.

Story

The story is disturbingly faithful to the original; as with all Muppet movies they add mostly flavour and silliness to the mix.

Score: 0.5

Characters

Other than the Muppets, we have two main human characters. The innocent, daddy issue laden Jim; and the devilishly handsome Long John Silver. Both are portrayed with nuance and depth that is impressive. The Muppets themselves do a great job as well, but the nature of the story and the lack of time between gags means the characters feel less fleshed out than they should.

Score: 0.5

Dialogue

The Muppets almost never disappoint when it comes to quippy, quotable, and cute dialogue. This was no exception.

Score: 1

Visuals and Music

This was a beautiful movie and the ship scenes set my childhood brain’s idea of pirate ships. The music was definitely an influence on future pirate movies. The songs however fell a little flat. Tim Curry is a fantastic singer and they definitely underused him and the actor who played Jim had a nasally falsetto that irked me. The rest of the songs were forgettable with the exception of Cabin Fever.

Score: 0.5

Fun

The majority of the time the Muppets deliver on fun. This is no exception. It had my daughter glued to the screen and me laughing most of the way.

Score: 1

Overall

This is one of my favourite Muppet movies and I enjoyed rewatching it. It’s nice watching a movie you loved as a kid and finding out it doesn’t suck.

If you want a fun watch with pirates and Muppets, this is your choice.

Final Score: 3.5 Stars

Point Zero – Chapter 9

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Prologue | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12

Chapter 9: Motivation, Mysteries, and Melting

The man pretending to be a doctor smirked as he waited for me to explain how I’d figured out who he was. “It’s not that hard. Your mask didn’t cover that chin. Put together with the fact that Animator isn’t here to help and my suit is still attached to me, that means this isn’t a real hospital. Plus this place smells like old paint and dust.” It was a smell I was so familiar with because of helping Frank in the theatre at school.

“Well done,” he said as he dramatically clapped. His facial expression and tone made it clear that it wasn’t a compliment. “Now. Tell me what you can about those abominations.”

“You know more than I do. They melt in water and have tech inside.” I wanted to see where this went.

“And the storm?”

I’m not sure why I lied there. I was worried for Mel. I hoped she was okay and took comfort in the fact that my suit was still on me. It meant that Mel was alive. “I did that. Sorry I got a little over zealous. You understand that right?”

His eyes flashed with anger but he just smiled smugly. He stayed that way, almost preternaturally still as I tried to figure out how to get out of the restraints. 

The mechanical sound next to me reminded me that I was attached to an intravenous drip. I sent a small electric bolt through my body and into the machine. The fizzing noise and the smoke rising from the top were satisfying.

The Puppeteer was still standing watching me, but it felt less like he was watching and more like a blank eyed stare from a video game character.

“Why gold?” I asked and he seemed to wake up.

“I really don’t need anything but the dance we’ve been doing. Villain versus hero, good versus bad, we dance you and I and it’s wondrous.”

“You don’t care for the gold or money?”

“I’d only make an army of golden children. Goldilocks with lazers.” He shrugged and smirked and it looked completely wrong on his face. Like a bad actor or maybe a bad mask.

The thing about restraints is that there isn’t a material on earth that doesn’t melt eventually. Tungsten melts at 5410 Celsius and boils at 5930 Celsius. A lightning bolt at full force can heat the air around it at temperatures hotter than the sun itself; that’s in the high 20,000 Celsius. They weren’t using tungsten.

“So all you want is to fight us with more and more ridiculous puppets?”

“No. I like the dance. I live for the dance. But I have a bigger goal—”

I didn’t let him finish. A concentrated blast of electricity around my wrists and ankles at the restraints was enough to make them evaporate. The room was filled with a black smoke and the smell of burning tires.

It was as good a smoke screen as I could have expected. I jumped up out of the bed and landed on my feet. The world tilted sideways and and then so did I. The floor was kind enough to catch me… specifically my face. I tasted blood and tried again to stand up. The world shifted a little again and I realized what was going on. 

“You drugged me?”

“I’m evil not stupid,” he said through coughs. The room was clearing of smoke but my mind and equilibrium were still terrible. 

I’m not sure what gave me the idea but I figured that if the heat from my lightning could melt the rubber, maybe it could burn the drugs out of my body. 

“Seeing as you’re not stupid, I think you might want to leave the room, maybe the building.” It sounded cooler in my head but I blame the drugs. At least it wasn’t a pun, Mel would be disappointed.

I started building the lightning inside of me but it wasn’t enough; I was tired and had already used a lot of my strength on the restraints.  I started to worry that I wouldn’t be able to do it. I looked around and found nothing to help me but I felt electricity buzzing in the walls. I reached with my mind or powers towards it and felt a rush of relief as I drained the energy.

The Puppeteer was still standing there with a disinterest look on his face. “Get out of here!” I screamed and he didn’t even flinch.

I knew that he wasn’t going to move and I tried to redirect my energy and heat. Finally I literally burst with energy. My last thought before it happened was that this could burn my insides along with the drug. It was too late to worry about it at that point.

I was drugged, tired, recovering from burns, and being the focal point for a supernatural storm and I still managed to save the man in front of me when I exploded. The room behind me and in a large arc was destroyed and on fire. Thankfully the room had been a set built to look like a hospital and not a real one. Another thing I hadn’t considered.

Feeling better and still crackling with energy I stood up and said, “This ends now.” Forming a sword with low energy I hoped it would be enough to knock him out not kill him.

“I’m sorry but it really doesn’t. You’re showing some incredible control. I’m impressed. I’ll have to up my game… After I take out the imposter.” He pulled out a gun.

I kicked the gun out of his hand and he jumped at me like he thought he had a knife in his hands. He impaled himself on my sword; it should have just been enough to disrupt his heart, but instead it burnt a hole through his shirt and sand started to fall out of the wound.

The Puppeteer spoke through his puppet, “You didn’t think I’d make it that easy for you? Did you, Sam?”

Read Chapter 10

While you wait for the next chapter, check out the previous serial stories:

Week 4 – Tinker Bell

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Tinker Bell is a super cute movie and has several sequels that are definitely worth watching. This movie was the first one that Dragon paid attention to at around 18 months old. So of course, I had to include it in her lessons.

Here is the link for the downloadable materials. (Again, please let me know if you have any problems so I can fix it!)

MondayTuesdayWednesdayThursdayFriday
Watch movieNature walk
(weather dependent)		Lego kitPuzzleFlex
Summary of the week

Daily details:

Dance

Ballet and martial arts on alternate days

Music

Singing, listening to different pieces, learning piano

Crochet

The project she is working on (currently she is making herself a poncho)

Basic Information

We talk about the days of the week and play games with the cutouts of the names. We do the same thing with the names of the months of the year. You can find the print-outs here.

Printing words

Download materials

Counting objects/math-type activities

Practice counting objects and writing how many of each type – in download materials

Count leaves after collecting them on nature walk

There used to be four fairy friends – now that Tinker Bell has joined them, how many are there?

Storytime

Activity

Nature walk – look for different kinds of leaves, acorns, maple keys, flowers, etc (weather dependent – you want no rain the day before as well as day of)

Build a Lego kit

Puzzle – put a puzzle together

Next week: Halloweentown!

Week 2 – Cinderella Results

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Week 2 was even better than the first. Dragon tried very hard in her virtual class through the school, and raised her hand several times to talk to the teachers – she even said some words in French. She worked hard on printing words with the letter ‘i’ (poussin, maison, voici, and poulailler (chicken coop – why she insisted on trying to spell that word rather than ‘ici’ is beyond me)) and on understanding how to break down numbers into their smallest components (4 into 1&3 and 2&2) and understanding the French names for the numbers. There were still technical problems, but not on our end, thankfully. I’m incredibly impressed by the patience and kindness of the teachers.

The part of the week taught by me went fairly well. There were a couple of hiccups with the paper doll project… well. You’ll see in the comments.

Dance

Ballet was fun and she got her first Martial Arts this week.

Good toes

Music

We listened to a bunch of French music. Coeur de Pirate was the favourite and I foresee using this CD often.

Crochet

We managed to get a few more stitches in.

Basic Information

I added a new category – basic information. In here, we talk about the days of the week and play games with the cutouts of the names. We will do the same thing with the names of the months of the year. You can find the print-outs here.

Days of the week
Months of the year

Printing words

Worked really well. The blank sheet was used on the second day with the filled in sheet as a guide for spelling.

Words
Words!

Counting objects/math-type activities

The download sheet worked really well. She got to practice writing numbers and she counted well.

Counting
Look at my numbers!

We also added a clock activity! Here is the link to the clock.

Monday
Friday
Legible numbers!!

Storytime

I feel like she’s understanding more, or perhaps we’re just reading books she’s more familiar with?

Activity

Sewing a button – This ended up being a huge success! I cut a scrap of fabric and let her pick whatever button she wanted. She had a bit of trouble threading the needle (very small eye) and tying the knot in the thread, but she grasped the concept of sewing the button on very quickly and is so very proud of herself!

My button!!

I ended up making a pillow for her little chair, so she got to see how a sewing machine worked (and how to ask Grannie for help!). We measured the chair and transferred the measurements onto the material. We talked about adding seam allowance, and what that means. We discovered that the ties need to be on the inside of the pillow before stitching if you want them to be on the outside of the pillow when you turn it right side out (again, thank you Grannie for catching that mistake!). And I showed her how I finished off the stitching with an invisible stitch after stuffing it.

Learn about mice (info here)

Make paper dolls (web) – do not use this link. The clothes are missing flaps and do not stay on the dolls. Dragon was super patient about colouring each item (she outlined them and made colour-coordinating clothes for the dolls) and even did some cutting, but we both agreed that they were not worth keeping. This activity definitely need to be re-thought. Maybe a simpler, larger doll and fewer outfits? Or maybe buying a simple set from the store would be better than printing one out?

Excellent colouring skills
The skirt doesn’t stay on…
Wait…no flaps?
Much better!
Belle, Beast, and Prince (these were mine!)

Dear Dragon – Welcome to Level 4

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Dear Little Dragon,

It’s been a big year for you.

Since your last birthday you’ve:

  • Potty trained to a point of no accidents;
  • Learned the alphabet in English (working on french);
  • Learned to count to 10 in English (working on french);
  • Learned to write your letters (better than me);
  • Graduated out of a booster seat at the dinner table;
  • Gone to Disney and your first rides;
  • Been an excellent if over-enthusiastic big sister;
  • Watched a lot of movies
  • Started école
  • and a lot of other fantastic things.
Dragon talking to fantastic FadhiliTheOne for a birthday video chat with Princess Tiana.

One of my favourite memories from this past year is the long-weekend we spent just you and me. You’ve already forgotten most of it, so you say, but it was fun. It was Halloween and we hung out, watched Phineas & Ferb, went to the cinema, played video games, and of course trick or treated. It was nice to have time just you and me.

On the bus on our way home from seeing Abominable in cinema.

Another great memory is you dictating your Christmas letter to Santa and making sure you told him what Pegasus wants. You truly love him and want to take care of him. It’s sweet and I hope that love and the adoration I see in his eyes doesn’t go away as you age.

One of your favourite things right now is to snuggle into someones lap and play video games with them on their phone. I’m not sure if it’s the game or the bonding you want but I’ll take the snuggles. (You’re already asking for your own phone by the way.)

I guess I can’t talk about this year without talking about Covid-19, or as you call it The Virus. You love being around people and last year you went to conventions with us, parties, and Disney. Then March came and everything stopped. It’s been hard for you and I’m so glad we podded with your grandparents.

I miss going shopping with you, I miss going to the park, I miss not panicking every time you touch a package. You have been great though. I’m not sure how much you get the concept, but you seem to understand it’s important.

One great thing about it, is that you have me home. I still hope you’ll be able to go to école for your first grade but everything is up in the air until a vaccine.

You’ve grown physically, mentally, and emotionally so much since you turned 3. (Oh man am I glad you’re no longer having full-on sensory overload tantrums anymore.) I can’t imagine what you’re going to be like next year, but I look forward to being there and finding out.

Happy Birthday, love you!

Your sappy Papa