
Spencer has an awesome teacher. Despite the anti-school phase he's been in this year, she has totally won him over with her fun teaching style and creative ideas. Maybe these are an essential component of the Manitoba curriculum, but I've got to say that the sugar pyramid was not her best idea. Spencer would disagree.
His class made these yesterday morning during the judging of the fair (the kids were called out individually to meet with the judges.) With all the busy-ness of "helping" the kids with their projects, we also had to send a box of sugar cubes and icing to school. The icing recipe we received called for 4 cups of icing sugar, so it made a huge batch. At the end of the day, Spencer came home with a stomach ache and a container of icing that didn't look like it had been touched. He said he ate almost the whole box of sugar cubes. It looked like he used a fair amount in the pyramid; when I asked him exactly how many he had eaten, he said sixteen. I think he just said the first number that popped into his head that seemed reasonable to him.
During the night he came to our room, clutching his lucky garbage can (he calls it "lucky" because he has anxiety issues and feels like he's going to throw up every single night. He has never yet thrown up in it, so he believes having it beside his bed every night is his lucky charm). Thankfully, the garbage can lived up to its name and he was all better by morning. After school, he told me a boy in his class had also been sick in the night due to sugar cube consumption. That boy's garbage can was not so lucky. Nor were his parents.
On a different note, it felt like spring today! Snow was melting, the sun was shining, and I feel like the fog over my head is lifting. My house is clean, at least on the surface, I feel like work is under control, and best of all, NO TANTRUMS! There goes my book idea. I was in such a good mood that I even bought the kids slurpees after school. We had nothing scheduled tonight; my neighbour came over for a glass of wine, and the older kids and I watched American Idol after dinner. If I'm still so happy and light-hearted tomorrow, I just might get out the leftover icing and let the kids all make sugar cube pyramids. And then I'll call Spencer's teacher and ask if my kids can have a sleepover at her house.
Talking about shapes (pyramids) reminds me of something Neve said in the van the other day. We were playing I Spy and when it was her turn, she said, "I spy something that's a rectangular prism."
It's nice to see her putting her education to practical use. And she doesn't just play I Spy with colours like I do; she thinks outside the rectangular prism. I bet she could even make one with sugar cubes.