Poems and Costumes

Artwork is not the only thing the girls have brought home from school lately.  Both kids have been reciting poems they learned in their classes; Madeleine's is about an apple tree, in conjunction with her preschool unit on apples, while Julia's is about the math her class has been learning. 

Below, Madeleine recites "Way Up High in the Apple Tree":



She has been so obsessed with this poem that she even felt the need to interrupt her dinner last night - and hold her VERY full bladder - in order to give us the whole presentation once again.

MADELEINE: (standing up on her chair, then thinking better of it) Uh... I better go down here to do it.  (hopping down onto the floor.)
ME: What are you doing?
MADELEINE: (reaching her hands up into the air) Way up high in the apple tree, two little apples smiled at me, (momentarily grabbing onto her crotch and doing a little pee-pee dance wiggle, then returning to the poem's hand gestures), I shook that tree as hard as I could, down came the apples, MMMWERETHEYGOOD (full-out clutching her crotch with a look of panic on her face) Um I have to go to the BATHROOM! (making an emergency mad dash towards the toilet.)

Julia's poems have to do with the correct way to draw the numbers one and two, which is part of her school math curriculum.  My first attempt at videotaping her wound up with Julia bursting into hot, angry tears because Madeleine continued reciting the apple tree poem loudly over Julia's voice.  We tried again, and Julia kept her cool this time, although unfortunately Madeleine wasn't able to pipe down in the background:



Julia has also been learning about the autumnal equinox at school, and was out of her mind with excitement today over the fact that her favorite season is finally approaching.  To add to the thrill, we got to take her too-big Halloween costume to the tailor's this morning, where she stood, dressed as a witch, in front of the mirror and smiling at her reflection, while the tailor made adjustments.   Needless to say, she was a bouncy ball of wild excitement all morning, acting even more ridiculously goofy than ever.  I mean, you know there's no hope for a normal, quiet morning when she decides to sing her favorite line from "The Lorax" while giving my rump some friendly whacks.

JULIA: (patting my bum) Shake that bottom line!
ME: (shaking my bum)
JULIA: Mama?  (giggling.)
ME: Yes?
JULIA: I was TEMPTED to SUCK your CLOTHES!

Oh, dear goodness.  How does one even respond to that?

Julia even went so far in her Halloween excitation as to make herself a mask.  Check it out:

Spooooky!

Finally, while this has nothing to do with the thread of the rest of this post, I will leave you with the image of what I saw upon walking into the living room last night.  Leftover evidence of the girls' pretend play game with their dolls.  I'm not sure I even want to know what the game was: