Concerts- Maeystown, SCCCHE, Mascoutah...

This past week, we were asked to sing for about 30-45 minutes at a Christmas celebration in Maeystown (about an hour away from where we live). We didn't have a whole lot of time for rehearsals and learning new pieces, so we pulled out a bunch of pieces we'd done in the past, added some that we were doing in TLC Singers and Choir, and added some instrumental pieces that we were working up anyway... and voila! You have 30-45 minutes of music. ;)

Two of the pieces we did...





We were performing in the "ballroom" of what used to be the St. George Inn but is now an antique shop. It was a lot of fun! :)

There was a news photographer snapping photos of us throughout most of the concert - like the one above. We met up with him later, and he told us he had considered asking us for the names of all the kids to put in his newspaper along with the picture, but then decided against it because there were so many of us!

Last night was the SCCCHE Christmas Concert! We nearly had to cancel because of the weather, but despite a few people being unable to make it, everything went well.  The TLC Singers and Choir performed their full repertoires.  Peterson Family Singers performed two pieces - an instrumental arrangement of Once In Royal David's City with chimes, flute, piano, and violin, and our vocal One Minute Madrigal.


This Sunday, December 8, we'll be performing Once In Royal David's City again with our much-requested and very fun Christmas Tree Feud at the Mascoutah Community Christmas Concert. It's held at Zion Lutheran Church, 101 S. Railway St in Mascoutah. I believe the concert is at 3:00. In addition to our family, TLC Singers will be performing some pieces, as will Zion choir, several other church choirs from this area, and a variety of other musicians. It's always a lot of fun and great music, so please come! :)

All right, so I have been slacking...

DISCLAIMER: THE FOLLOWING POST WAS WRITTEN BY A SLEEP-DEPRIVED NANOWRIMO PARTICIPANT WHO WAS RECENTLY INTERRUPTED IN THE MIDST OF WRITING HER NOVEL. A perilous venture indeed; don't try it unless you're either bringing her a cup of tea or making her laugh so hard she can't attack you. Anyway... READ AT YOUR OWN RISK.

As my brother has very kindly informed me, I have been slacking off on this blog lately.

The reason? Well, partially... it's November. :D And everyone should know what that means: http://ywp.nanowrimo.org/ (or http://nanowrimo.org/ if you're brave and amazing... *cough* Jael *cough*)

And as I have been attempting to write 30,000 words and keep on top of school and other stuff, another "interesting" aspect of life has been my very entertaining bunch of siblings!

A few days ago, I was innocently sitting at my desk studying, when I looked up to see this:



Yeah, well, I'm afraid Gloria may have ruined the drama of the moment. ;)

Then, this evening, I was working on my novel, when my sisters started doing this:

And they kept it up for about half an hour... I finally just tuned them out and kept on writing. I'm not sure how coherent that writing was; it's hard to tune them out completely...

Right before that, this conversation happened between Cecily and me:

Cecily: Um... Sylvia, can I have my rubber band?
Sylvia: *looking up from her laptop* Oh, is that what just flew over my head?
Cecily: ...Yeah.
(Sylvia tries to shoot the rubber band back at Cecily, but misses by about three feet. She's only sitting about five feet away from Cecily.)
Sylvia: ...Ow.
(Cecily bursts out laughing)
Sylvia: Yeah, that's typical me... try to shoot a rubber band; end up harming myself but completely missing the target.
Cecily: Yeah, you missed me by three or four feet...

And just because you so need more Peterson craziness...

(French assignment, filling in comparative or superlative forms.  The assignment: "Je mange ___ Henri." (Literally, "I ate __ Henry.")
Mom: You may do "I ate MORE THAN Henry" or "I ate LESS THAN Henry," but you may NOT do "I ate the most of Henry!"
Cecily: But Henry was the name of my apple yesterday! And I ate most of it!

Bjorn: It's boring.
Mom: BORING? Good; it's almost 10:00 at night! Go to sleep!

Sylvia: Or better yet, coat them with red duct tape!
Cecily: ...Cook them with red duct tape? O_O

Mom: There was some mold on the cantaloupe in the fridge... I should have saved it for Knut's Biology assignment.

Papa: What's the second law of thermodynamics?
Cecily: the Law of Splat.

Knut: Stevie did it!
Sylvia: Which Steve?
Knut: Stevie.
Sylvia: The monkey?
Knut: Not necessarily...
Sylvia: Which Stevie, then?
Knut: Stevie.
Sylvia: Who's Stevie?
Knut: ...I don't know, but he did it!

Papa: Sylvia, could you... uh... um... *tries to say something, but can't find the words*
(Sylvia starts raking up the leaves by the curb)
Papa: It's lovely when you can read my mind.

Knut: When I was 4 and Thor had just been born, when Thor hit me with his hammer, my brain died. Fortunately, I had made a replacement brain, 'cause I wasn't quite sure to expect, since I'd never had a little brother before. Good thing I took precautions. So when my brain died 'cause Thor hit it with the hammer, the replacement one took over. But it's kinda weird, since... I made it... and it needs chocolate to work.
Papa: It works??
Knut: Sort of. And it would die if I didn't have chocolate at least once a week.
Sylvia: Only once a week?
Knut: At LEAST once a week. But if it's only once a week, then it... fades and deteriorates and doesn't work very well. I have to have chocolate at least four times a day for it to function at its full capacity.

Mom: Like, I gave up on getting Sylvia to switch to cursive. But then after I gave up, she switched.
Mom and Sylvia together: ...Story of my life.

Mom: Knut, you should have most of this already in your own personal computer... called your brain.

Papa: You know, we always used to have quiet children... right up until the time Knut was born. 

Mom: If he gets out the jug of milk, stop him.
Sylvia: Slap him!?!?
...Cecily: Ooh, don't warn him! I wanna do it!

Cecily: No dead people allowed in the house???
Sylvia: WHAT!?
Cecily: Gloria just said that...
Sylvia: Oh... I thought it was a French sentence you were trying to translate!

Thor: It's number A of letter 2.

Knut: New rule! Thou shalt eat like a civilized human being.
Papa: What's that? Thou shalt eat the civilized human being?
Mom: There has been way too much talk about "eaters of men" around here...

Rosemary: The ice cream truck is a runaway chicken.
Bjorn: No, the ice cream MAN!

Bjorn: This is how you eat.
Cecily: That's how YOU eat; it's not how I eat.

Cecily: We were playing outside being Ninjas and hoping nobody called the police on us.

 Cecily: Yankee Doodle went to town, riding on a pony; stuck a feather in his cat... um... I meant hat... and threw it out the window.
Sylvia: You are so strange.
Cecily: I really like "Old McDonald had a farm and threw it out the window."


Anyway... back to studying and writing and coming up with ways to take over the world... um, in my novel, of course... *very innocent expression*

Whiteboard Ninja War - Guest post by Knut

Abbi Trinkline and I had a whiteboard ninja war after the concert on Sunday. She played Kai, (The orange ninja in the picture) and I played Sensei Wu(The random person in the hat drinking tea.) Since the writing isn’t too legible  we provided a transcript below. (We were writing and drawing on both sides of the board, and switching back and forth to reply to the other person’s last comment. The other side isn’t shown since we didn’t have time to take a picture of it, but it was about a giant potato falling and squashing Abbi.*nod nod* Don’t listen to her if she says it fell on me.)

 

Knut=Black

Abbi=Orange

Transcript for the above picture in case you can’t read it.

*Sign pointing to the picture of Kai falling off the training poles*

FAIL.

Gimme a break, I’ve only been here a day or two.

Phttt. I was perfect on day one.

Yeah right. Besides, you’re the one teaching me.

HA! You admit that I am better.

For now! Wait till we rescue you later.

I escaped less than a second after they caught me. I don’t need rescuing.

Yeah, that’s what they all say.

*Arrow pointing to the picture of Sensei Wu drinking tea*

See, I’m back drinking tea already.

My Sensei Wu is better than yours.

I drew mine much faster.

I drew Kai too.

Yea, but I drew him. *Arrow pointing to the big black ninja*

I drew him… *Arrow pointing to Kai holding the sugar cup* …and him… *Arrow pointing to Sensei Wu* …and him… *Arrow pointing to Kai falling off the training poles* …and him. *Arrow pointing to a ninja in the bottom right*

*Arrow coming from the ninja falling off the training poles*

Wait, you’re a “him?”

You were the one who put my name there.

It’s still you.

I don’t follow your logic.

You’re brain isn’t strong enough to comprehend my logic.

Illogic.                                                            

Logic.

Illogic.

Logic.

*Apart from everything else that was going on… in the center of the board the orange ninja(Kai) is holding a cup of sugar. Sensei Wu is pouring himself a cup of tea just to the left of Kai.*

Kai: Is that one sugar or two?

Sensei Wu: Fourteen.

Kai: No wonder you’re so crazy.

Sensei Wu: True.

This entire thing just goes to show how crazy homeschoolers can be. And yes, I did post this without Sylvia's knowledge. *ninjaface*

Ten things we've been doing lately...

'Cause we all love lists... ;) 

1. TLC! In the absence of our usual co-op, Lyceum, Mrs. Phillips put together TLC: The Limited Co-op to fill the gap. 

In the van on the way back from TLC, waiting for the shoppers to return laden with groceries to the car...

2. Hobbit party:

All you Lord of the Rings fans out there know, of course, that September 22nd is the birthday of Bilbo and Frodo Baggins. In honor of them, we invited a few families over to celebrate Hobbit Day, complete with lots of food, readings from the Lord of the Rings books by Papa, and sword fighting. 

Leify with a sword

Three of the fighters 

"Will you mix up my cube?" 

Readings

3. Elephant Rocks
Some friends of ours, the Polahars, invited us to come to Elephant Rocks with them and some other friends. We spent the afternoon climbing, running, hiking, losing each other multiple times... and generally having tons of fun!

The group of "crazy homeschoolers"

Squirrel pose! 

4. Willoughby Farms 
After the fun time at Elephant Rocks, we decided to try doing something similar... sending out an email to a bunch of friends, inviting them to come with us on another "adventure." The hiking trails were quite a workout, especially when carrying a baby... I was extremely grateful to Jael for trading off with me!

How many people can fit on the tire swing...?

5. Bjorn's 6th birthday

6. The Saxon Lutheran Memorial fall festival
This was a really neat event, and lots of fun despite the constant rain!  The rain made for some interesting adventures, too... the van got stuck in the mud when we tried to "escape" from the field we'd parked in... thankfully, there were folks with 4x4 pickups ready to pull out unfortunate visitors like us!
Also, both Papa and Mom forgot their cell phones, and I left my camera in the car. So... no pictures, I'm afraid. :P


7. English Country Dancing
This was just a couple hours after we returned from the Saxon festival... pictures may come soon from those who weren't too busy dancing to take them. ;)


8. FLL and FTC

VX3 (Cecily's and Thor's FLL team) at the FLL-team-sponsored kids' activity during the monthly SCCCHE meeting. 

Robo Raiders (Knut's and my FTC team) at the local hardware store picking up the last supplies needed for a build day (we only got a few stares as we all trooped in...)

9. Bible Bowl
Cecily's and my Bible Bowl teams competed in our first monthly Round Robin tournament a couple weeks ago, and the Lord granted us good success!


10. School
Well, at least... we try.  We may or may not all be behind in some way or another... *nervous laugh*
It's going pretty well, though, and we're managing to mostly stay on top of it all.


And now for some other random "Peterson Life Snippets" (aka Insanity)...

Papa: It doesn't fail to not be nonunirregardlessness.

Sylvia: (holding down the lid of the mixer which is about to fall off, while trying to amuse Leif, who is strapped to her back) 45 seconds, Leif; we can hang on!
(Mixer lid nearly falls off)
Sylvia: Hey! You took that as a challenge, didn't you... (pause) I'm talking to a mixer. I've lost it completely. -_- 

Mom: I'm afraid I don't feel that sorry for you, Knut.
Knut: I do. 

Cecily: Pink is NOT red! People keep pretending it is. What I'll do when I see a pink stop sign, I don't know... I'll probably die.

(Translating "Jacquelin a reçu une robe de son frère.")
Cecily: Mom!? Jacquelin gave a dress to her brother!?
Mom: No, Jacquelin received a dress FROM her brother.
Cecily: ...Oh.
(a little later, translating "Tu veux être médecin.")
Cecily: You want to be medicine??
Knut: No, you want to be a DOCTOR!
All those slight changes in words that make such differences in meaning... ;)

Papa: Cecily, how can you help Thor to grow in his face? ...Faith.

Knut: Okay, my goal in life is to create a language that makes sense.
Mom: And then you'll go and teach it to the world?
Knut: Yes. And to my minions. But you don't know about that.

Mom: Get rid of all these extra verbs! You have être, prendre, and partir and you're just trying to say "takes"!

Sylvia (translating): Bread is pain.
Knut: But I like bread!
Sylvia: But it COULD be pain... like, if you hit someone over the head with a loaf of French bread, that would be painful. So it's FRENCH bread that's pain.
Knut: My dislike of French extends to French food.
Sylvia: The French are famous for their chocolate...
Knut: So? When I grow up, I will be famous for MY chocolate. And the French industry will fail because of my chocolate that will put them out of business.

Rosemary: What? Why do you have a brain like Gloria? 

Sylvia: Knut, why is your Rubik's cube in the fridge?

Thor: I shall buy it with my life and my knife. And my other knife. And my other knife. And my other knife. And my other knife. And my other knife. And my other knife...

Mom (reading French phrases for us to translate): Quelque chose?
Knut: ...Something...
Mom: Very good! 

Cecily: Mom, does this outfit look okay?
Mom: No way.
Cecily: Sylvia said it did...
Mom: Oh, then yes, definitely!

Thor: I can't find Frodo's head!
Sylvia: That is really disturbing, Thor...
Knut: I know where his head is. Actually, I know where three of his heads are.
Sylvia: That is even more disturbing, Knut...

Cecily: Wouldn't it be weird if your face was a compass and you always had to be facing north?

Knut (yelling at his toast): Hurry up! 

Papa: And anything you don't want to keep, well, you might as well put it in the cottage. ...And siblings are not allowed to be stored in the cottage!

Knut: You may now apologize to your short little sister for calling her short. 

Cecily: I learned something about Africa! Algeria looks like a ducky!

Sylvia: Thor, clear the table.
Thor: I refuse.
Sylvia: ...What did you say?
Thor: *suddenly looks angelic* Nothing!
Knut: You will now feel the wrath of the Short One!

(I know I will get teased unmercifully for that last one... but sometimes I have to obey my younger, bigger brother when he tells me to post things on the blog. :P)

A Typical Day for the Peterson Family (video)

Our family performed this skit for the SCCCHE meeting last night:



Everything in this video is true! The following things happened as we were writing it:
-The call about Grandpa shooting squirrels after having eye surgery
-The call from Papa about inviting people over to lunch on Sunday (people whom we didn't know previously)
-Leif tried to escape upstairs

A couple days after we wrote this skit, we forgot that we were supposed to bring snacks for FLL, so the team went without snacks (and somehow survived, thankfully...).

Although Knut doesn't order electrical fence wire and have it shipped to our house, he does buy it to work on his chain mail armor and brings his chain mail making supplies EVERYWHERE he goes!

The argument about 10:00 or midnight for English Country dance practice is an ongoing discussion/debate... ;)

The sword fighting happens quite regularly... during school.

And... trust me; everything else is completely true as well!

EDIT: Jael brought the one incongruency with real life to my attention: we've never had the problem of the CLEP testing center being closed on a Monday. It was closed over the summer, but we were able to go to the other testing center nearby, so it wasn't a problem. ;)
EDIT #2: ...Then I found out that the usual CLEP testing center really IS closed on Mondays, and Monday is when I was hoping to text next.


Thanks to John for being our impromptu videographer.

Leif the Stupendous

Insanity

Rosemary: What's a bibbidy bobbidy boo?
Cecily: I don't know.
Rosemary: Is it a kind of bibbidy bobbidy boo?
Cecily: No, it's a kind of bibbidy bobbidy BEE. It's like a bibbidy bobbidy boo, but it's really a bibbidy bobbidy boo.
Rosemary: Grandpa says it's a bibbidy bobbidy boo.

Rosemary: I got married 1 minute ago and then the bad guys took my husband away to jail.

Thor: Then they saw a dot in the distance...
Cecily: It's a flaming chicken!

Cecily: Rosemary, how about you eat your food in silence.
Rosemary: But I don't HAVE socks on!

Thor: Don't talk with your mouth open! Don't eat with your mouth full!

Mom: We're going to have more food for the trip than we can fit in the car!
Sylvia: Then we can stick the extra stuff in the freezer. I haven't cooked in almost a month!
Knut: Uh-oh...
Sylvia: What??
Knut: You've forgotten how.
Sylvia: I have NOT! Just taste a doughnut.
Knut: Mwahaha! It worked! *grabs a doughnut and runs away*
Sylvia: ...I think that was a compliment!

Cecily: The Great Sylvia made a mistake? :O

Cecily: I like to simultaneously burst into song and dance.
Sylvia: ...Okay...
Cecily: Wait, what does simultaneously mean? Just making sure...
Sylvia: Not what you're using it for.
Cecily: Wait, WHY did I say that!? That was dumb; I meant spontaneously...

Cecily: I was going to laugh at something, but then I forgot what it was...

In Florida...

John: So if the house was flipped over...
Camryn: We would fall to our deaths on the ceiling. 

Sloan: I feel like a banana.
Cecily: Well, I feel like a European Marshmallow. 

Cecily: I FOUND MY BRAIN!!!

Mom: So... beginning on day 1 of school, I'm messing up my lovely schedule because of that field trip tomorrow.

Sylvia: It's the second day of school and I'm already two weeks behind- figure that out for me!

Sylvia: I hope you're not running with a knife in your hand.
Knut: Well... yes I was. But it was a very blunt knife, only good for cutting bread. Except in case of emergencies.

Mom: See these little verbals? They're very cute, aren't they?

Grandma: So did anybody learn anything today?
Knut: I did! I learned that an electric chair takes 1,500 volts of electricity.
(A long time and lots of discussion later...)
Knut: The things we talk about over the  dinner table...
Grandpa: Who started this discussion, anyway?
Grandma: I did; I asked if anyone learned anything today.

Knut: I went into FLL to play with Legos and came out a lawyer!

Mom: Je ne parle pas. I don't speak. *stares at Cecily and Thor* Je ne parle rien. I say nothing. Je ne parle jamais. I never speak.

Florida Vacation, Day 6 (Everyone)

Uncle Travis had things perfectly planned out on Friday morning! The dads would leave at 6:30, go pick up the TeenPacters, and be back in time to meet the ladies and kids at the river where we were going to go tubing at 12:45. The ladies would leave later in the morning, pick up a couple tire rims for the van from a junkyard, and meet the dads and TeenPacters at the tubing place at 11:45.  Uncle Travis was quite insistent that they not be late; he really didn't want to have to wait around for them! 

No one saw any problem with this plan... 

The TeenPacters spent the morning taking pictures...

Thanking staffers...

Eating breakfast...

Taking more pictures...

Playing Four-Square...

Watching the washing of watermelons...

Signing t-shirts...

Dodging the staffers' volleys of water balloons...

Being greatly entertained by the staffers chasing each other with water balloons...

Watching broomstick sword fighting...

Playing Four-Square with the president...

The dads left at 6:30 to pick up the TeenPacters, arrived at the camp and picked up the four teens, and were back on the road by about 10:00.  Everything was going just fine!

Papa telling one of the staff moms about a Constitution video series we've been watching that ties in really well with TeenPact's mission

In the meantime, the ladies' day wasn't going quite so smoothly.  They loaded up all the kids/towels/swimsuits/lunch/etc and went to pick up the tire rims.  They had some trouble finding the place, but eventually they accomplished their mission and were on the road... the one problem was that they had the wrong address entered into the GPS.  They soon figured out that something was wrong when they were on a tiny back road with a 30 mph speed limit.  Mom called Papa.  As she was on the phone with him, he suddenly heard, "Uh-oh; I have to go... we're getting pulled over by the police."  Needless to say, this wasn't exactly what he wanted to hear!

The ladies had quite some adventures. Mom, distracted by trying to call Papa and figure out where she was going, had been driving over 30 mph.  However, the policeman had noticed the maps, GPS's, etc. and was very understanding.  He tried giving them directions, but when that failed, he told them to follow him, and led them right to their destination in time to meet the dads and TeenPacters at 11:45.  They were even there two minutes early, and high-fived each other at their punctuality, thinking how pleased the dads would be with them.

As for the dads and TeenPacters, they arrived right on time: 12:45 on the dot! 

...That's when they realized that 12:45 and 11:45 aren't at the same time. 

Oops... ;) 

:)

Bjorn with his tube

After tubing, we went to swim at a place about 10 minutes away.  The water was COLD, so several of us played Ninja instead.

Camryn and Sloan

Margaret and her littles

Camryn

After swimming, we went to get pizza...

And then most of the gang went to Wal Mart to get the rims put on the van while the other car with the TeenPacters, Uncle Travis, Ethan, and Isaac went home.

The gang spent a LOONNGG time at Wal Mart... 

When they finally returned home, it was time for games and ice cream!

Bjorn and Freda

Chess and Pinochle

We left at about 8:00 the next morning and arrived home late last night. Praise God for safe travels and a stupendous vacation!

Florida Vacation, Day 5 (the Family)

All I know about this day is what I can figure out from the pictures... :P 

Playing at the community playground

Rosemary and Isaac "playing Risk"

The boys in the game room

Sloan and Gloria "sleeping" in their fort

Gloria in the fort

The TeenPacters' Day

Florida Vacation, Day 5 (TeenPact Congress)

The dining hall was really empty at 5:30 a.m...

Sunrise

The majority and minority leaders called a caucus meeting at the beginning of the day to let us know which bills the leaders of our respective parties wanted to pass. The Justice party wanted to push the "Iran bill"... one that would put sanctions on Iran and support Israel in any measures they might take against Iran. 

Anna Leigh speaking on her bill 

Reporters 

In the afternoon, we had to adjourn sine die. :(  *sigh* The travesty of it... :(

However, we did have a bill signing ceremony by the president!  Nine bills passed out of both the House and the Senate:
ECC002, The Immigration Reform Act (more border security)
ECC004, The Cellular Communication Protection Act (prevented wireless providers from giving information to government agencies without proper warrants)
ECC007, the Ammunition Management for More Obtainability Act (prevented government agencies from buying excessive amounts of ammo, keeping them from exercising indirect gun control)
ECC015, the National Debt Relief Act (abolished several unconstitutional, expensive, and unnecessary federal departments, required a balanced budget, required 50% of federal spending to go toward paying off the national debt, and stopped several other unnecessary government expenditures)
FBC009, the Freedom to Fish Act (abolished the restriction of fishing areas)
FBC011, the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act (stopped federal funding of abortion or healthcare that includes abortion)
WMC002, the Military Construction Act (granted money to the Dept. of Defense to meet its needs)
WMC008, the Federal Reserve Transparency Act (required "an audit of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System")
WMC009, the Federal Reserve Independence Act (amended to dissolve the Federal Reserve within 10 years)

All nine were signed by the president.

President Campbell spoke on each bill, explaining briefly why he felt it was important and so was willing to sign it. Then he called the sponsors up to his desk, shook their hands and congratulated then, and signed the bill into law. 

After the bill signing ceremony, there was another press conference.

The president answering questions

That evening, the staffers prepared a banquet in the dining hall.  Everyone was banned from entering until they had decorated the room. 

Random photos from waiting outside the dining hall...

The evening session that night was... awesome.


The rest of the family's day