And Rerun’s Galileo biography bottle is done and off to school a day early!  (It’s due tomorrow.)

We got to the point where Rerun was saying “yes, Mom, whatever” while I was waving felt and the hot-glue gun around.  He did less work than he should have on the body, but he did insist on the collar – and then left me to figure out how to make it work.

But Galileo is done, he’s holding a telescope (a paper tube, rolled in black cardstock, with saran wrap over each end to simulate glass – and thank you to Tad for donating two of your braces’ rubber bands to the project) which is glued into his hands.  I helped Rerun secure him on the bus this morning, and I confirmed when I picked Rerun up this afternoon that Galileo had indeed made it to school intact.

The presentations will be in a couple weeks, just before school gets out.

Which leaves me thinking only one more thing…

Thumper is going to end up doing a report on John Williams someday, I just know it.

Galileo is progressing.

However, since I am in charge of the hot-glue gun (mostly because I don’t want Rerun burning himself – been there, done that on MYSELF as a kid), I delegated the task of cutting a whole lot of yarn to Rerun.

Since Galileo had a mustache and beard (according to his portraits) this meant a lot of yarn, and a lot of “are we done yet?”

But the head (along with a semi-lousy haircut by yours truly) is complete, with quite a lot of yarn and hot glue, and a couple of googly eyes.

He might need more hair on top, but I can work on that without Rerun.  He did quite a lot of cutting and has definitely put in the effort!

Rerun has a project due at the end of this week.  His class is currently doing a biography report.  This seems to be part of the curriculum for 3rd grade, since Auntie’s class does this as well.  It’s not a super-intensive research project in her class, and it’s not in Rerun’s either.  Her kids give a short presentation to the class, where they can dress up as their subject.  Rerun’s class is supposed to construct, at home, a “biography bottle.”  The concept is easy enough – put a papier-mache or styrofoam head on a 2-liter bottle (using a straw or stick to hold the head on), and dress the head and bottle up to look like your biographical subject.

When we were chatting about this, Auntie recalled that her biography project in 3rd grade took place during Black History Month, so she picked Colin Powell.  I remembered that Ane did this in 3rd grade as well, but because her teacher was brand-new and fresh out of student teaching, she made the rookie mistake of allowing the kids to pick whoever they wanted – without insisting that everyone pick someone different.  Ane, to her sheepish recollection, along with about ten other kids, did her biography report on Taylor Swift.  (There were about five Justin Bieber reports as well, per Ane’s memory.  Like I said, rookie mistake.)  Tad did a biography report in 4th grade, but had to make a poster.  He did it all at school, and got to print it up on the school’s color printer.  At his teacher’s direction (she understood him well), he did his report on Jacques Cousteau.

Rerun went completely in a different direction, and his pick surprised me, but maybe it shouldn’t have.  He chose to do his report on Galileo Galilei.

So, he and I made a trip to the craft store, and started working on the biography bottle.  This is where Rerun learned that I will direct, I will advise, but this is HIS homework.

Oh, and I am also in charge of the hot-glue gun.  For obvious reasons.

If you haven’t been following the Mariners this season, well…. it’s been rough.  This was billed as a “rebuilding year,” but the team got off to an insanely hot start.  Then it all came crashing down.

So, are we still going to the games?  Yes.  Are we hoping they will win?  Yes.  Are we really going for the swag and the fireworks shows?  Pretty much.

It was Star Wars night at the park on Friday evening, which meant… people in costume!

And it meant Thumper’s favorite music being played at the ballpark, which is a huge plus.

And this year, we had a fireworks show set to that music!

Thumper wore his noise-canceling headphones, which let him enjoy the lights without the booms.  I’m convinced that Thumper’s hearing is extraordinarily sharp and sensitive.  I think he hears too many things, which is why he enjoys the noise-canceling headphones.  It allows him to filter out the sounds he doesn’t like, and focus more on the things he wants to hear.  With the headphones on, the fireworks were no problem for him, and the music was plenty loud enough for him to hear it and recognize it.

AND… the Mariners won the game, so THAT was an even bigger deal, since it was the first win we’ve seen in person this season!