Mello Cello

For those of you who don't already know. . . .
Xavier is taking Cello lessons with Miss Emmie.

Taste of India

Mom's plate.

After the event we took this
picture next to a wooden
peacock. The peacock is the
national bird of India.

On the Saturday night of 11-2-13 the Schuelke family or, at least most of them (Evan was sick) went to an event called Taste of India to eat some Indian food, see some Indian dancing, and as it turned out do some Indian dancing.  This event was held by the ICA (India Catholic Association) to raise money to build a school in India.
We sat down (at Table 18 to be exact) to wait for Dad and read through the programs. Seconds after Dad walked, in we sang the National Anthems of the U.S. and India. Soon after, the dancing began. First was the Invocation Dance. Next they showed us a short video about the school. After the video was over, we ate. I, personally, tried everything on the buffet which included naan (non) the equivalent of bread, tikka masala, (tee-ka   mu-sal-u), palak paneer (pu-lak  pu-neer), somosa (su-mo-su) yogurt dip and more. For desert there was chocolate cake and mango custard. During the eating the Peacok, Bollywood Kidz, Kavadi Chindu, and Dola Re dances took place. After that they drew winners for the raffle.They did the Lights of Love dance and then we took a mini lesson on Indian dancing. That pretty much ended it. They said thank you and got us out of there so they could clean up.

This dancer was the most skilled
in traditional Indian dancing.

You can see some dancers waiting for their turn behind us.

 These dancers had real peacock feathers for part of their costume.

From Hamsa to Henna

One of our art projects for our India unit was making "henna hands".   There was an artist offering henna (or mendhi) at the Taste of India fundraiser, and I think it is beautiful, but I don't think it is quite appropriate for my lifestyle.  If I knew I could remove it when I was ready to, I might spring for it.  So instead of getting real henna, I had the boys trace their hands again and then draw henna designs on their paper hands. 

Evan's Henna Hand

Xavier's First Attempt at a  Henna Hand

Cole's Henna Hand

Xavier wanted to do a second hand.  He says he really liked doing them.  It was late in the day and he must have said that he wanted to do another one, but he didn't know what to do.  So I had him watch me sketch out a pattern, starting in the center and just moving out, add the same things around the circle.  I encouraged him to make it squiggly.  Then I turned him loose while I worked on supper.

Mom's demonstration for Xavier

 

 

Xavier's practice on scratch paper

I think his second hand turned out magnificent!

Xavier's Second Henna Hand

Henna is usually black when first applied, then becomes a burnt orange color.  I looked briefly for a picture of the henna design that won a UT photo contest.  It was pictured in the Alcalde, but unfortunately, I didn't find it.

Evanessence

 Here is an acrostic poem of my name

                                         Extreme
                            Very
                            Awesome
                            NOT OLD ENOUGH

All Saints Day 2013

Our parish hosted an All Saints Day Festival on October 30th and dressing up as saints was a major component.  This pretty well doubled the costume-making efforts for the year. 

St. Michael the Archangel

  

My name means "Who Is Like God".  I am the patron of police, paratroopers, mariners, and grocers.  (Yes, grocers.  I haven't figured that out yet.)  My feast day is Sept. 29.

Blessed John Paul II

I was born in Poland in 1920. My family called me Lolek, but by the time I entered the seminary my parents and my brother were no longer living. I attended seminary in secret while living at the residence of the Bishop of Krakow. I very much enjoyed the outdoors.  I was called to Krakow for a meeting when I  already had a kayak trip planned with friends. They called me Voo-Yek, which means Uncle in Polish.  At this meeting I was ordained Auxiliary Bishop of Krakow.  I begged permission to skip the reception and returned to my friends where I celebrated Sunday Mass with them using an overturned kayak for an altar.

I was elected Pope in 1978 and served for 26 years, making my pontificate the 3^rd longest.

I will be canonized on April 27, 2014.

St. Maximillan Kolbe

I was born in Poland in 1894. I became a Franciscan. I had a newspaper called "Knight of the Immaculate". I went to Japan and India.  I returned to Poland. Later I was arrested by the Nazis and brought to Auschwitz. When the Nazis were choosing ten men to go to the starvation chamber, I offered to go in place of a man with a wife and children. I led the people in the starvation chamber in prayer and song. I was the last to die. I was canonized in 1982.

 

St. Catherine of Siena and St. Martin of Tours also made an appearance!

APB on GI Joe

BOLO (Be on the Look Out) seems to have replaced All Points Bulletins, but here is the important part:

Xavier would really like to have a 12-inch Police and K-9 unit GI Joe.   Most likely finds will be on ebay and garage sales.  I would request that anyone who finds any 12-inch GI Joe or accessories in a garage sale or the bottom of someone's toy chest send them our way please.

Also, FYI, they do not want the GI Ninja cobra whatevers that ARE in the stores.  They want old, classic GI Joe.  If anyone sees the collectible Teddy Roosevelt Joe at a decent price, that would be really fun.

Morocco

Xavier's favorite part:  Building a casbah with "cannons pointing towards the ocean". The big green duplo blocks sticking out at the top are the cannons.

Cole's favorite part:  The reading, such as

The Traveling Man: The Journey of Ibn Battuta, 1325-1354 by James Rumford.  Ibn Battuta was a kind of Moroccan Marco Polo.  I especially liked the author's talent in crafting such phrases such as "Traveling: first it leaves you speechless, then it makes you a storyteller,"  and "Traveling:  first it makes you a stranger, then it brings you new friends."  Those may not be the exact quotes as we returned the library books before I finished this post. :-)

and

The Grand Mosque of Paris: A Story of How Muslims Rescued Jews During the Holocaust by Karen Gray Ruelle and Deborah Durland DeSaix.  We learned from this book that the rector of the Parisian Mosque at this time was Si Kaddour Benghabrit, an Algerian, who had also been a high ranking diplomat in Morocco.  The mosque was built in 1926 when Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia were under French rule.



Evan's favorite part: creating hamsa. Hamsa is the Arabic word for five, and also for these "good luck charms" popular in Morocco (and elsewhere.) 

Cole's hamsa from a piece of Altair Design paper

Xavier's hamsa

Evan's brightly colored hamsa

It was also a treat to look at the online photo album of a middle school friend of mine who has done a lot of traveling, including Morocco.  I love Google image search, but there is something nice about knowing from where the photos came.  Though it wasn't in her Morocco album, one of the first pictures we stumbled on was a photo of a hamsa that she had sent as a gift to someone else.  Fun!