summer school/camp

So as many of you might know, I do the Trinity summer school/camp every year. It is, by law I think, the hottest two weeks of the year every year and this week is no exception. Plus humidity. Every year I DREAD summer school, but then it goes fine and quickly and all is well, blah blah and it is decent money, so I’m not sure why I get my knickers in a knot about it other than the weather. But every year I say I’m not going to do it and every year I do. Even this year when Jan is just little. This year is a bit different in that for the past several years David has done it with me, but this year, they didn’t advertise at all so we only got 19 kids instead of the somewhere-between 35-50 kids we usually get. This meant that the school couldn’t afford to hire David in addition to me and the other guy (Dennis, who has done it for a jillion years). This also meant that we couldn’t afford to hire a babysitter as we had planned (sorry Lily!), so David has been taking Jan to work every day! He toodles him around the church in the stroller. And sometimes Jan gets to play with the big kids’ toys in the nursery. We are tremendously blessed to have not only an incredibly tolerant child who laughs a lot, but incredibly tolerant co-workers who don’t mind Jan sitting in on all the church meetings. He knows all the latest gossip, but he’s not telling. ha ha. He is literally being raised in the church.

But back to the school/camp thingamabob. I keep saying it with a slashie because it really is kind of a camp for nerds. The theme is classic Rome (this year) and the kids have a class on myths and Latin and stories and stuff and then they have crafts class, which is what I do. Here are some pictures of kids working on papier mâché Roman helmets.

Oh yes, it was a glorious mess. (Which word I have just learned the slang(ish) for in French: what a mess= quelle pagaille!) We made helmets and “wax tablets” this week; volcanoes and aqueducts next week, oh yeah! We are also putting on the Shakespearean version of Julius Caesar (did I mention this is for nerds) and we have some serious dodge-balling going on. Today it was so unGodly hot that we actually had a competitive water-balloon toss and then a free-for-all water balloon fight. I hardly got wet, too bad. It’s not as cool to throw water balloons at me as it is to throw them at the teenage “counselors.”

It is very interesting to me to watch these little dudes interact now that I have one, albeit an even littler one. I keep thinking “is this the way Jan will act when he is this age?” or sometimes “he will never behave like so-and-so” (who shall remain anonymous, but whose photo is up there on the right, he he he). But then I think, “HA fat chance I’ll be able to prevent him from behaving in certain ways.” He’ll be his own person and he’ll behave as he behaves despite my best or worst efforts, I’m sure. I mean, look who his parents are!! Are there two more strong and determined personalities? He is going to be a headstrong little guy, I’m just sure of it. So, we’ll just do our best to make sure the behaviour is not offensive and is hopefully, even, maybe, good. Although I have already started using the infamous Baxter question: “are you being a bad experience?” (instead of “bad example”) I have really not even given serious time to my faint hopes that he will remain as totally jolly and mellow as he currently is.

But I will sign off now because I am so tired from running around in the heat and I need to play with the young lad since I haven’t seen him all day. Stay tuned because tomorrow I don’t work and I think there may be some vine vexation!