My daughter had her first science project to do as homework this year (First Grade). A weather poster. She was told to pick one aspect of weather (the usual ones were listed as examples: wind, tornadoes, hurricanes, rain, snow, etc.) and make a poster. The grade was based on whether the poster had the key ingredients (title, illustrations, captions, etc.) and presentation. I was thinking that, since we live in Louisiana and my daughter rarely sees it, she would choose SNOW. Or maybe, because we live in Louisiana and we do occasionally experience them (there happened to be one in the news at the moment, actually), HURRICANES!
Like a really good mom, I gave her tons of time to choose a topic. Too much time, actually. Well, she finally decided two days before the poster was due.
Her final choice?
Sunny Days.
That's my girl! Surprise em all! That one wasn't listed on the homework sheet. Way to get creative, Baby Girl!
I don't usually think of "sun" when I think of the weather. I'm a little more depressing with my thoughts, I guess.
I think:
"Will it be so stinkin cold outside that I have to lug around that ugly jacket?" I hate cold weather.
or
"Will a hurricane take my house this week?" HOUSE, meaning TRAILER...wouldn't be too difficult.
or
"Dang it, I gotta carry around an umbrella! Stupid rain!!" This means I HAVE to wash my 6-feet-long hair tonight, whether I wanted to or not.
or the most recent one
"Will the wind blow my skirt in that embarassing Marilyn Monroe fashion as I'm walking into the office today?" Yup, it happened. And trust me, it's not NEARLY as hot when it happens to me!
So then I had to stop and think. Is "Sunny Days" considered "weather" or part of the climate? Or season? Or just somewhere in between?
But since my husband informed me that the weather channel has little suns on days with "sunny weather", it was okay to use it on a weather poster. And then I could be proud of my daughter, choosing such a happy, positive thing to focus on!
So my daughter picked up her colored pencils and drew the picture which would be the centerpiece for her display.
"Oh, Angelyn! You did such a great job!" I said. "I love the picture of you jumping rope on top of the trampoline (please, God, please don't let them call CPS because of that blatant safety hazard)! I love how you put the sunny sky, the green grass, and even the dirt with the worms and things at the very bottom. But why did you draw so many footballs in the yard?" Puzzled, because she only has one football, and it's purple, not brown. She's usually very detail-oriented with her drawings.
"Mooooooom," she rolled her eyes. "Those are NOT footballs! They are ant piles! Don't you see the ants in the dirt, too?" Oh. The lines on top of the brown, oblong blobs are really the ants marching to and fro.
She proceeds to inform me that she only likes to jump rope on top of the trampoline because she is safe from the ants up there.
Wow. So much for happy thoughts.
We then proceeded to pick out sentences for the poster. I helped her along.
"Sunny days are fun because....."
"I can go outside and play on my trampoline and jump rope on it, too!" Awesome. That'll go underneath your picture. Next.
"Too much sun is bad because....."
"I can get a sunburn?" Too true. So we took a smiley face sponge, put red paint on it, and slapped it down on the paper to show a red, smiling Angelyn, which is exactly what she looks like after an afternoon of jumping rope on the trampoline on a sunny day.
Okay, let's do one more.
"Not enough sun is bad because....."
"the plants may die." Glancing over at the dying plant on the kitchen cabinet which was formerly a Kindergarten lima bean growing science project (sitting underneath a window now protected from all persistent rays of sunlight by blinds AND an awning), I grimaced. Yup. Lesson learned. So we pulled some dead leaves from the plant and glued them underneath that sentence.
"I know another one, Mom!" I am skeptical at this point. "Plants and animals need sun to grow!"
Okay, yeah, that's right. We'll add that. And we also added a drawing of a fish, a cat, and a flower. Just to prove the point.
DONE!
And it was beautiful.
And it was the only poster made on "Sunny Days".
And she got an "A" on it.
