What a great way to say goodbye to 2012! There was sparkling cider, empanadas, sweets, presents, and lots of cheer for everyone! Happy holidays everyone and see you in the new year! =)

What a pleasure meeting with Ellen and her sister today! It was so neat seeing her after a year of working together on the American Mural Project and having the opportunity to reflect on our experiences.  We hope with all of our hearts that our interviews will help AMP achieve its goals.  Thanks so much, Ellen, for bringing this project and all of your energy and passion to Paul!

What an AMAZING show!!! Whether it was the acrobatic fairies, the lovers' mud fight, the shameless Bottom, or the mischievous Puck, we were thoroughly entertained the entire 2 hrs and 45 minutes of the play, and I often found myself wishing it would never end.  At the end of the play the actors came out, and we were able to ask them questions.  It was incredible to hear their thoughts about acting, performing Shakespeare, and their preparations for each show.  Two hundred people worked to make the show such a success.  We see the actors but there are just as many people working behind stage, not to mention the costume and set designers, publicists, and of course, the very talented director.  This was a truly delightful mind vacation into a purely magical world.

This is just the beginning of our Keeping it Green campaign, but we were able to add 2 trash cans and 3 composters to our school yard garden on Friday.  It definitely took some team work to assemble the composters, but when there is a will there is a way! After the assembly we cleaned up the lot and filled our composters with fallen leaves and debris from the garden.  Our next steps are assembling the greenhouse and planting for our new pollinator garden to be developed for this spring!

We really enjoyed having Eva from the Shakespeare Theatre in our class today.  She was very impressed by how much the students already knew about the characters and complicated plot.  She led us in a silent scene version of the play, and we added dialogue throughout.  It was very enjoyable seeing the students act out the roles of the mechanicals, lovers, royal court, and fairies.  I am amazed everyone could keep straight who loves who during all of the fairy's mischief in the forest. 
After the 9th grade workshop we had time to play around with Shakespeare's language having a compliment and insult face off.  Congratulations to Jimena for having the best compliments and Kiana for the best insults!
After the 7/8 grade workshop we divided into groups and created a logo, motto, and commercial to advertise a Midsummer's based on a specific character group.  The fairy and lovers commercials were rocking!
We are totally ready to see the performance next Thursday.