Family Highlights 2012

Crazy Kids Drama Camp

3 years ago, my daughter was enrolled in a week long arts camp at a public school with a few friends.  The camp was cancelled for 3 days because of a crazy guy the police were trying to catch who had keys to all the schools.  I was sad my daughter didn't get to go to camp with her friends, so I invited them over to do a drama camp at our house.  We played some drama games and video taped a 5 minute version of "Jack and the Beanstalk". The kids had a great time, and loved watching themselves on the TV.  And that's how "Crazy Kids Drama Camp" was born.

The next year the kids came over for 3 hours a day Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.  We thought of different fairy tales, raided our halloween costumes and dress up boxes, and tried to put them all together.  Our final product was 25 minutes long, complete with commercials.  It was entitled "Pickle Chicken, a Fixed Up Mairy Tale".  

This year, our production was called "The Wonderful Writer of Loz" and was part of an "Enchanted Theatre" TV show.  It ended up being 32 minutes long, so I won't post it all, but I wanted to share a few parts.  One of the girls was the hostess of "Enchanted Theatre", and sat in a armchair in front of the fireplace. She introduced the show at the beginning, and closed it at the end. Her parting words were "Join us next week for our presentation of "Egg White and the 7 chickens", and the kids thought it would be funny to make a trailer for that show, so I thought I'd share that. 

The kids are very creative, and come up with all sorts of silliness to put in the show.  Although I usually present a basic outline, all the dialogue and such is on the spur of the moment.  Sometimes the show goes in a different direction than when we started, and so by the end some earlier parts don't make sense, but the kids don't seem to care.  I think their favorite part is making the commercials.  They come up with a product and how to present it all on their own.  Occasionally I'll throw in a few suggestions (the boys shot an "invisible steak sauce" commercial that was completely nonsensical) but most of it is their own work.  Here's a commercial they did for "Get There Right Now Programmable Shoes".

Actually, I think even more than the commercials, the kids like to see the bloopers I put at the end of the movie.  In fact, sometimes I think they mess up on purpose while we are filming so that there will be bloopers to put at the end.



As you may have noticed, we seem to think chickens are funny around here, and so in each show we always try to have a chicken.  The first year, Joshua was a chicken that laid golden eggs.  The next year he was a chicken that laid magic wishing eggs.  This year, our friend William took over the roll of chicken and was the wicked witch's devious chicken servant.  Now to start planning for next year . . .

The Birthday Interview

We started this family tradition when my oldest was 3 years old. On or around one of our children's birthdays, we sit them down on the couch and videotape a birthday interview. We ask them their name (because it's cute to hear them say their names when they're little) and how old they are and then ask questions about their life, such as favorite food, color, song, tv show, treat, toy, movie, doll, parent, etc . . .

We also have them do any of their signature tricks for that age, or try to get them to say their signature phrase, like my 3 year old christopher who's favorite thing to say at that time was "That's the deal, okay? Don't break the deal." We also talk about things that they have accomplished during the year, like potty training, moving to a big kids bed, or starting school. If they're learning to play an instrument, we have them play a song. There's also a fair amount of silly voices, face making, nonsense, and telling jokes.

We keep each child's interviews on a separate miniDV tape (that's the kind of tape our camcorder uses) and then we are able to watch all the child's interviews without anything else in between. We usually watch them after we've recorded the most recent one. The kids love seeing how they've grown and laughing at their silliness. And there is a lot of silliness.

It's not to late to start with your children! (well, if they're 20 it may be) It doesn't have to be long. Shorter in this case is better. It doesn't have to be right on their birthday. This year we didn't get Joshua's done until a month and a half later, but it still works. Just grab the camcorder and ask some questions. You'll be glad you did!

Here's a sample of interview bits from age 2 to age 6 of one of my sons.  It's about 4 minutes long, but will give you an idea of how we do our interviews, and some of the questions we ask.

Clown School Birthday Party

My son just turned 6 and he asked for a clown party.  He is a rather silly boy so I guess it fits.

As the guests arrived, they colored in clown pictures I printed off the internet.  Then when we all had gathered, I welcomed them to clown school and they chose their clown names.  I put a bunch of silly names in a jar and let them each choose out 3.  They could choose 1 of the three to be their clown name or they could combine 2 if they liked.

What does that say?  Razzle Giggles?

Once we had our clown names, it was time to learn how to put on our clown faces.  To do this we played "put the red nose on the clown"; not real exciting, but good for this age group.  Then we had to learn how to walk in our big clown shoes.  We got a couple of pair of my husbands shoes and put the kids in two groups.  I had them also balance a bean bag on their heads to slow them down so there wouldn't be any running and tripping.  As they raced, the other kids would cheer on their team, using clown names of course.  (note to self: next time hand out name tags with new clown names to help avoid confusion)

Next came the "how to make people laugh" part of clown school.  For this we practiced slipping on a banana peel.  I taped some yellow streamers together at the tip to make our banana peel and put it on the floor.  Each child took a couple of turns walking up to it, pretending not to see it, and slipping hilariously on it.  Some of the kids really got into this; others not so much, but everyone laughed a lot.  We videotaped them all, thinking that we could watch them at the end of the party if we needed to fill up time, because what child doesn't love to watch himself on tv?  We didn't end up having time, but I made a video of some of them.



We then ate cake and ice cream.  I used a round pan and half a wilton ball pan to make the clown head.  To make the face decorations I used airheads.  I love using airheads to decorate cakes.  The colors are really bright and they're easy to shape.  You just pop them in the microwave for 5 or 6 seconds and then put them in between wax paper to roll them out flat with a rolling pin, and cut as desired.  Plus I didn't have to mix lots of different color frostings or use decorating bags.  The red nose is a warmed airhead rolled into a ball.  To make the hat, I cut a cake donut in half, secured it on the head with straws and wrapped airheads over it (mmmmm. . . . gross).  For hair, I used gummy worms secured with half a toothpick.  I thought it would be fun to use cotton candy for hair, but I couldn't find any.  I used melted chocolate chips to draw on the eyes and smile.  I had twisted 2 colorful twizzlers together and secured them to the head with toothpicks to make the ruffle at the bottom.

After cake and presents, I had the kids sit and watch the "Best clown in town" Backyardigans show (I love the backyardigans)  while I made clown balloon hats for them.  I bought a Klutz balloon twisting book on amazon.  The kids loved them.  This lasted until the parents came to pick up children.

My son handed out the party bags, which contained a variety of things essential for every clown and purchased from oriental trading company, mostly.  The party bags consisted of a red clown nose (of course), kazoos, laffy taffy, graduation pen, graduation bracelet, bubbles, silly face, and smiley stamps.

All in all, I think everyone had fun, especially my birthday boy.

Making Music Videos

When my boys were 2 and 3 years old, we made a short music video to one of their favorite songs. It was so much fun and turned out so cute that we now make one music video a year. This is our fifth year for the music video tradition. When we listen to music, I am always thinking if it would make a good music video. Picking the song is usually the hardest part. The first video was to "Clap Your Hands" by They Might Be Giants. Video #2 was set to "The Goldfish" by Laurie Berkner. Backyardigans songs make for great videos, and we used "A Pirate Says Arrr" and "I Love Being a Princess" for the next two years. This year's video is to "The Eye of the Tiger."

Some tips for making a great music video:

• Get the kids involved in the whole process. The kids help me pick the song, plan costumes, and make scenery (if any.) I also talk to them about what they want to do in the video.
• I make a list of shots I want to get before going out to shoot the video. Depending on their age, you may only have a short window of cooperation.
• Take LOTS of video. For this last video, I uploaded 40 minutes of video, and edited it down to a 2 and a half minute song.
  
• Shoot a variety of shots. Take some up close, some from a distance, and different angles.

I use iMovie to do my editing. I put some video up in the editing window, turn off the video audio and add the song track. Then I can cut the video clips to the right timing in the music.

Sing-a-long Primary video follow up

Well, I think this is a good idea, but next time I think I'll do things a little differently.  It was too much for the kids to try and record all the songs in one music time.  I had the junior primary do 4 songs and the senior primary do 4 songs.

It started out well.  The kids were really excited to make their own movie.  They sat up straight with their arms folded and sang out.  By the last song, all I got on tape was a lot of fidgeting and yawning, and nose picking.  

Next year, if I'm still in this calling, I'll do the songs a month at a time.  The last Sunday of the month we'll record the song we've been working on, and I can post it on youtube if the kids want to see it right away.  Then when all 8 months of songs have been recorded, I'll just compile them to a dvd and pass them out to help the kids practice for the program.  

This would also be fun for a Quarterly activity in the fall.  We could split up the kids and let them come up with the pictures or actions, film it, and then get back together and eat treats while we watch what everyone did.

Here's one of the songs.

click for the original sing-a-long post