Circus Camp: The Beginning

Cambridge Montessori School

Slept well last night at Naomi's place. The airbed I'm sleeping on has a terrible habit of deflating slowly so I woke up on the ground haha. I blew it back up and we were fine. Got to sleep in which was fantastic! Went and picked up some breakfast at Whole Foods around noon =P I went to get some prepackaged fruit and dropped a container on the floor spilling the fruit everywhere. My bad =( Luckily a guy who worked there was on it and told me he would get it lol. I'm such a schmuck! haha. Got some almonds to snack on and some other things. This store was not very well laid out but there were tons of young people in there! Crazy! haha. I've been in Brattleboro too long. 

Inside the School

Naomi was working with one of her coworkers at the house on some arts and craft projects for her other camp. I sat on my computer and did research on moving. Always fun =) We left for the school around 12:40 and made our way through Harvard Square. We were a little late because when we turned onto the road for the school, a dump truck and a mini van were blocking the entrance to the school. We waited a while then Naomi got out to ask the mini van to pull over a little so we could squeeze by. To our surprise, no one was in the van. Oddly enough, it belong to one of the dump truck guys so he moved it.

Our Space with the Kids

We went into the school and I was all decked out in my crazy socks and circus gear. We checked in with all the appropriate administrators and went into the gym and rigged the trapeze and the rope and harness. Luckily they had mats so I laid them out the best I could. We found out that we had 25 kids instead of the original 20 kids! Yikes! I was a little nervous about that but we had an additional 4 counselors with us that spent the whole day with them. 

We set up and were all ready for the kids. They came in and boy, they were much younger then I was expecting! I was all ready changing my plans for the day in my head. The counselors were great and kept them under control and let us do our job. They all sat in a circle as Naomi and I introduced ourselves and told them what we were going to be doing. Then they went around and said their names, what they liked about circus and what was interesting about them. A lot of them said they had nothing interesting about themselves! Bah! I will show them otherwise! =D It was a very diverse bunch of kids too. Two of them were Korean and couldn't speak English. That will be fun! I'll need to brush up on my Korean... I could only remember how to say penis thanks to my good friend Richard Lee in college. He was always so helpful lol. I was pretty sure that word wouldn't be good to use. =P

Naomi Blocking the Sun at the Korean Restaurant

First Naomi did a warm up with them and then we did some acrobatic stuff just so we could see where they were at. We had them do forward rolls which they could all do really well. Then I upped the ante and had them do cartwheels. Only 2 kids could do them so I was like, Ooook time to revamp everything haha. Then we split into two groups, one at trapeze and one at rope and harness. I was given 13 kids to work on one trapeze. What fun! It took a long time and I only taught them knee hang and angel. They all did it though thanks to some spotting help from one of the counselors. I was exhausted afterwards from holding them up. They really liked it though and I loved doing it too. One girl named Amy cried when she tried to do a knee hang the first time. She didn't even get up onto the bar. When her turn came around again We got her into a knee hang and she took one hand off and waved. She got down and broke out crying. She said she was afraid to do trapeze so we told her she didn't have to do it again. It was so cute in a really sad way. 

At the end of the first group, I wanted them all to stretch their shoulders but they said they wanted to see me do a trick on the trapeze before they did the stretches. So I did a neck hang haha. They freaked out. It was funny. But it got them to stretch their shoulders so whatever works =P At the end they were still really excited about everything and I was too.

View from the Roof

Naomi and I went out to a great Korean restaurant after work and I had some delicious Bibimbop. We were both soooo tired from today and had no idea why! It was probably getting used to the new energy from the kids. Then we went home and watched some TV and I updated my blog. I spent a bunch of time on the phone as well. It was a beautiful night and I loved being on the porch on Naomi's roof as I talked with people. When I went into my room and laid down I was out like a light! 

*click*

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Coldplay - Viva La Vida

(I love this song but hate the video. Can't bands be more creative then just having them on the screen the whole time playing? Jeez. It's such a beautiful song and it has a great opening/style. They could have done so much more. Bah. Just listen and don't watch. You'll be better off.)