Mad Tea Party
Jonathan has been reading our big Lewis Carroll book for the last year or so. Every once in a while he goes on a jag and I find him reading it every day for a week. I think he's read the whole thing several times, but he keeps coming back to it. I can't blame him; it's fascinating to me, too.
We've decided to have a Mad Tea Not-Back-To-School Party on August 25th, and we've decided to invite the schooled kids on the mountain, too, because we're inclusive like that, don't you know. We'll be having it up at the local community center, and have amassed quite a pile of crazy hats, Chinese lanterns, coloring pages, mismatched china (from Good Will, of course), bud vases, Alice in Wonderland tattoos (believe it or not), and tea sandwich recipes.
In preparation for the big day, we've read the pertinent chapter repeatedly, and the boys have gone on an Alice movie-thon. One of the things they want to do at the party is taken from the famous scene in the movie in which The Hatter tries to fix his watch by smearing it with butter and mustard and then proceeds to smash it to bits. I don't know how we're going to make that happen for them, but they've taken the first step into their own hands:
A pocket watch made from two yogurt lids and a strip of packing tape
With gears inside, naturally