ALL ABOARD FOR TACOMA
We were in the train station waiting for the train to come. We were still having fun going around to different groups and playing games, and they were fun games. Then it was time to go on the train. While we were on the train, my mom read a book to me. Other people finger knitted with yarn. After we got to the Seattle train station, we could stay on the train for an hour or we could get off and walk around the train station. I stayed on the train. After an hour, we took off for Tacoma. When we got to Tacoma, we went on the light-rail over to The Museum of Glass.

On Thursday, November 3, the 1st through 6th graders went to The Museum of Glass in Tacoma. At the Museum of Glass we had to put our coats and backpacks in a big bin. After that we made shadowboxes and mine was animal themed. Next we saw some paperweights with flowers, people and messages in them. Then we went into the Hot Shop and got to see them make a candleholder. One of the glass blowers blew a big glass bubble, and we got to touch paper thin glass. I would definitely recommend The Museum of Glass for anyone that likes any type of art.

THE MUSEUM OF GLASS
When we were at The Museum of Glass we went to the art room first. We made boxes and used cut outs and drawings to decorate it. I watched other students build their projects. Some students focused on one topic. My sister focused on animals. In the gallery we saw paper weights that had intricate designs in them. We saw plants with orchids and orchids on trees. In the hot shop we watched glass blowing and we saw them make a glass bubble and they made a horse for us (actually right in front of us). There were about six people working in the hot shop blowing glass. There were three furnaces for blowing glass. To color the glass they rolled it in what looked like little rocks that were colored. When I was there last time they were working on a project in the hot shop.

On Thursday, November 3, we went to The Museum of Glass. We saw people making glass art. They made a glass horse, and they made a glass candlestick. It looked like a regular candle and then they made a ball. They put it in the furnace, and they got a tool and made spikes on it. Then they put it in the furnace again and it was an oval. Before that I got to touch blown glass. It felt like rubber. In the gallery, I saw glass flowers and glass bamboo. There were even things in the gallery that weren’t made from glass. When I grow up I want to blow glass.

On Nov. 3 and 4 we had a sleepover at the church in Tacoma. When we got there, we unloaded all of the food and sleeping bags out of the cars. Then most of the grown-ups went and worked on dinner while some more grown-ups showed the children to their rooms. The girls had the room that was next to the stairs, and the boys had the room that was next to the lunch room. For dinner we had English muffin pizzas. It was delicious and yummy. After dinner we went swimming in an indoor pool. Although it was a 5 mile drive there, it didn’t feel that long to get to the pool. When we got there we got our bathing suits on, and I cannon-balled into the pool. When I jumped in the pool, it was so warm. There was also a diving board, but you had to take a swimming test to go on the diving board. I passed the test and so did my friend Caitlyn. So we both went on the diving board together. I was scared to go on the diving board because I haven’t really been on a diving board before. After we got back we got out of our wet bathing suits and got in our pajamas and went to bed. It was really hot in the church so Soren, and Caitlyn and I had to sleep on top of our sleeping bags because we were really hot. It was a fun field trip.

This quarter we went on a train trip to Tacoma and went to the Washington State History museum. It was so fun but the only thing that was not fun was we had to do a worksheet. My favorite thing in the museum was the trains. I liked to follow one everywhere and watch that one go over on the bridges. I also liked listening to the exhibits. They told me a lot of things I did not know. The ones about the Native Americans were best. The Native Americans are my favorite to learn about. I also liked the exhibits where you got to see a movie. My favorite one was the one where the seats were rocks and you could climb on them and put your hand in front of the projector and make funny shapes with your fingers. I also liked the gift shop. I bought a wind-up train. It is so fun to play with.

TRAIN TRIP TO TACOMA
The train trip to Tacoma was fun. We got to knit, watch the video (without sound) play card games, and eat. On the train there were motion sensors that opened the door. It was fun to try and get past it before it sensed you. We stopped in Seattle at the train station and walked around the Seahawks stadium. We got wet because it was raining when we first started our walk. The Seattle Depot was fun to walk around in. There was a really cool floor design on the Seattle Amtrak station floor. The most fun part of the train trip was when we first arrived on the train trip. We waited in the Mt. Vernon Amtrak station and played lots of fun games. Some of games were concentration with Mr. Roosma about explorers and what they did. With Mr. Davis we drew part of Marco Polo.

On Thursday the elementary school went on a field trip to Tacoma. We went on the red- eye ferry. The first thing we did was we drove to the train station, but we were early so we were put into groups of four or five. My group was Kirsten, Vinnie, Sean, Stephanie and me. We went around to different places and this is what we did. The first place we would find a partner in our group and we would act out something about an explorer. We would pick one out of about ten explorers or so. The second place was we would pick a piece of tiny paper and it would have a part of Marco Polo on it and we would have to enlarge it so it was bigger. Then the next place we would have to tell two truths about ourselves and one lie. Then the rest of the group would try to guess which one was the lie. The last place was a game kind of like memory and we played it about explorers. When the train finally got there, we got on. It was about 3 hours until we got to Tacoma.

Then we took the light-rail to a glass museum. The first thing we saw was a bridge going to the museum but when you looked up you would see a whole bunch of glass crowded in a big case. When we actually got into the museum we got to see people making glass, two people were making a candleholder together. After the museum we went to a church where we were going to stay. I was in the school van with Mr. T. We set up our beds and then we ate dinner. We had pizza. After dinner we got our bathing suits on and drove to an indoor pool. It was really fun. There was a diving board on the deep side, but to go on the deep side and the diving board you would have to pass the swimming test.

I didn’t want to try. After swimming we went back to the church to sleep. It was really, really hot -- some people didn’t even get in their sleeping bags. In the morning we packed our bags, had breakfast and left for another museum. We went to the Washington State History Museum. It was really cool. We had worksheets and while we read and looked at things we had to fill them out. After the museum we went to the ferry and when we got to Orcas, we drove back to the school for our parents to pick us up. And that was the end of our field trip.

EXPLORERS
Kid Pix is a computer program that we use. I was working on Kid Pix. I was making a report about explorers. We were studying about some of the world’s great explorers like Leif Erickson, Columbus, and Marco Polo. Marco Polo was 15 when he went to China. He lived there so long that when he went back to his home in Italy, he had forgotten some of his language.

People in those times thought that the world was flat and if they went sailing in the ocean, they would fall off the end of the earth. Columbus had three ships, the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria. Columbus thought he could go to the Indies by going west instead of east. Magellan was another explorer. His crew was the first crew to go all the way around the world. There were 240 men to begin with. When they got back, only 18 men had survived. Magellan didn’t make it. He died.

My Kid Pix project about explorers was seven pages long. I showed it to my mom and Woody at conferences. They thought I did a good job on it.

MAPS
This year in school we have been studying maps. The maps that we have made so far are: a treasure map, a 3-D map and a world map. The 3-D map was a replica of the treasure map. The world maps (awesome by the way) were very detailed and taken very seriously. When we were done with our treasure maps, we wrote a story about them. My story was about a young boy who was carried off by fairies and lived through the obstacles of Treasure Island. All the stories were really awesome. All of them were very adventurous and dangerous and a lot of other stuff. But, the point is that all of us did a great job. We got to do a lot of stuff for our 3-D maps, like making the dough. The ingredients were two cups of salt and two cups of flour. You mix it all with a little bit of water and stir it for a couple of minutes. It sounds gross but luckily you don’t have to eat it. You would get a horrible stomachache. When we were done with the map, we let it harden over the weekend. When we came back we had a great little island that we can give to people on the holidays and a lot of other times.

PUMPKINS FOR SENIOR CITIZENS
The elementary and junior high kids decorated small pumpkins and cards. We delivered them to senior citizens at the senior center lunch. I liked giving out the pumpkins and talking to the seniors. I liked the pumpkins too. I liked the cards that we gave with them. Some of the cards had trees and pumpkins and leaves on them. I would like to do this again next year.

In the month of October at OCS, grades 1-6 went up to the junior high, and we made fall cards for the Orcas senior citizens. My card said, “Fabulous Fall from Orcas Christian School.” Then everyone picked out a pumpkin and taped it onto the little card. When we were making our cards we got 7th and 8th grade buddies. My buddy was Jacob Hansen. After we made 70 cards, we all went back to our classrooms and had a normal day at school. It was very very fun.

FIELD TRIP TO WARM VALLEY ORCHARD

One day it was apple picking time at my house. My class got to go to my house. It was because I wanted them to see how much work I do every year, and I think they got the point at last. We picked apples off one out of more than 100 of our apple trees. We put them in the baskets that we had there. We put the baskets in the cart. The bad apples went to the sheep.

After that we saw the wool in my mom’s workshop. There was a lot of wool in it. In my mom’s workshop there were hats, scarves, shawls, afghans, sheepskins, yarn, silk, mohair, angora, cashmere and other stuff. The class had a good time, and they helped us do a little bit of our work.

PRESSING APPLE CIDER
We made apple cider with Mr. Laursen and his apple press. While we were waiting for our turn to crank the handle that chops the apples, we got to eat an apple. We had 20 barrels of apple cider. It was hard to crank the handle. The juice was good. We got to take a bottle home, and we drank all of the apple cider.

We pressed apple cider. It was fun and kind of gross at the same time. Some apple chunks landed on me. We got to grind up the apples by the blades inside of the machine. The second step in the process was to press the ground up apples. When you press the ground up apples it squeezes the juice out of the apples. It was awesome to look down into it. Mr. Laursen was the adult that supervised the apple pressing. The apples came from near Roo Smith’s house. Chase got some apple juice after we made the cider to take home. I hope that we get to do it again next year at school. This was my first time to press apples.

SUGAR CRYSTALS
We started sugar crystals about five weeks ago. The 5th graders got big beakers. The 6th graders got small beakers. After a few weeks all but one of the 5th graders beakers started to crystallize. Mine was one of those. The 6th graders have none on theirs. Here are the ones that have sugar crystals: Effie, Graye, Soren, Sean, Caitlyn, Halley, Sierra and me. Effie is the only 6th grader that got a big beaker.

CHEMICAL REACTIONS
We were making bread, and it was fun. We put warm water in a bowl. Then we put yeast and sugar in the bowl. We waited 20 minutes, but nothing happened. The yeast was dead. So we got new yeast. We did it over again. We waited again. Some of our yeast worked, but some people had to mix it up again while the other people moved on. We put wheat flour and white flour in a bigger bowl. Then we put in salt. We stirred it for a long time. We poured in the yeast stuff with some oil. We stirred it again. Then we patted it. We took it to the kitchen and let it sit for a long time. Maggie wanted her bread to be in a different shape so she put her bread in a coffee can. Then we put the bread in the oven. We waited for a long time. When it was done, we kept it and ate it and it was good.

We were making ice cream one day when we were studying about chemical reactions. We had a big can and we had a small can. We put half and half, milk, vanilla and sugar in the small can. Then we put the small can inside of the big can. Then we put ice and rock salt, lots and lots of rock salt around the small can. We put the lid on. We all sat around in a circle, and we rolled the can to each other for 20 minutes. We took the lid off, and it was ready. It became vanilla ice cream, and we got to eat it. We got seconds of the ice cream. I like the ice cream a lot! I was surprised that the milk turned into ice cream.

OPERATION CHRISTMAS CHILD
Every year at OCS, we do Operation Christmas Child. It is when anyone who wants to can buy things to put in shoeboxes that get sent out to children in other countries. There are lots of things you can buy, like stuffed animals, toys and school supplies. We put it all in a big box out front until it is time to put everything in shoeboxes and send it out. When we pack a shoebox, we put a label on it that says if it is for a boy or a girl. The label also says what age group it is for. You will want to put things in the shoebox for the age group that you chose. Although there are lots of toys you can buy, we don’t want anything war related. Balls, small animals, and those kinds of things are best. We don’t bring any books because the children we would be sending them to probably wouldn’t be able to read English. We would really like it if you could help out, if you haven’t already put something in the box. Please note: Everything should be small enough to fit inside a shoe box. The shoe boxes are being sent out sometime in December. The box to put everything in is in the elementary building. You will see it as you go in the front door. Thank you for helping out with Operation Christmas Child. It makes all the children happy.

HELLO!
I am seven years old. My name is Stephen. I’m sssoooooooo happy in Orcas. I’m the new student. I enjoy studying at school. My favorite thing to do at school is to play with my friends and to write stories on the computer. I’m so happy at Orcas. My new wish has come true because I always wanted to see my dad and to see killer whales.

STORY TIME WITH MRS. ERICKSON
We had fun reading with Mrs. Erickson. In fact, we had lots of fun. We had a blast with Mrs. Erickson. We all love Mrs. Erickson’s books a lot and we don’t step on Mrs. Erickson’s books. She reads a lot. It is fun to see her read to us. We love hearing the stories. Mrs. Erickson is a storyteller and the librarian at the public library. She taught us some hand claps. I love book time because I get to read a lot and I just love to read.

ITBS TESTING AND BREAKFAST
One day the third grade and up did ITBS tests. I did the third grade tests. I was tested on math, spelling, punctuation, make sense stuff, and reading. One part was words like cloun, dance, and jump. We had to fix that and find the word that was spelled wrong. It was not very hard. Each day we had to do one of the things I said. I think I did pretty good on the tests.
Miss Dawn made breakfast for the whole school. We were working so hard, and we wanted our brains to be able to think good.

We did ITBS testing (Iowa Test of Basic Skills). We had tests on Monday through Friday. Every morning we could have breakfast if we wanted. The ITBS tests are about reading, math, and basic things like that. Third grade tests lasted about two days. My favorite part about the testing was that it was all really easy. We did about 45 minutes a day. The third grade was tested in the office because there were three of us. My favorite parts of the test were reading and math. I like ITBS testing. I hope it’s fun again next year.

ART CLASS
I’m going to tell you about what we have been doing in art class lately. Well, lately we have been drawing border lines like paths of the sun on the ocean -- like the edge of the ocean or something. We had to use pastels or different types of chalk. It was very fun. We could use big pieces of paper, but I used a smaller piece paper. I did one where you were looking off a beach into a cool sun set. Also in art we paper maiched a balloon. We called it glass blowing for fun. I liked it a lot. Our class in art was studying glass blowing. So we took toothpaste stuff and a pink straw and put the toothpaste stuff on the straw and we blew bubbles. It was fun. That’s what we have been doing in art class lately.

PHYSICAL EDUCATION
This year at Orcas Christian School we are blessed with two amazing P.E. teachers, Tyler Brewer and Alan Ayers. They came from Walla Walla, Washington. They teach P.E. to grades one thru six everyday of the week. We start off the week by running a mile each Monday morning. That is twenty laps around our gym. The rest of the week we start off gym class by running five laps before we start our class activities. We are learning the importance of stretching our muscles in our P.E. class. The best parts of P.E. are the different type of games we get to play. Come and join us on Mondays and run the mile with us!

HYPERSTUDIO
We are doing a computer program called Hyper-studio. It’s where we get pictures off the internet and paste them on our computer program. We put a text box and we go on the internet and we go and get a story of the explorer’s life and put them in our text boxes. It’s really long so they think I was typing it. I am doing explorers called Ferdinand Magellan, James Clark Ross, Vasco Degama, and Columbus.

BIG BROTHERS, LITTLE SISTERS
On Friday, October 21, we got our big brothers if you’re a boy, or a big sister if you’re a girl. I got Maddy, Caitlyn got Halley, Graye got Thane and Sierra got Anika. Everyone got someone. We played a game with them. It was called 2 truths and 1 lie. So we had to write 2 truths about ourselves and 1 lie. And then we would have to guess which one was the lie. We are going to do a lot more stuff with them, but so far that’s all we have done. To me it feels really good because I don’t have a sister. Well I know we’re going to have a lot of fun.

SWIMMING
In swimming we went to the Athletic Center two Thursdays. I have been in the pool many times because I take lessons there Monday, Wednesday and Friday. I know the crawl stroke, breast stroke, and the butterfly stroke. Swimming with the school is more fun because I get to play the whole time instead of working most of the time learning swimming strokes.

We go to the athletic center every other Thursday to swim. We change in the men’s locker room. When we’re done changing into our swimming suits, we go into a shower, and then we jump in the pool and swim. The water is really warm when you get in the pool, but if you get out of the pool and go back in you feel really cold. There are little surf boards in the pool area. Sometimes Graye brings his water football and we play dead or alive. We can’t get the carpet wet in the locker room or we will get busted.