Foxes, the game.

Most of Hide & Seek is up in Edinburgh right now for a big project for the fringe, but they've got a game on Saturday for the Hayward Gallery- so I've been brought in to run it. (I can't tell you how thrilled that makes me.) The game is for some unspecified number of families (or adults, but probably families) in the afternoon. I'm preparing for somewhere between 50 and 80 groups with the option to expand significantly if we need to.

The game is a sort of naturalist fox hunt. There is a fox who magically can turn into a human somewhere in the Southbank centre. We know what the boundaries of his territory are, but we're not quite sure where is earth (den) is. Can you help us? Foxes mark their territory with scent and faeces markers. They also mark important landmarks within their territory. Find some poo and dissect it, hopefully what they have been eating will give us some clues as to where they are currently. Oh, and his foot prints look like this...off you go.

Today I needed to pick up quite a lot of odds and ends for what has turned out to be rather a crafty game set up. It was great fun, and quite a lot like a treasure hunt looking for all the things I need. (still don't have fake flowers...will continue to hunt tomorrow.)

Something it would have been good to keep in mind:
Meters and Yards are quite significantly different. I now have three METERS of orangey brown fake fur...This is a ridiculous quantity.

At the end of the game when the earth has been found there will be a craft table with supplies for making fox tails to take home with you. It turns out that construction paper is difficult to find in London, particularly if you want only one specific colour and not a rainbow. So I was delighted when, after dejectedly finding absolutely nothing of use in the craft store, I went to the bookstore next door and found a bin filled with rolled up pieces of thick, brown packing paper. Which is perfect  for what I need. And totally unexpected. Also, they had sidewalk chalk. Best store ever. Also, what? You're a bookstore!  

In addition to making fox tails, players will need to dissect the fox poo that they find. (In order to discover what the fox has been eating to aid in locating them....this totally makes sense. Go with it.) So that means that A) I had to make quite a lot of salt dough to be used as fox poo and B) I had to figure out how to make it brown.

You know what people don't seem to sell? Brown food colouring. So I bought, along with 5 kilos of flour and bunch of salt: cocoa powder, soy sauce, onion gravy granules, and instant coffee. It's been exciting discovering what sorts of weird chemical reactions happen when you try to combine all of that together. So far the best in terms of colour has been cocoa powder mixed with a bit of oil and then kneaded into salt dough which has been made with coffee instead of water. It's a perfect colour, but unfortunately REALLY difficult to knead. Which I'm not particularly interested in considering how much of this I'm making. More experimentation proceeds apace.

My hands are currently covered in the lingering smells of soy sauce and cocoa powder with a just a slight hint of onion gravy.

It's gross.

Best Shopping Trip Ever

Winter Wonderland

A bit of scene setting: it has been pouring down rain like no one's business for days/weeks/years now. Quite a bit of the UK is flooded and, in Hyde Park, there are rivers flowing through the horse trail.

So it's a little bit wet.

Apparently, at Christmas time, Hyde Park turns into a Winter Wonderland. This is a fully stocked portable amusement park. Seriously, the thing is huge. Craft stalls, noodle stalls, a bier tent, mulled wine booth, waffles, cotton candy and popcorn, a kiosk with assorted hand and neck warmers, and the most (okay, only) portable ATM's I've ever seen. And an ice rink. And a Ferris wheel. And the tallest portable free drop in the world (why do I know this? Because there was a flashing sign on the top that told me)

And the rides. Oh! The rides! I spent the whole time walking through fair ground repeating to my self "this would be an irresponsible use of money, this would be an irresponsible use of money" But, roller coasters! In the pouring rain! It would have been neat.

On Saturday Ella and I went shopping on Oxford Street looking for boots for her before she heads off to Poland to visit her boyfriend who is gigging over there currently. Oxford street on a Saturday is mad enough, but Oxford Street on a Saturday during Christmas season? Insane. They had shut down the street to cars so it was completely pedestrianized which was helpful because even with doubling the amount of space to walk it was still difficult to weave a path through all. the. people.

Fortunately *I* wasn't stressed out about finding anything in particular so I mostly just soaked in the atmosphere, got covered in fake snow bubbles, gazed at the impressive shop window displays, and hurried after Ella who dismissed any and all boots for being uncomfortable (i.e., not feeling exactly like her 3 year old pair that are falling apart. I'm not being totally fair- I didn't actually try any of the boots- but I have to admit I am inclined to think that she is completely discounting the whole idea of, you know, wearing leather in...)

Getting into the tube station to go home was challenging. They kept shutting the entrances because there were too many people on the platform- and that was fine because I do appreciate them making sure that no one got pushed on to the tracks.

Tykalicious. Also: shopping.

Today the tykes had tantrums. So I decided to remember my blog from yesterday and when the eldest tyke was flipping out to such an extent that she was gripping the table and screaming--instead of trying to reason with her I picked her up and took her to the next room. She knows how to tell time so instead of engaging with her at all while she tried to reason me out of things (or into things?) I told her at what time I would let her go out and play (I read somewhere once about giving kids time outs equal to their age- one year=one minute. Seems reasonable, doesn't it?), I told her that even though her father would be "very cross" with me that I could take it and she still needed to calm down, and then when her sister was flipping out outside the room I closed the door and wheeled a rolling bookcase to block their view of each other (glass door). And you know what? It worked. It worked really well. Yee haw!

I know I'm still wet behind the ears and very new to all of this- but I'm good at it! Also I'm paying very close attention to the other teachers and doing my best to model what I do on them when their techniques work.

The weather has been changeable so when we took them out to the garden to play it was sunny, then it was rainy and sunny, then it was just rainy and just as we were deciding to take them inside, it was sunny again. Harumph. This did mean that the tykes were finding shelter wherever they could- including the cabinets where the outdoor play equipment is stored. At one point we heard a banging and thought it was the tykes in one of the cabinets that we could see- but no, it was the tykes in the other cabinet who had somehow managed to get themselves stuck....oops.

We watched Happy Feet today. It turns out that that movie is far too tense and scary for three year olds. One of the smaller tykes sat in my lap and kept saying "I like not this movie" which was totally totally cute. And I couldn't really help him except to rub his back and say "it's okay, they'll all be okay."

After school was done today I walked through Hyde Park to Oxford Street where I stopped in at Primark. Primark is this giant super cheap clothing chain that does knock offs of designer stuff. Their clothing is not terribly well made but they are directly on trend so it is fun to go through and figure out what is hip. Plus- their dresses are always fun and did I mention cheap? It's like a giant dress up box for adults. Actually, they have kids stuff there too- but you know what I mean. Anyhow- I wanted to buy Laine a dress or two because I think London is still a couple months ahead of the US (and I think I can say confidently definitely ahead of Seattle.) and Primark doesn't exist in the US.

I ended up buying her two and then video skyping with her when I got back to show them off because I'm not very good at surprises. I like receiving them but when I have things for other people I want to tell/show them straight away. It's the same problem with telling jokes- I'm so excited about the punch line that I jump the gun, tell the pay off, and then belatedly realize that there should probably have been some set up and context... In any case- it was totally fun video chatting with her because a: my sister is a cool cat and always fun to talk to, b: she was at work, c: she put me on mute, and d: I could hear everything that was happening in her office. (Oh, um. Laine? Is it okay that I'm telling the Internet this?) She types *really* fast. It's impressive.

I also bought myself a dress and a long silver necklace with plastic crystals and glittery butterflies. It is so over the top. I've been prancing around in it around my empty apartment since I got home. I love it.

Comments

There have been a bunch of advertising comments recently- so I have just enabled comment moderating and changed it so that you have to type in squiggly letters before blogger.com will let you post. This should completely rid the blog of spam comments- but it does mean that comments may take longer to actually show up now because I have to receive an email saying that you have posted a comment and then approve it.

So, a little more work- but hey! No more spam!

I'm back in London and I went shopping again today- this time for clothes that I can actually wear in the Gambia. (We leave on FRIDAY. Everyone is sending emails back and forth, I'm getting excited) I went to Camden and found this awesome shop that sells light, but fitted clothing from India. So I'm totally down with the fabric and the cuts. I bought a very nice shirt that I think I will even be able to wear to work after the trip- and a pair of Aladdin pants. They are billowy and peacock blue and a bit silly but I *like* them.

I've just about gotten over my jet lag and am having crepes with Latana tonight. She got back from Paris this morning and I met her at the St. Pancras Int'l station. There are more creperies then normal there. Probably this is because that is where the Eurostar leaves from and why not get a head start on Parisian food?