Miles is Nine!

Happy Birthday Miles! We celebrated Miles' birthday today. It's hard to believe we've had him for nine years now. I remember when he was a cute little baby in the NICU with 4 tubes sticking out of him and he was barely strong enough to drink. He's come a long way. We are so glad to have Miles in our family, we love him very much.


After church I asked Miles what kind of cake he wanted and he said, "Boston Cream Pie!" Melinda was out visiting teaching, so I started to make the sponge cake. Of course I selected the hardest recipe out of the book, so I let Melinda finish when she came home and I took a nap.


Marsha gave him a cool foam helicopter that flies really high, and a croquet set (which he's always wanted.) Grandma and Grandpa gave him a Lego Star Wars kit, which he really liked, too. Miles wants us to give him a season ski pass to Brighton, so that will get me up on the slopes this year, too.

Greatest Show with Grandpa

Eric wants me (Melinda) to do a guest entry in his blog. While Eric was at his company retreat, the rest of us went with Dad (Grandpa) to the Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey Circus. Dad wanted to see the circus once from a decent vantage point, not the very front row, but not the nosebleed seats either. However he thought it would be silly for him to go alone, so he asked if the grandchildren wanted to accompany him.

We were somewhat surprised that some of the children seemed less than enthusiastic about the idea of going to the circus. I wondered if it was because we had just read Pippi Longstocking. When Pippi goes to the circus, she leaps into the arena, joins the circus acts, gets in trouble, but then becomes the crowd favorite. I thought that maybe they were afraid that they would have to leap onto the back of a galloping horse. But it turned out that the Scary Clowns were the problem!! (And all clowns are Scary!) However, as soon as we cleared up a few circus misconceptions, the kids were ready to go!


Everyone enjoyed the elephants, horses, zebras, tigers and the trained, back-flipping dogs. Then there were the tightrope walkers, the Chinese acrobats, the trapeze artists, the wheel-in-the-sky walkers, the human cannonballs and more! The show lasted about two hours, but it seemed to fly by as every moment was action-packed. After it was over, Lisette said, "That really was 'The Greatest Show on Earth'."

Thanks Grandpa! Now the kids know what a circus really is all about. (Not just Scary Clowns.)

Saffron with Grandpa. She is holding pieces of the confetti that was blown out into the crowd and rained down on us.


Oh, no!!! A Scary Clown!!!! Ian refused to wear the clown nose, but Miles was brave!

Retreat!

Oh no, retreat, retreat! Well, that's always my initial reaction to the annual company retreat. But even so, I always make it through and I (surprisingly) end up actually enjoying it a little. Since I didn't have to go the meetings yesterday (because of the down server) it doesn't seem so bad today.

Thursday when I told the kids I had to be gone for 2 nights they said, "you never used to leave us at all and now you do all the time!" They're right, 3 months in a row leaving them for 3 days and two nights (Florida and Chicago.) But I actually got to stay home last night, and I'll be home tonight so it will actually only be 2 times. I'm actually very lucky and glad not to have to a traveling job.

I found out that after dinner they don't have any specific activities planned so, I'm going to sneak home and sleep in my own bed. They have a room for me, but the 2 other guys already have the beds, and I really don't want to sleep on the hide-a-bed. There's nothing like your own bed. I'm pretty sure Melinda would rather have me home as well.

We had our management meetings, and they weren't so bad. After several years I can finally keep a straight face during the motivational and inspirational pep talks about being all you can do, and giving it a 11o%, and all that schtuff. It's actually good to see co-workers and people who call me on the phone in a non-work environment. It reminds you that these are actually real people and not just disembodied computer problems.


Fall is really pretty here in Park City. After our meetings they gave us free time to explore Park City or do what we want. Some people went horse back riding and others golfed. I optioned to do the restort activities so they gave me an all day activity pass. I rode up the lift and went on the Alpine Slide twice, and a new Alpine Coaster twice as well.


Anyway, I don't have to feel to guilty about having fun without my family, since Arden took them all to the circus. It will be nice to see all my sweet little niños tonight. Then I'll just have to make it through tomorrow's meetings and awards and my weekened will be mine again.

Crisis mode

Computer Network Administrator is usually a pretty good gig. You get to play with new technology, and the work is usually varied enough. Sometimes you spend more time than you want fixing little user problems that pop up instead of your own project initiatives, but overall it's not a bad deal.

However, when a server goes down and everyone can't do their job you have to go into crisis mode. Crisis mode really stinks. It can get pretty stressful when you are try to figure out what the problem is and everyone is calling you at the same time. Luckily, I have a technician who I can transfer my phone to, then I close my door and barricade myself and buckle down to fix the problem.

Yesterday our Microsoft Exchange 2000 e-mail server went down. I thought we had it up again, but this morning it was down again. I had to take the server offline and do a defrag and repair on the e-mail database. I was supposed to be off to go up to Park City for our company retreat, but it was not to be. It took about 6 hours today to get everything back up and running again.

I had budgeted for a new e-mail server this year, and we should have rolled it out in spring, but every time they look at the price tag (40 grand over 4 years) they keep putting it off. So I have to keep nursing this one along until they finally break down and let me buy it.

You learn a lot during crisis mode, but the stress and excess adrenaline can really wear you out.

Sunflowers

I really go for the naturalistic look in the garden. It's fun to see what flowers reseed themselves and how the patterns in the garden dynamically change from season to season and year to year. This purple coneflower Echinacea purpurea just popped up between the vegetable boxes, and it looks much better than the ones I planted.

Fall flowers are really nice. I love the color in the late season. We get a lot of it from our sunflowers Helianthus annuus. When we first moved in to our house and I saw the sunflowers pop up I was so excited. After a couple of years, though, when they started spreading all over, they kind of moved over into the weed category for me. I pull out a lot of sunflower sprouts every spring, but I always miss some, and I can't bear to pull all of them out.



Plus the birds love them, and it's so entertaining to watch the little birds lite on the stems and twist around to pick out the seeds out of the flower heads. Plus they have such an unassuming, simplistic beauty that's hard to ignore. It's also nice that they don't require any additional watering at all.

The state flower of Kansas is the sunflower, yet it was once on their list of noxious weeds. Here's an excerpt from an article that chronicles the status of this flower.

Despite a glaring sun and 94-degree heat on the afternoon of Aug. 9, 1820, zoologist Thomas Say could hardly take his eyes off the Kansas landscape as a U.S. Army mapping party rounded the spot on the Arkansas River that is now Great Bend.

"The soil was a deep fine white sand, which rendered the traveling very laborious," Say wrote in the daily logbook. "The chief produce of these tracts of unmixed sand is the sunflower, often the dense and almost exclusive occupant."

Thus began the recorded history of the sunflower in Kansas, a journey that has taken the lowly wildflower on a rags-to-riches ride - -- from a once-scorned noxious weed to a cheerful, globally recognized symbol of Kansas and the Great Plains.

More than 182 years after Say's written reference, historians credit the sunflower's dramatic reversal of fortunes in Kansas to the late Morris County state senator, George P. Morehouse, whose two- year effort in the Legislature led to the designation of the sunflower as the official state flower nearly 100 years ago --- on March 12, 1903.

"Kansans have always taken what we have and made something special," said Kansas historian Roy Bird. "The sunflower is a good example of something that most people would consider a weed and (we) made it into our state symbol by celebrating adversity. It's a real example of what Kansas character is all about."

Though Morehouse's bill became law in 1903 without a dissenting vote, Kansas lawmakers haven't always honored the prairie flower, having declared it a noxious weed in 1895.

- Sunflower: Enduring symbol - The Topeka Capital-Journal, Jan 29, 2003

Even if some still call it a weed, what a glorious weed it is. If only more weeds were like it.

Support your local library

Salt Lake County has a fantastic library system. All of the libraries in the Salt Lake Valley have their catalogs linked, so if you local library doesn't have a book, you can simply look it up on their website and have it delivered to your local branch. They also have a lot of music CD's and DVD's to check out. Most of the movies I watch are checked out from the library. It's hard to beat free.

It's also cool because you can check your account online to see how many items you have out, and you can renew them from there as well. One disadvantage is that you can only check out 30 items at a time. However, Lisette, Miles, and Ian all have their own cards. So all together our family can have 150 items checked out from the library at any time. Of course we never really have that many out at once, but we easily get up to 120 items at any time.

It's really great for homeschooling, because we can get tons of books on history subjects, and lots of educational movies as well. We always have books around on the various subjects du jour. For example right now we have books on Islam, Catholicism, ancient Egypt, speech therapy, health and exercise, Yoga, Jesus, snakes, tarantulas, science for kids, and various easy readers and works of fiction.

However, today we discovered things had gone wrong, very wrong. Usually Melinda or I check all of the cards every Monday to make sure we have everything renewed or turned back in. Somehow we miscommunicated and I didn't check my card. Books on tape or movies are fined at $1 a day. So I had several of those overdue for a week. Ouch. Not to mention once your fines get so high, they don't let you renew anything. So Monday I went to the library near my office and coughed up over $47 in late dues. Dang! That would have covered almost 6 months in Netflix dues. So if you can't think of what to get me for Christmas, I hear you can give gift subscriptions to Netflix. Wink, wink, hint, hint ;)

Piano lessons

On Saturday Lisette had a piano recital. She played an arrangement of the William Tell Overture. Lots of other kids played their songs and afterwards there were cookies to snack on (that was a big plus for the boys and Saffron.)


Lisette is pretty good at practicing, though she does miss a few days. But she seems to really enjoy playing, so we're glad that my parents left the piano with us when they moved to Alaska. I'm impressed about how much she has improved this last year. Her songs are getting more complex and she plays them with a lot of style.

Melinda's aunt, Robin, is her piano teacher. Lisette also enjoys lessons because she can stay and play with Joy when they're over. I hope she wants to stick with it; I quit piano lessons when I was a kid and I regret it. I'm looking forward for the day that I can sit back in an easy chair and listen to Lisette playing ragtime on the upright piano.

Sk8r Boi

About 2 years ago Miles decided that he wanted a skateboard. I talked to some people in sporting good shops and they said we should steer clear from the Toys 'R Us and discount store variety. We found a good Andy Mac professional skateboard on sale from Amazon.com for under $100. So we worked out a deal where Miles had to read so many books and he had to earn money for his pads and helmet.


So he's had the skateboard for about a year and a half now. We got some videos and books from the library about skating and he got a few pointers there. But mostly he picked it up pretty well by himself. Last fall he was just dying to go to the skateparks all the time.



This summer a friend of Miles' told him about a skateboard class he was taking from the County Recreation Department. So Miles has been attended weekly skating classes at a local skate park. He's been doing well and learning a lot. It is early in the morning on Saturday, but luckily his friend goes too, so we can take turns carpooling (actually Melinda does all the early morning duty while I sleep in).


We're also very pleased how well he's been doing with homeschool this year. His reading has improved steadily, and he has been doing lots of math. He's also very pleasant and willing to help around the house. I love to watch how sweet he is with his little sister, Saffron. He's such a great help to her. If Saffron gets mad at me, she will often to to "Mi" for comfort.

Miles is a fun kid and we love him, skater or not.

Saffron - Jazz Singer Extraordinaire

Saffron has unearthed her hidden talent: jazz diva. She found the sprinkler wand and the rest is history; a star is born.



Saffron would like to give special thanks to all of those who have supported her in her new career. Marsha for the red skirt and ruffled shirt, Mom and Grandpa Ashton for the curly hair genes, the trumpet guy in Disneyland for the sparkly beads, the Jeff Hamilton Trio for the accompaniment, Dad for filming her, and Home Depot for the sprinkler wand, and her brothers and sisters for attending her gigs and adoring her cuteness and praising her vocal stylings.

Of sparklers and dirt

Lisette found a leftover sparkler in the closet last week. I was going to just throw it away, but Lisette wanted to light it. Here she is framed in a ring of fire!




She also wrote a poem today. She said, "I only did it because Mom made me."

Dirt

Most dirt is compost,
Made of dead plants and apple cores,
And sometimes even dung.

Ok, now here is a poem about Lisette's poem and Lisette's sparkler. Keep in mind, this isn't the greatest poem in the world, this is just a tribute.

Soil
Rich humus,
Food for worms,
Dung of worms,
Home for worms.
Wormy worms.
Sparkler
Fire-sticks for children
Burning sparks of pain
Sting tender skin on hands and arms.
Wonderful light,
Making night shapes.
Sparkly sparks.

Loop-de-loops

I've mentioned to Melinda before that I want to grow my mustache long and curl it up on the ends after I go all gray. She hasn't been to keen on the idea. I wonder if she would go for this look?


I saw this front page article today on Deseret News. I have to admit it's a little extreme, but I still like the idea of a simple mustache curled up at the ends. I like the idea of letting everyone know that maybe I'm just a little bit eccentric. Besides, I'm much too old to get a flame colored mohawk and tattoos are just too permanent.

Afternoon walk

I have lots of time off from work saved up, so I thought I'd take the day off today. I slept in and then did crossword puzzles and Sudoku in bed. After breakfast Saffron and I went for a walk. It was such a nice comfortable day, with the warm sun and a cool breeze. We walked pass mothers pushing children in strollers, joggers, and the occasional cat. Saffron pointed out when an airplane and helicopter flew by.

We walked past the front bumper of a Honda just sitting there on the sidewalk with the license plate still intact. We walked south on 13th east, which is a street I drive on every day to work. It was interesting to see it from a different perspective and different pace. We walked through Cottonwood Park and watched a group of young adults playing flag football. Then Saffy saw the playground and we had to stop.

She climbed up on all the bouncy animals, and then she went up and down the slides with me. She thought it was really funny when I climbed up the tube slide with her. She didn't want to leave, but finally I coaxed her off the swing and got her back into her stroller. She protested, but she was distracted after doing some stroller wheelies and hairpin turns.

I sure love the autumn weather, but it seems to go so fast. I guess I better enjoy it while I can.

Get Me To The Church On Time

The past two months we've been having a hard time getting to church on time. Not really late, but over 5 minutes. I think a lot of people in our congregation must be having the same problem, because as we were walking in the building the bishop announced something to the effect of "get here on time because you're detracting from the spirit by arriving late." Of course he was preaching to the choir, all except for us. Oh well. Someone mentioned in Elders quorom today that his Grandma says that you go to church "to show what team you're on." So even if we're sometimes a little late, at least we're on the Lord's team.

We also just barely got Saffron's Minnie Mouse hat off before we went inside. Lisette was looking at a Disneyland photo album this morning, so it must have inspired her little sister to wear her hat. She was pretty cute, though. I'm sure everyone would have smiled to see her march in with her mouse ears.


We ate dinner at Grandma and Grandpa Ashton's house tonight, like we usually do. Brian and Wendy both had friends over for dessert and a cousin came over too, so it was a lot of fun with such a big group. Then they got started talking about personality tests, and before they were through, there were 5 laptops on the table with everyone taking tests and laughing together.

Miles and Ian made elaborate Lego worlds downstairs, Saffron sat on the doll chairs, and Lisette hung out with her aunts and uncles. We picked some of their tomatoes and apples. We called it a night and the kids took their Otter Pops and gave sweet goodbye kisses.

Wheeler Farm

Today we all went to Wheeler Historic Farm. It's a working rural farm in the middle of the city. Since we went to the fair last week to see the farm animals, now we can see them in a more natural environment.

The kids enjoyed feeding the cow grass. We haven't ever done it, but you can buy tokens and then you can go milk the cows, or the feed the ducks, or take a tour of one of the historic buildings.

Saffron enjoyed the animals, but she kept covering her mouth. I couldn't tell if she was trying to keep the flies out or she just thought it stunk. They had milking cows, horses, chickens, sheep, turkeys and rabbits. We decided that rooster's crowing doesn't sound at all like cock-a-doodle-doo, or even like ki-ki-ri-ki, as they say in Spanish.

The main point of us going today was they had a textile art exhibit. It ended up being more of a vendor driven event, than any real exhibit, still it was educational and entertaining. These young alpacas were really cute and friendly.

They had lots of people spinning wool and alpaca fibers. But I think the highlight was the weaving. Melinda and all the kids (except Saffron) got a turn on the loom. It was pretty cool to see how it works.

It's cool to see farm life and crafts from earlier days, but we have to admit we are very glad to be modern day city dwellers.

Friday!

It's Friday and we've made it through another week. I had a big project at work that I had to do after hours. We had to move our Internet router, firewall, and core switch from the networking closet into the server room. I had estimated it would take 4-6 hours, but we actually did in under 2 hours. It's always nice to come in under your estimate, especially when you have to work after hours.

It went remarkably well. I think having it all mapped out and planned well helped a ton. I usually assume that some things will come up and take longer; but remarkable everything went just as planned. Of course, if anyone has any problem at all on Monday, they will of course blame it on this project (they always do).

Anyway, we've had a busy week and are looking forward to this weekend.

Ian's World

In case you didn't know, Ian has his own planet: Phyramic. He isn't the leader and he doesn't technically "own" it, but he is Supreme Chief Inventor. It's really far from earth; one light year away. Luckily, Ian invented a super-dooper-xblooper rocket so he can travel there every night.


The planet is inhabited with different creatures. One of them is the cycagani, which is a kind of insect. People pull out and their tails and eat them, but their tails grow back again. There are also fire spiders, turtle mice, sontwos, and kamayaways. In the picture above, Ian has diagrammed some of the kamayaway's internal organs. He says, "they are interesting because one of their brains is in the neck, but the main muscle brain is in the lower back, but it's weird because they have other brains."

The main form of transportation on Phyramic is hovercrafts, which Ian (of course) invented. Below is another of Ian's inventions, a super hydro watch. If you push a button on it, it will give you a pet. It will also clean the pet's cage and water and feed it.


Every now and then Ian will give me updates on his planet, and he will explain the way things work there. But not too often, because he's busy inventing.

P.S. Ian wanted to say that he doesn't tell me too often not because he's busy inventing but because it would stress him out too much to be explaining how most of stuff works in one day.

Rosemary potatoes and Saffron hugs

The kids and I watched Labyrinth tonight while I exercised. It was kind of refreshing to see a movie with good old fashioned puppet special effects instead of everything CGI. It was a pretty good flick, though it did have quite the 80's vibe. One of the puppet goblins sounded a little like Miss Piggy, which is always fun. I can't ever watch The Empire Strikes Back without visualizing Miss Piggy when Yoda speaks. I keep expecting for the little Jedi Master to say, "moi?"

Lisette forgot to eat, so when it was over she cried because she hadn't eaten anything. Melinda made vegetarian jambalaya, but that's not what Lisette wanted; she had her heart set on rosemary potatoes.

Saffron came over to comfort Lisette and gave her a big hug. She snuggled up in Lisette's arms and patted her on the back. Then occasionally Saffron would look her in the face, smile, and caress her cheek. Kids always have their little fights, but it's lovely to see them care for each other.

After a little slicing of yukon gold potatoes, a little olive oil and fresh rosemary in pan, and Lisette is good as new. Saffron's hugs didn't hurt, either.

Ode To Tomatoes

When Melinda and I were dating, she told her family that I had several bad qualities. I skied, swam, hiked, wore shorts, played the guitar, played the oboe, and worst of all - I liked poetry. Melinda was sure that anyone who liked poetry couldn't possibly be stable. I'm not really "into" poetry and I haven't even read some of most famous poets. But I had recently had a Spanish literature class and I really enjoyed some of the poems we read, so I happened to mention that to her.

Really, the only poet I know much about is Pablo Neruda. The way I see it, who else matters? I know I'm prejudiced toward him because he is Chilean, and I have a soft spot for all things Chilean, but really he is the best. He is know in Chile as El Poeta, The Poet. If anyone refers to The Poet, it's Pablo Neruda.

Interestingly enough, Chile has two noble prize winning poets, Gabriela Mistral and Pablo Neruda. He was actually a student of hers when he was very young in the south of Chile. There are statues and monuments to Gabriela Mistral all over Chile, and she has her own currency; she is on the 5000 peso bill. But Neruda was much more prolific and important poet than she was, but his politics made him more controversial.

Some of my favorite poems that he wrote are in Odes to Common Things. He was the voice of the common person; all the hard workers of Chile. In Chile a very common dish is ensalada chilena, Chilean salad. It is made with cut up fresh tomatoes, onions (they usually soak them in salt water first to make them milder), olive oil, lsalt, and parsley or cilantro. It's a basic food that everyone eats. So before the tomato harvest is over this year, let's give it up for the tomato!

Ode To Tomatoes
Pablo Neruda

The street
filled with tomatoes,
midday,
summer,
light is
halved
like
a
tomato,
its juice
runs
through the streets.
In December,
unabated,
the tomato
invades
the kitchen,
it enters at lunchtime,
takes
its ease
on countertops,
among glasses,
butter dishes,
blue saltcellars.
It sheds
its own light,
benign majesty.
Unfortunately, we must
murder it:
the knife
sinks
into living flesh,
red
viscera
a cool
sun,
profound,
inexhaustible,
populates the salads
of Chile,
happily, it is wed
to the clear onion,
and to celebrate the union
we
pour
oil,
essential
child of the olive,
onto its halved hemispheres,
pepper
adds
its fragrance,
salt, its magnetism;
it is the wedding
of the day,
parsley
hoists
its flag,
potatoes
bubble vigorously,
the aroma
of the roast
knocks
at the door,
it's time!
come on!
and, on
the table, at the midpoint
of summer,
the tomato,
star of earth, recurrent
and fertile
star,
displays
its convolutions,
its canals,
its remarkable amplitude
and abundance,
no pit,
no husk,
no leaves or thorns,
the tomato offers
its gift
of fiery color
and cool completeness.

Saturday is a special day

Lisette's book club just finished reading Pippi Longstocking, so they had party last night where they made cookies and watched the movie at one of her friend's house. Miles made a quiz show game and played it with Ian and me. He had Harry Potter, famous places, famous landmarks and Star Wars trivia questions. Then after the kids were in bed, Melinda and I stayed up late reading.

Melinda got up early today to take Miles to his skateboarding lesson, but the rest of us slept in until 10:00. We were going to clean up the house, but no one felt like it so we all decided to have a school day instead. It was quite successful, too. Miles finished his novel, Tom Swift: Young Inventor - Into the Abyss, Ian read 12 easy reader books, and Lisette read 5 easy reader books in Spanish and did a lot of math. We really enjoy the flexibility of homeschooling; it works really well for us.

Saffron was very sweet this morning. She sat in my lap and kept bringing me new picture books to read as the other children did their homework. She looks so cherubic with her curly blond hair and her innocent, loving smile wearing only her diaper. Spending time with her and the other children this morning brings to mind what "joy and rejoicing in your posterity" means.

Stressed desserts

Summer is winding down and it's time again for the Utah State Fair. We saw the usual sheep, goats, pigs and cows but we were utterly unprepared for the spectacle that was Deep Fried Desserts. Someone decided that Twinkies, Snickers, and Oreos don't have enough trans-fat already...

...so they thought they'd be better battered and dropped in boiling oil. I asked the guy about the fried Coke, and it's Coke mixed with a dough, deep fried, sugared, then covered with Coke syrup, and whipped cream. Sounds like a recipe for heart disease to me.

It's a potato, it's a corndog, no it's a DEEP FRIED SNICKERS BAR!! Miles and Ian paid $2 each to share this culinary creation. (Please don't report me to DCFS for letting them buy it). I asked Ian if he liked it and he said, "yes." I asked him to describe the taste and he said "it tastes like melted chocolate with the slightest taste of chicken." Miles said it tasted like "a caramel-nut waffle that is deep fried." I can imagine having to eat 2 or 3 of these in a row would make a great new method of torture.

The fair had a reading program this year, so Lisette, Miles, and Ian all read 10 books and got a free admission, a free ride ticket, and a free drink. The drink said "regular" but it ended up being about 8 ounces (how generous). Here are the girls waiting for the boys to get off the Tilt-A-Whirl.


Miles and Ian survived without puking (actually they probably could have rode it all night). Lisette ended up selling her ride ticket to Ian for 50 cents so she could see the Amazing Giant Pig and the 13 Foot Alive [sic] Giant Alligator. She was more impressed with the alligator, she said.



I saw my friend Ryan's family there at the fair. They have a farm which includes Dexter cattle, which is a really small breed. I got to talk to Ryan's dad and meet his sister. Above is a picture of a cute 1 1/2 week old calf they have. And yes, the sign says "DON'T TOUCH" and yes, that is what the mystery girl is doing. Obviously she must not have participated in the Reading Program. So much for literacy.

Unmanageable

Today I went into my company's management meeting to discuss having a standard computer desktop background and screen saver with our company logo on it. Here are some of the comments I heard before the whole discussion broke down:

• "Can we still get on E-bay? I use E-Bay a lot for work."
• "What's next? Will we still let them go to the bathroom?"
• "I like to see my family pictures on my screen saver; that's the only time I see them."
• "One company I know found out they hired a mafia guy from his page on MySpace.com."

Ian is a poet and he didn't even know it

Here is a poem that Ian wrote this year in his poetry workshop.

As the icicles
Rose higher into the sky
It made the fog grow dark
Until midnight suddenly struck.
There was a sudden crack
There was a strike of lightning
Across the sky.

The sun struck red... it was a traffic light.
I couldn't couldn't figure out what kind
So I trotted to the scientist museum
And suddenly there was a strike of tornado.

It was a thunder, bunder tornado.
As the thunder bunder tornado crept
Towards the scientist museum
It went under the scientist museum,
Spinning the scientist museum around and around.

It was so loud it work me up,
I had a nightmare.

Potter Pals