Lego Fair

Two years ago, we participated in a homeschool lego fair with a local homeschool group. 

Last year we were all too weepy after saying goodbye to Irina post hosting. This year, the kids were ready! 

Here is Luke and Ethan's creation. (A restaurant, house and garage/work shed) It was mostly built and designed by Luke, but Ethan built some of the furniture inside the house. I was thankful that Luke was willing to share the spotlight. [I did NOT tell them they needed to match. The funny thing is that we have so many blue shirts with stripes, it is almost inevitable. :)]

 It is hard to capture the detail in the picture, but I enjoyed seeing Luke's creativity. 

My understanding was that their building needed to be their own idea and not a pre-packaged set. 

You can see in the background of this picture that there were a 

lot of eager builders there. A much bigger crowd then two years ago. 

Two years ago when Luke had to explain his creation to the judges, he was like a statue 

and hardly said anything. This time, he was confident and very talkative explaining 

each feature. I was very proud of my shy guy. 

They received the "Honorable Mention" prize.

Irina and Aaron decided to build something together at the last minute. They were hoping to win a prize and I tried to prepare them to just have fun! I didn't want to discourage their interest in participating. They built a restaurant. 

 It was the first large crowd gathering we have attended with Irina that did not have clear structure. There were lots of unfamiliar faces and lots of mingling. I was anxious and like a fish out of water. I've completely forgotten how to be social in large crowds. ;) Irina, on the other hand, was confidently circling the room on her own looking at the lego displays -- always making sure she knew where I was and where her brothers were at all times. The only time she became nervous is when one of the judges talked to her in fluent Russian. Her cheeks became flushed and her eyes became big. She couldn't believe it! Of course, she said nothing back in Russian and later told me she didn't know what he said. She explained, "Irina no talk 'russkiy.' Irina talking good English."