Attending a Citizenship Ceremony at the House of Burgesses in Williamsburg (Virginia) by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Attending a Citizenship Ceremony at the House of Burgesses in Williamsburg (Virginia) by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget-Pennington

The day before Laurent was to be sworn in as a citizen of the United States, I ironed all of our clothes while Laurent polished shoes.  Everyone had to try on their outfits, which I touched up with more ironing.

I made dinner reservations at the Boathouse, so Florence could get a huge bowl of crab claws to remember the occasion.

The next day, we went to Williamsburg (Virginia) for the citizenship ceremony.

Williamsburg has very sophisticated Christmas decorations I noted as we drove into town.  There were no colored and twinkling lights in this town.  Williamsburg dwellers paint real fruit gold to go with the pine wreaths on their doors.

This seventeenth century town made me think we were walking through the streets of England with all the red brick buildings.

Our destination was the House of Burgesses where Laurent’s citizenship ceremony was going to take place.

I told Florence, “We are in a very famous and important place,” as we took our seats on the 400-year-old benches.

A judge swore in the new citizens.  Then, different members of the Williamsburg (Virginia) Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution presided over various pledges and recitations that we were given handouts to repeat and sing as needed:

-the Pledge of Allegiance

-the Americans’ Creed

-the Star-Spangled Banner

The Daughters of the American Revolution then introduced Donald T. Regan, the speaker:

Regan, who was President Reagan’s former Chief of Staff, exhorted the new Americans to learn English and drive the speed limit.

We all received miniature American flags at the end of the ceremony.

“You always get party favors in the U.S.,” I told Laurent and little Florence as we headed out to our blue Nova in the parking lot.

As we were pulling out of the exit, Mr. Regan walked by our car.  We waved our flags at him, and he gave us the thumbs up.

I rolled down the window and said, “We’ll drive the speed limit,” as we pulled out of the parking lot giggling.

We went to the Boathouse and ordered platters of grilled scallops, shrimp, and red snapper.  I got a bucket of crab claws for Florence.

I cracked crab claws for Florence and handed the delicious meat to her and said, “Here you go, kiddo,” after dunking it in warm, melted butter for her.

We ate Key Lime pie for dessert and took photos of Laurent with all his citizenship papers.  Everyone in the restaurant cheered him and loved it that he was a “Navy Guy” husband.

By Ruth Pennington Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Visiting the Holiday Light Show at the Norfolk Botanical Garden (Virginia) by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Visiting the Holiday Light Show at the Norfolk Botanical Garden (Virginia) by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

It was getting dark, so I started preparing for my family’s outing to the Holiday Light Show at the Norfolk Botanical Garden.  My sister sent me a membership to the Garden as a Christmas gift, which we were immediately using for the Holiday Light Show.

I made a huge bowl of popcorn just before we left for Laurent and Florence to munch on in the car as we drove through the light show.  Laurent and Florence sat in the backseat and let me spread out a blanket over them.  I gave them each a big bowl of warm popcorn and set out.

I turned on the Christmas Carol radio station and drove to the Botanical Garden where I got in line with a bunch of cars to drive through the Botanical Garden.

Inside the Botanical Garden, I drove slowly by the twinkling lights on the huge wire sculptures that were set up throughout the Garden, which resembled a winter fairyland.  We all agreed that the gingerbread house made of lights was the best.

“I like the gingerbread house, because there is no witch in it,” Florence said.

“Witches sometimes make you grow up when you outsmart them,” I said as I cackled and made menacing sneers at Florence.

“That’s not true,” Laurent said.

“Hansel and Gretel saved themselves by outsmarting a witch in their fairy tale,” I said.

“That fairy tale is German,” Laurent said, laughing.

We stopped at the gift shop and drank some non-alcoholic eggnog and wassail and sang carols from song sheets.

I still had the Christmas spirit when we came home and made chocolate chip cookies while Laurent and Florence watched the Batman movie.

By Ruth Pennington Paget. author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Visiting the Objectivity Exhibit at the Contemporary Art Center of Virginia by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Visiting Objectivity Exhibit at the Contemporary Art Center of Virginia by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

For my birthday, I asked if we could go to the Objectivity exhibit at the Contemporary Art Center of Virginia.  I wrote a review of the exhibit that I put in our family journal:

Fostering Love for Art: A Family Pursuit

Stimulating your child’s creativity will provide them with a lifelong source of enjoyment and relaxation.

While many parents provide their children with all the materials to let them make projects, they rarely take them to art exhibits or museums to see how others have put their talents and various media to use.

After taking my young daughter to museums and exhibits, I have developed a few activities that can make viewing art a fun and challenging experience.

Visiting the Contemporary Art Center of Virginia’s current show Objectivity: International Objects of Subjectivity offers families a great opportunity to create scavenger hunts for museum visits, for example.

Before visiting an exhibit, try to set the stage for your outing.  Find a book on contemporary art from the library and look at it with your children.

You may want to purchase art books for children as well based on what you see at the library or bookstore.  I purchased Art Forms by Duane Preble at a used book sale for the purpose of discussing contemporary art.  When I planned visits to contemporary art exhibits with my daughter, I would look over this book with her.

When I first started taking my daughter to museums, I had a mental checklist of things to look for to keep her interested in the artwork.  I would ask her questions like:

-Do you see any angels?

-Do you see any mothers?

-Do you see any babies?

For specific exhibits, I try to find out what kinds of items will be on display, so I can make a scavenger hunt list. 

Scavenger hunt items for the Objectivity exhibit included:

-a skeleton

-books

-pillow

-baby cradle

-garbage cans

-spider

-feathers

-butterflies

-canoe

-spiral staircase

-tires

-Chinese characters

As your child locates these items, you can read the labels to find out what country the artist is from and help your child build their vocabulary in the process.  Scavenger hunts are also a way to teach your child to become observant.

The unconventional subject matter and a variety of media in this show would pique interest in many children.  A pail of fingers and a four-sided basketball hoop were among my daughter’s favorite works at the Objectivity exhibit.

My entire family liked Ik-Joong Kung’s pagoda-like structure called English Garden decorated with three-inch tiles and topped off with cassette players.

The idea for tiles came to Kung when he was commuting between the Pratt Institute and his jobs at a Korean grocery store and a flea market.

Kung had no time for studio work, but could easily fit the tiles in his pocket and work on them while he was commuting.  The tiles record his impressions of his life as a foreigner in New York.

Inspired by Kung’s work, the Center for Contemporary Art provides its visitors with the opportunity to purchase a tile for fifty cents to decorate and make part of a mosaic shown in the exhibit.

On the way home from an exhibit, talk about art projects that would be fun to do with your child.  Some easy art projects include:

-make a collage from photos cut from a catalog

-fill a shoebox with everyday objects to make a time capsule for future generations.  (Inspired by the Monica Exhibit from Brazil at the Children’s Museum in Madison, Wisconsin.)

-use pictures drawn on copy paper to “tile” a door

-create sculpture using boxes paper bags and other items such as cupcake papers, photographs, and string

Make sure to display your children’s artwork and make labels for it to hang up in their bedroom.

A good reference book for children’s art projects is Creative Art for the Developing Child:  A Teacher’s Handbook for Early Childhood Education by Clare Cherry

By Ruth Pennington Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Visiting the Forces Exhibit at the Contemporary Art Center of Virginia by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Visiting the Forces Exhibit at the Contemporary Art Center of Virginia by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

It was easy to indulge Florence in art exhibits in Virginia Beach.  We took a brisk walk in Virginia Beach and then entered the Contemporary Art Center of Virginia.

They had a neat exhibit called Forces: Art of the End of the 20^th Century about work with non-traditional materials called “Basic Life Forces” as the brochure called it.  The work Laurent liked the best was called Russian Constructivism via Venice Beach 1994 by James Ossi.

This rectangular pane of glass spouted bubbles inside its sculptural framework.  Florence, the bubble princess, tried bursting the bubbles by reaching for the bubbles.

My favorite exhibit was Bubis Vekris’s work called Split Particles of Rain, 1995.  This work required you to enter a darkened room.  Red lights that looked like cascading particles of rain fell down around you in this room.

This rain exhibit led directly to Shu-Mia’s Holographic Floor, 1996.  We amused ourselves by walking around and seeing what emotion would be on a face popping up from the floor.

The faces in the holographic floor were all Asian, which brought back the prediction of my high school art history teacher, who said that “art will cross all national, racial, and gender lines in the 21^st century.” (Dr. Cletie Tyler – Cass Technical High School Art History Teacher and later Director of Art Instruction for Detroit Public Schools.  Susan Rice was also one of my Art History Teachers at Cass Tech.)

By four, Florence’s favorite exhibit was an entire room dedicated to the three-dimensional strobe light artwork called Mother May I? by Gregory Barsamain.

The strobe light whirled away to the side of the room and hanging from the ceiling in the center of the room was blue blob.

As the strobe light turned, a green hand would reach in and out and take out a ping-pong ball.  We danced in the room to the rhythm of the ping-pong ball.

Florence also rolled on the ground and ran into Laurent and me.  Then, we all got on the ground, crawling around, laughing.  Some serious art lovers came by and left the room, making us laugh even more.  We left, so they view the work.

Florence was certainly developing a love for modern art that day.

Later in the evening while I was sipping some Darjeeling tea, I thought of how expensive it is to produce modern art.

Holograms do not strike me as a cheap medium.  Who financed modern artists?  You had to be rich just to start out.

By Ruth Pennington Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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