Well this was the third robotics tournament in a row! It was the First Tech Challenge (FTC) robotics qualifying match. We were crossing our fingers and hoping that the weather would hold up (there was a winter advisory in the area), and it did, though it was pretty rainy! We went to the Appalachian Sate University in Boone, where it was held. Over the past few months we have been working with some kids in Mitchell county to prepare for this tournament. Dad has been coaching- he used to coach this level FTC in Shanghai too. Our challenge was to make a robot that could put whiffle balls into a tube, the higher the tube and the more balls you put, in the more points you score. Being a rookie team it was pretty hard stuff, but we managed to get a working robot and although we didn't move on to the State competition, we still won the motivation award and learned so much! Now, the next robotics adventure will be Sumobots! More on that later!
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Last weekend Mom and I went to the Junior Theater Festival in Atlanta Georgia. It was incredible! After finishing our big production of Guys and Dolls jr., we condensed the show into less than 15 minutes and took it to the festival. The festival started Saturday early morning. We were placed into a pod with six other groups from all over the country, minus one that was from Australia! Each group presented their 15 minutes to two adjudicators and they gave us feedback on our performance. I thought that we did a great job! JTF offers a lot of experiences and a couple students from each group got picked to audition to be on a choreography DVD for the Jr. shows. After lunch, we went to three classes: dance, acting and singing, all with groups and people that we have never met before. That evening we had the new works show case. A few theaters were chosen beforehand to show a couple of numbers that are part of the new shows: there was Singing in the Rain jr, Elf jr and the kick-off for the Lion King Experience. Not to mention a sneak peak of the new musical James and the Giant Peach. We even had a special guest- Daren Criss (he plays Blaine in Glee) that sang some songs for us! When the showcase was over we had a dance party that lasted pretty late into the night. Sunday was more relaxed. The kids who were chosen for All-Stars (two kids from each group picked for their great performance) and the Broadway Slam (where each group enters eight students and there is a random raffle draw) had their rehearsals. They all had an hour to learn a number, and perform it later that day! There was also the first ever Tech Olympics where four kids from each group competed in back stage tasks. Parkway Playhouse got second place! There were some special guests who came, including the songwriters from Frozen, Lilla Crawford who plays Little Red in Into the Woods and Luca Padovan who is in Newsies on Broadway! A producer of Lion King came and talked to us about the making of the musical. He even brought the actor who plays Scar and his make-up and costume crew, and we got to see him get ready on stage! The animator who designed Scar came as well drew a picture of the well known Lion! We also got to see some of the group that got chosen to perform on the big stage. After dinner we all got dressed up and went to see Megan Hilty in concert! (She plays Galinda in Wicked and she was in SMASH.). The experience was fantastic! 4,500 people were there- all really into theater and acting and singing and dance. It was really a wonderful experience and I can't wait to go again next year! PS While I was busy at the festival, mom had a good time catching up with her cousin and her friend! She had a yummy Indian lunch at her cousin's restaurant on one day and visited the Martin Luther King Memorial with her friend from Shanghai on another day! Last weekend was a busy one for our family. Aneka and Mom went to Atlanta for Aneka's Junior Theater festival. Dad and I went to Greensboro for the North Carolina State First Lego League competition held in Greensboro. (We had won the regional championships back in November. See this post: http://happerfamily.weebly.com/our-notes/first-lego-league-regional-competition). We didn't win any big awards but we sure learned a lot! And had a lot of fun! After staying up until midnight the day before we thought it would be great to go into New York, well kind of. We all had some more cousins to visit, and New York City being a great in between place. We drove into Staten Island and met up with our Dad's second cousin and his family, which made his son Louis our third cousin, confusing right? Luckily Gladys got all that figured out. All of us then rode the ferry into NYC. The day was really nice, blue sky and sun but so cold and windy! We didn't exactly want to hang outside too long, so we went to the Museum of the American Indian. That was really incredible, there was lots of old photos and jewelry and clothes to look at, not to mention the tepee! We got to see the Trinity Church Cemetery and the 9/11 memorials. We also managed to check out Times Square without getting run over by people. We could still see little bits of the confetti from the night before. Overall it was a pretty awesome way to end off our vacation. |
The Happer'sHi! This is Preeti, Jim, Rigel, Luna and I (Aneka). We have recently left our home in Shanghai, China to Somewhereinthemountains, North Carolina. Preeti and Jim are both international school teachers and Rigel, Luna and I are homeschooled. Categories
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