The Egg Hunt is on! (well, almost)

Passover begins at sunset today, and Easter is this Sunday. While perhaps better known for spiritual practices, these holidays have something else in common--searching! Whether for Matzoh or colorful eggs, children (and some adults) will be keeping their eyes peeled, and the girls in the Barn won't be missing out just because they're at boarding school. Starting on Thursday night, Michael and I will hide candy-filled eggs all over the dorm...and we'll keep hiding them all weekend!

New Barnies for Next Year?

You might remember when your family came to Revisit Days at CSW, and many of you know that this week the week we welcomed about 115 newly accepted families to come to campus for the inside scoop on what it's like to be part of our community. Though we didn't have the best weather ever, we did have a lot of help from joyful and enthusiastic Barnies. Some of them hosted visiting students and took them to class with them, some of them gave presentations to a large assembly of students and parents, some had lunch with our (hopefully) future boarders, and some showed off their dancing skills. I was so proud of how the members of our community pulled together yet again and gave so freely of their time and energy. It was fun to watch and listen to them--they are all CSW experts, but also so articulate and passionate. They shine.

The admissions office accepted an outstanding group of boarders from all over the world (including China, Honduras, Hong Kong, South Korea,Malaysia, Mexico, Taiwan, and Vietnam), and all over the states (CO, CT, DE, FL, GA, MA, MD, MN, NC, NJ, NY, OR, PA, TX, and VT) and many of them were able to come to a Revisit Event to meet our current boarding students. There were a lot of great connections made, and the girls in the Barn have been eagerly asking if we've heard back from the boarders they hosted. It's an exciting time in a sense, thinking about the future of our dorm!

Surprise Party

Several of the Barnies got sneaky this past week to throw a surprise birthday party for Cheyenne and Rada on Saturday night in the student lounge. Impressively, they were both actually surprised--including Rada, who helped organize it! They had told her it was for Cheyenne, and she had no idea she was a guest of honor as well. We have some great event planners in the Barn this year!

Baby Rainn is Born!

Williamson Rainn Wanner was born yesterday morning (finally!). Isn't he a cutie? He hasn't come home yet, but we're very excited and are preparing a warm welcome for Alicia and Travis and baby Rainn! (But we promise to give them time and space before we all try to meet the new baby!) Yay!!

Happy Birthday, Rada and Cheyenne!

Today is Rada's 17th Birthday, and Cheyenne's Sweet Sixteen. We celebrated last night at the dorm meeting. Rada had requested tropical fruit, and Cheyenne's mom brought cupcakes for the dorm, and, of course, there was a bit of singing to mark the occasion. =)

A little art to introduce spring break...

Following this post, you'll find most of the Barnie art that was in the Mod 5 art show. Some artwork was in binders and hard to take pictures of, but I did the best I could. This mod had the wearable art fashion show too, and I wish I had been prepared to take video for you. I don't think any Barnie work was in the fashion show, but it was still really neat to see how innovative CSW students are! In any case, enjoy the art...and SPRING BREAK!

The Barn already misses it's lively inhabitants...

Melisa's Art

Hyeon Jin had a LOT of art in the art show this mod, and for one of her projects, she mailed art-making instructions to various people and then put the resulting art in the art show. She mailed me a card with a cityscape on the bottom, with instructions to make a collage and statement about the true meaning of life. (I'm pretty sure that's the hardest question possible, by the way). The best I could come up with was: "The meaning of life is to live a life full of meaning."

Juliana's Art

This is a picture of someone "reading" Juliana's collage book. It doesn't really do it justice because you can't read it for yourself. It was really cool though...certain words on each page were highlighted in such a way that they told their own story as you flipped through the pages of the book.

Hyeon Jin's Art

This is hard to explain, but it's Hyeon Jin's visual representation of her movements and experiences on the day that Robin died.

Da Hae's Practically Edible Art

It's licorice!

Hyeon Jin's Visitor Art

This is an artistic representation Hyeon Jin made of visitors to the Barn. How cool is it to make art out of visitor logs??

Hyeon Jin's Silhouette

You can totally tell it's Todd!

Kanae's Art

I think she made this with a snowball!

Jin's Art

Minami's Self Portrait

Katie's portrait of Sarah

Katie's portrait photography!

Maddie's Photography

This is Maddie's photo of Da Hae's form for the licorice bra! =)

Hyeon Jin's Art

Hyeon Jin is tripping over a rock she drew on the wall! haha. =) Notice the tears in the last frame...

Sharing the love...

Briana, Courtney, and Kandice are in Facing History together and decided to have a table at lunch raising awareness for a group called To Write Love on Her Arms, which is a non-profit movement dedicated to presenting hope and finding help for people struggling with depression, addiction, self-injury and suicide. TWLOHA exists to encourage, inform, inspire and also to invest directly into treatment and recovery. They wrote love on many arms today, including mine. Great work, girls!

Happy Birthday, Jane!

Jane's birthday was really yesterday--and there was plenty of singing and yelling and giggling then too, believe me. But we had our dorm celebration at the meeting tonight, complete with brownies and ice cream. Happy Birthday, Jane!!!! =)

Welcome back, Jofia and Blen!

Jofia and Blen get back to the states tomorrow. Yaaaayyyyy!!!! We've missed you guys!

Dance Concert!!

This weekend was the annual dance concert, highlighting student choreography, performance, and lighting design. We were lucky enough to have the Barn well-represented at the dance concert this year. Here are some clips from the night--sorry we couldn't get the whole thing (though I bet you could find it on youtube).

Shari was in "Totems", choreographed by Martha Armstrong Gray, the head of our dance department.



Rada designed the lighting for this dance, called "Door", which Minami choreographed and performed.

Minami is also one of the "dancers" in this clever performance, choreographed by Carey Foster, one of our dance teachers.

The next dance, called "Blind I's" featured Jenny--and she did the lights for it! Sadly we experienced some technical difficulties and my camera ate Jenny's dance off of my memory card. Sorry! She was really good though--take it from us!

Briana and Shari are both in this dance, called "Kidz on da Block."

Missing Robin

It's been a tough week at CSW, as we struggled to process the death of Robin, one of our beloved theater teachers, on Monday afternoon.

Robin had taught here since 1970, and was chair of the theater department from 1976 until this fall. She had a tremendous impact on our community, and she will be missed and remembered by many, many people.

Robin was surrounded by her family when she passed away. She is survived by her husband, Jeremy, and three children.

CSW is working with Robin's family to plan a community-wide celebration of Robin's life sometime this spring.

Missing Barnies

So we're missing a few of our family this mod: Da Won, Blen, and Jofia. Da Won is doing her capstone project back in Korea, and we're totally missing her. Blen and Jofia are spending this mod in Costa Rica, studying all kinds of neat things first-hand. You can follow their adventures on the CSW Costa Rica blog. There's some great pictures!

We miss you guys--hope you're having the time of your life!

Oops, I lied

I had every intention of posting pictures of the end-of-mod art show, I really did. This is the first art show I've missed seeing during my time at CSW, and I'm sad about all the Barnie art I (and, consequently, you) have missed seeing. But by the time I finally made it over there, much of the art had been taken down already. I'm sorry--I'll take twice as many pictures next time!

Whoa--Winners in the Barn!

More on this soon...but I just heard that Jin, Kanae, and Minami were all Gold Key Winners in the 2009 Boston Globe Scholastic Art Awards, while Helen won an honorable mention!

CONGRATS to our Artistes in Residence! =)

Happy (Almost) Valentine's Day to Us!

This is the time of year where everyone gets cabin fever. The February blues, if you will. We've had our little crush on the snow, what with the sledding and skiing and spontaneous snowball fights, but now we're writing love letters to spring break and t-shirt weather. We've had enough of staying inside, and the snow has turned all crusty and dirty and lost its glittery shine.

Which is why the Barn dorm parents decided it was time to take things into our own hands. So we organized a break-out of study hours as a surprise for the girls. We gave ourselves a girls' night out at the movies. It wasn't required, of course--but anyone who needed a little uplifting was welcome to come along to bond over a new movie full of good dating advice: "He's Just Not That Into You." The general theme was: if you want to know how a guy feels about you: ignore everything he says and pay attention to his actions! Good advice, I'd say.

It was a good movie--we laughed, we cried, we cheered, we groaned, and we clapped. And, on the bus ride home, you could just feel the good energy on the bus. Yes, we had to come back and finish homework. But we were heartened. And uplifted.

And, then (speaking of judging men by their actions)...after we came home and settled in for the night, there was a knock on the front door of the dorm. And who do you think it was, after in-dorm time? The White Farm Boys--also out for a little V-Day pick me up (albeit a little early). Turns out that they spent the night making AMAZING chocolate covered strawberries for all the girls on campus (including dorm parents--thanks, guys!!!). They were SOOOO good. To be honest, the Barn girls were just a touch suspicious. It was all just too good to be true.

But it WAS true. We were again heartened. And uplifted.

Take that, February.

(Come to think of it, maybe this is WHY Valentine's Day is mid-February. What better reason to create a holiday filled with chocolate, than to break up the February blues?)






(Special thanks to the White Farm boys--and to Tom, since we suspect his culinary talents and thoughtfulness may have had something to do with tonight's treat. YAY White Farm!!)

Happy Birthday, Kandice!!

Today is Kandice's birthday, and even though we're officially celebrating as a dorm on Sunday night, she still had a pretty celebratory day. Barnies left little love notes for her on the white boards all over the dorm...

...and then there was singing and cake at dinner!

Long time, no see....

My apologies...we're a bit behind on the blog posts...it's been a busy week. I haven't made it to the end-of-mod art show yet, but don't worry--I will! I promise there will be some pics from the art show in the next few days, so keep checking back.

Melisa and Michael Make Maki

The Barn girls have just finished a mod, and many of them are off-campus for mod break, getting refreshed for a new mod-full of classes. Michael and I decided to take this chance to head back to school: cooking school, that is. Make no mistake--Michael is the head chef in our house. But we both love sushi, and so we enrolled ourselves in a class that promised to teach us to make our very own ngiri sushi, scallop ceviche, and spicy tuna maki. I have to tell you--I was skeptical of our ability to make maki. And, I have to confess--it did take a ridiculously long time (this explains the slower service in sushi restaurants, perchance)...but being the photo geek that I am (just ask our girls in the dorm) I managed to sneak some evidence of our success...before it got gobbled up!

Happy Birthday, Maddie!

Yesterday was Maddie's birthday, and she wasn't here for us to sing to her (lucky her!) so we made her a card instead. Even though we didn't get to sing to her, we're still wishing her HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

The Question Board

Outside our apartment door, Michael and I have a "Question Board". It's really just a white board, nothing special. I'll write a question on it, and the girls will all answer anonymously. It's really fun to see what people say, and to see the things we have in common--it's sometimes very surprising, but also kind of reassuring.

This week, I wrote the following phrase: "Since coming to CSW, I..."

Here were some of the answers:
...have begun really living
...become well-rounded
...gained and met new friends
...have loved high school
...learned a lot about people
...have been worried about the future
...have been more confident in the way I dress and act
...have really wanted a boat

Once the board is full, we start over with a new question. Right now, the girls in the dorm are writing anonymous love notes to each other on the board. =)

Happy Sunday from the Barn...

Happy Birthday, Hyeon Jin!

Today is Hyeon Jin's birthday, and we celebrated last night with her request of spanakopita (how sophisticated!). She's giving me this fake smile here because the first photo was blurry and I made her pose again. =)

Hyeon Jin got the best birthday present EVER from Jane, our Head of School--a SNOW DAY!!!!

We.Are.So.Excited.

Jin won!

Our super cool school counselor had this awesome bag that she knew one of the Barnies would like (because we're so awesome, too) and last night a bunch of people threw their names in a hat, and Jin was the lucky (awesome) winner of the awesome bag.

My apologies for my overuse of the word Awesome.

Belated Boy Birthdays =)

Michael and Travis are getting old. ;) hehe. (Just kidding, guys!) Michael's birthday was on January 2, and Travis' was January 22...but we're just getting around to celebrating because our nights have been pretty busy celebrating birthdays this month. This picture is of Travis and Michael getting all shy because everyone is singing to them. We celebrated with apples and peanut butter (the safe kind) and Hagen Daaz ice cream bars, which were a big hit! Happy Birthday, Travis and Michael!

YAY Barnie Basketballers

Our girls JV team (half of which are Barnies) won tonight! Yay!!

Winter Wonderland Dorm Dinner

Tonight was our Winter Wonderland dorm dinner. Half of the Barnies came early to set up (note the awesome table decorations and snowmen) and half of them stayed late to clean up, so it was a real team effort and a big success. There was comfort food...soups, salads, garlic bread and cheesecake with toppings! (Helen was REALLY excited about that part!) =)

And, if I'm not mistaken, we actually pulled off the first dorm dinner of the year, so we've left some big footsteps for the other dorms to follow in. ;)

Katie's Birthday!

Katie's birthday is on Thursday--she's turning 19! We celebrated with singing and cream puffs--with cherries on top. Happy Birthday, Katie!

Juliana's Trip to the ER

Juliana sliced her finger on a rogue fishbowl today (you'd be surprised how dangerous a fishbowl can be!) and needed a quick (or not so quick) trip to the ER to get a few stitches. We rushed her right off (along with Cheyenne, for more moral support) to Newton Wellesley, which we all agreed was pretty much the nicest hospital we've ever seen. We got a pager when we checked in (like you do at chain restaurants when you're waiting for your table) and there were comfy chairs and flatscreen tv's and valet parking. We didn't have time to check out the cafeteria, but I bet it's top-notch.

This is a picture of Juliana waiting for "Dr. Bailey". Seriously, that was supposed to be our doctor. We were pretty excited to see how our Dr. Bailey compared with the one on tv. Sadly, we wound up with Dr. Bailey's assistant. But she was actually really cool. And also really patient. She answered all of Cheyenne's millions of questions (Cheyenne is very curious, you know) and she was really cool about trying to make sure Juliana couldn't feel her stitches. But, you know, it's kind of hard not to notice when someone is stitching up your finger, especially when you can see it happening.

That's Rebecca, explaining the whole process to Juliana.

There she is, injecting the anesthetic and getting ready to stitch.

Juliana was very brave but it still hurt a bit and it was good that Cheyenne was there. Cheyenne was a really good friend and held Juliana's hand and tried to distract her. But she kept sneaking peeks at the stitching. It was a tad fascinating. =) Juliana is pretty sure she never wants to have more stitches, but I'm not sure Cheyenne has the same conviction. Rebecca let us watch Family Feud while she was stitching Juliana up, which was a decent distraction. We're all really good at Family Feud.

We were in the pediatric wing, and this was the registration desk. At first I thought they made a mistake, because, you know...Juliana isn't a little kid.

But it turns out there was no mistake. ;) Cheyenne had a lot of fun with the nautical wheel. =)

The whole ordeal took about 4.5 hours. And if it had just taken a littttttle while longer, we could have gone out for dinner. Sadly, we finished just in time to make it to dinner back at the dining hall. What happened to the days of getting ice cream and lollipops after a visit like that? Juliana deserves some ice cream...she was very brave. (Juliana? You should come get some candy from our candy bowl at least!)

Thanks to Juliana for being willing to share her stories and pictures for our little blog community. It made for a pretty exciting story, didn't it? But we're really glad you're all sewn back together! Feel better soon!

Tomorrow (Tuesday) is our dorm sponsored dinner, and Juliana actually headed up the committee to organize and plan for our dinner. It will be in the dining hall, but we will totally transform it into a real winter wonderland. It's gonna be awesome. Stay tuned for pics...

Monopoly Moguls

Hard core monopoly night in the Barn tonight...they've been playing for about four hours. Shari is pretty much out of money, and Asha and Jofia are neck and neck. Notice Helen on the couch...she refuses to play with her sister, who she claims is overzealous when it comes to monopoly. I suspect Shari might agree. ;) But it's all in good fun, and everyone seems to be having fun on this snowy night.

**UPDATE** In case you were left in suspense...Jofia won. =)