Venerunt, Viderunt, Vicerunt

We're back from the North Carolina Junior Classical League Convention at UNC in Chapel Hill, and the kids, like good little Homeric heroes, covered themselves in Everlasting Fame and Glory. I'm so proud, and we had Such fun!

The convention started Friday afternoon. There were around 700 kids, and the "spirit event," in which the various clubs competed with their various cheers was very loud. But despite the noise, I enjoyed it. After spending so long with our little group, where the oft expressed attitude is "this is boring," or "I don't care about Latin/history/writing/etc.," it was lovely to watch a gymnasium full of kids just overflowing with excitement at the prospect of competing in Latin related events.

 (This isn't the group, but one group had a giant blow-up penguin mascot, and their cheer seemed to involve penguin moves. It was quite entertaining.)

 Ed did not enjoy driving on the streets around UNC, but he did enjoy this pizza place!

Getting around the city was... well, we got lost a lot! But once we figured out where the Student Union was in relation to the gym, the kids and I did very well finding the other buildings. What a gorgeous, gorgeous campus! Katie insists she is going to go there some day.

 Love. Sigh.

I offered to help out with the Impromptu Art event, which involved the kids being handed stacks of assorted craft supplies and a written prompt and being given a certain time to make something brilliant. Travis won first in this contest, but I was busy judging the middle school projects and didn't see his Leviathan.

 We missed the chariot races, but we did see a catapult. Ed wanted it to be quite a bit bigger. Maybe next year!

And Katie came in 3rd in two different art categories! She entered a jewelry set (Roman beaded jewelry), and a greeting card. Given the short notice she had to make something, I thought she did very well.
(These first ones below are not hers.)

The one awkwardly mounted on foam is hers. Poor kid. Clearly a good mother has things like fake necks lying around the house, so that her daughter's jewelry projects can be shown to best advantage! Fortunately, presentation clearly didn't count here!

And Katie's is the cute little mouse in a toga. The saying is "Carpe felem" (Seize the cat!).

And Travis entered our club shirt, which he designed the logo for, and won 2nd! Some of the shirts were really terrific, so that was particularly gratifying.

I don't know who made this map, but it shows the birthplaces of various Roman authors, and I thought it was very cool! There were just scads of wonderful, imaginative projects.

Today Travis had a couple meetings, both kids did academic testing (where they didn't cover themselves in quite so much glory -- we need to spend a little more time on Roman culture and mythology next year), and we went to a couple lectures by professors from the Classics department. Also, there was a series of short, "Latin-y" plays put on by students in the drama department, which was fun but made me realize how much pop culture I don't know. Still, we had a great time!

Did I mention how beautiful the campus is? Oh my!

 And then there was a closing "spirit" contest, and winners in all the various events were announced, and the new officers were sworn in. I'm not sure exactly what Travis's responsibilities will be as Technology Coordinator, but he liked the other officers, and all the people I talked with in the group seemed very nice, so I'm sure it will be interesting and a good experience!

 (New officers looking at the new president. Aren't they just sweet and sincere looking?)

And now, of course, we are completely unprepared  for co-op on Monday -- papers are not written, history is not read, Latin is not completed -- but I expect we'll get enough done, and we had Such a good time!