Diorama

Di-o-ra-ma...four syllables that strike fear into every parent's heart. I must be the oddball because when I learned that Addison had to do a diorama for school in preparation for their May field trip to the Philadelphia zoo, my inner grade school child was unleashed. I loved making dioramas as a kid. I find it amusing which childhood memories stick with you. Three of my most distinct ones all involve my dad and school projects. The first was a Sculpey koala bear for my Kindergarten zoo project. Let me tell you. When you have an architect for a dad, you are guaranteed to the have the best-looking, most life-like Sculpey animal in the Kindergarten zoo. The second was a veggie person whose head was made out of butternut squash. I have a picture of me with it, which I will try to dig up and post. I'm sure you'll get a chuckle. And the third project was a diorama which, if memory serves me correctly, was supposed to be of a particular topography and I think I did the plains.

Back to Addison's project. His animal choice was the polar bear. We used glitter paper to cover the exterior of the shoe box to represent ice and snow crystals. Inside we used scrapbooking paper that looked like clouds for the sky. Addison painted the bottom of the box a deep, marine blue for the Arctic water, and then we used poster board for the icebergs and white Sculpey for the frozen sea. The bears were purchased from the animal bins at AC Moore.

We were both pretty happy with how it all turned out. I'll let Addison tell you the rest and read you his report. The kid cracks me up.

Part one.

Part two.