ANZAC Day 2014

The girls marched in yet another ANZAC Parade this year. Agent Smelly was particularly excited because it was her first time marching as an actual Guide. She so loves being in the older group.

 

 

Behind the girls are the wooden poppys that were made this year and placed in various public areas around town. Don't they look fabulous?

W is for ... "Wreaths"

 



Yesterday was ANZAC Day here (and in Australia). Our town held it's annual service in town and once again the girls participated with their GirlGuides unit.

This year Agent Smelly finally got to lay the wreath (she has been complaining for years that she never gets a turn at doing anything on ANZAC Day) at the cenotaph. (That's her on the left in the pink shirt and sash).

 

Here's the wreath the Brownies helped make. We used a glue gun to place a layer of poppies around the top, outside and also inside of the foam wreath. (Photo courtesy of a friend)

I was mucking about with some our handmade poppies and put one in Agent Smelly's hair and had one of those "Aha" moments. I ran off and was off with an old headband and glue gun in hand and Voila, a headband perfect for ANZAC Day. Is there nothing that a glue gun can't do? I wonder if they make cordless one's? I can see me now walking around with glue gun in holster, gluing things around the place left, right and centre ... "such fun!"

 

 

 

R is for ... The Red Poppy

Today we read The Red Poppy, written by David Hill and illustrated by Fifi Colston and song (yes there's a CD accompanying it) by Rob Kennedy.

It's a lovely picture book about a young Kiwi soldier (I am guessing by his friends Maori name) in France during World War 1 waiting to jump out of his trench and fight the Germans. He's scared and not looking forward to shooting at or killing anyone, although of course no mention is made of this in the letter he has just penned to his family.

Jim jumps out of the trenches with his comrades and makes his way towards the enemy, many of his comrades are falling around him and then he ends up wounded and lands in a deep hole cause by a shell explosion. In the hole he meets an enemy soldier, Karl, who he realises is seriously wounded and initially is as scared of him as he is of Karl.  Together, Jim and Karl, with the aid of Kipper the dog, work together to get rescued.

My girls liked it and found the book a little sad (I confess I did a bit too ... constricting voice last page read) and although it is aimed at a young audience I would tend to keep it to older children as it deals with serious themes. The pictures are all dark and muted except for the splashes of the red poppy, the symbol of hope.

I would highly recommend it though, as I love the messages in this book. War wasn't pleasant and was scary but Jim still showed courage, compassion and humanity.

If you'd like to hear the lovely song, click here ... Little Red Poppy  There are a few on You tube but I chose this one because it has the words with it.


Later we made our own Red Poppies to finish for our wreath to lay on ANZAC Day at the Cenotaph.

• We used a butterfly punch to cut out two butterflies from red card.
• We glued them across each other.
• Punched out a small black circle and then glued that on the top in the middle of the flower.
• We then cut out some random shaped green leaves (they were more realistic that way - OK we didn't have a leaf punch) and glued them on the back. Some have one, some have two leaves.
• We then slightly bent the petals and leaves a bit so they were rounded like a real flowers petals and leaves would be.

Quite simple but effective poppies, wouldn't you agree?

Q is for ... Le Quesnoy

Every year on the 25th April, ANZAC Day, both the nations of New Zealand and Australia stops to remember those who served or are serving in our military.

Briefly for those who don't know what an ANZAC (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) is, it is man who'd served with the Anzac forces at Gallipoli in 1915/16. Over 8,000 Anzac's were killed at Gallipoli and 18,000 wounded and another 8,000 missing (possibly blown up or captured).

This year it is in the middle of our school holidays in NZ so we wont be doing too many activities as we are pretty busy with trips planned away. I did manage to grab a few books from the library for us to read. Sadly they didn't have much choice for my girls age so we made do with what we could find.

The first book we have just read is "Le Quesnoy - The Story of the town New Zealand saved" written by Glyn Harper and illustrated by Jenny Cooper.

It's the true story of how a group of NZ soldiers saved a small town in France, Le Quesnoy (pronounced Ler Kay nwah) being occupied by the Germans, during the first World War. It's written as though the story is being told by a woman who was there when she was about 5 or 6.

The town of Le Quesnoy was an old fort, protected by high stone walls up to 20 metres high. There were around 2,000 Germans occupying the city, which they had done for about 4 years. It wasn't an easy time for the locals, they shipped any healthy men off to work for them in Germany and then took what they wanted, not leaving much to the towns people who were hungry and scared.

The New Zealand division was sent to Le Quesnoy to take back the town. In order to take back towns, in many cases they were destroyed and civilians killed. In this case, whilst around 130 Kiwi soldiers were killed and another 300 wounded, not one single civilian life was lost!

The book is basically a picture book, so there's not a lot of reading and it's probably best aimed at 5 - 8 year olds but my 11 year old found it a "cool story", although she more listened than looked at the sweet illustrations. At the back of the book is a map of the town and more "older aged" details which I was able to read out to my girls. We all thoroughly enjoyed the story and then spent a little more time online looking to find out further information. Agent Smelly was even inspired to go and make a poppy out of Hama beads.

The people of Le Quesnoy have never forgotten what the NZ troops did for them and many of the town's streets have New Zealand names and they even teach NZ culture and geography as part of their curriculum in their Primary schools. They have also erected a monument near where the the first New Zealander, Lieutenant Leslie Averill scaled the wall to take back the town. Apparently New Zealanders are very warmly welcomed still to this day.

The Fashionista was pretty right, it is a "cool story".