Mami is an alien and other conspiracy theories

Mr E came up to me the other day, magnifying glass in hand, and an inquisitive look on his face. I was instantly proud of him, imagining him a play detective or scientist. And I suppose I was right, in a way! He inspected me for a minute, and when he could not find the evidence he was looking for, he still gave me a skeptical look, and a not so friendly warning. "I'll be watching you!" he said, dead serious, and walked away. 

You must already know what this was all about, but I didn't realize it at the time, until later that day when I heard him tell his sister that there was other evidence they should take into account. "What does she do all night after we go to sleep?" He asked behind the closed door of their bedroom, trying to convince his sister. "Everybody knows that aliens fix their spaceship at night, when no one is looking- yes, she probably has a secret button in the garage and some stairs that come down and her secret spaceship is up there. And isn't she suspicious when she makes new dishes, and why did she walk away from me when I was inspecting her!?!" He was all worked up by now, so he really can't be trusted. And also in my defense, I totally didn't walk away. I had just stood there stupidly, in fact, thinking something like, What the heck? 

But I was an alien now? My latest "new" dish had been a hit! And we do have a not-so-secret opening in the garage, and it does have a staircase that folds down from the ceiling, so one can go to the house's attic. No secret airships in there! Ah, well. When I told Quijote about this little occurrence later that evening (while HE was making dishes, might I add) Q said that E had also been looking for a zipper on him. Ha! So that's what the inspection was all about. 

Ms E could not be convinced of my unearthliness. But it doesn't stop here, of course, because the idea had been planted. And where other children have imaginary friends, mine construct entire civilizations. The next time she read a book on her tablet, she came up to me asking if I knew where her pink thumbtacks  could be. What did she want thumbtacks for, you ask? 

 Because there are aliens out there, that's why!

She had read a book about the Aztec pyramids, the Nazca Lines, crop circles, the Bermuda triangle, and other mysterious places of the world. She showed it to me, and said she had a theory and all these had to be evidence that aliens really must be out there. And did I know her book on space says that there are billions and billions of galaxies just like ours out there? Surely the odds that one of those planets can have life are pretty high. She's pretty sure the government is keeping secrets from us, actually. 

Still, since she has never seen an alien with her own eyes, she has started a record of the evidence she does have. This is what my children have been using their lessons on the scientific method for, you guys. She says she is going to solve the mystery of the aliens. And wonders if she can make a living out of this. In the meanwhile, while we could not find her little box of fancy pink thumbtacks, we did find some regular white ones, and she used an old stretcher as a board. And here is is her handiwork.

It is hanging on the wall next to her bed, and has all kinds of information she's gathered from her books, as well as personal experiences, like that time when she was out playing by the trash bins and a talking racoon kept bothering her. She doesn't remember what the trash panda was saying exactly, but perhaps talking animals could in fact be aliens in disguise. Also, some of her things have been disappearing, through no fault of her own, of course, and what other explanation could there be? I did mention that some cultures believe in fairies or even house gnomes, but she wasn't convinced. She has been collecting visual evidence with my camera, after all, and is reminding me now that I should post those videos, too. I promise to do that soon.

Well, she has also been reading up on the subject, and holding informational meetings with everyone who will listen. She even gave her spiel to my mom, who got a call specifically for this purpose and was so patient in listening to the whole thing, and even sent her a video, which she loved watching.

That weekend, I sent the hubs to check the mail, and we got a letter from Grandpa! The kids decided to put the letter, which included some interesting questions on plant structures and their relationship to mathematical structures, into their folder with all their plant information.

They also got a special package from our local church. There was a secret message written in crayon, and some watercolors so that they could read it. Thus, the sleuthing experienced a revival, and a couple more activities ensued.

She wrote a letter to her best friend J, whom she's missed very much this year. She is wearing her detective cap, by the way.

I also tried to get them to write their own secret message, this time with lime juice. We revealed our secret messages by heating them up with a hair straightener. It kinda worked. I think using grape juice might have been a better reveal technique, but we don't have any to try it with.

What was a little more exciting to both make and tell the kids all about was the cryptex from The Da Vinci Code. There are tons of videos on YT on how to make one from cardboard, but since these videos are mostly edited for entertainment value, they seldom explain any mechanics, let alone the entirety of the mechanism's important specs, which made it challenging to recreate a working, locking cryptex. I had most of the information, though, and I finally figured out a couple issues, and I just want to say I am super proud of myself for figuring this out. Here are my two creations, one for each of the kids. 

 I am re-watching videos and this one actually shows a correct mechanism. She doesn't explain it, but she does show every step in the making. I simplified it by using toilet paper rolls. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=659fGzWpLzg&t=279s

There are tons more interesting things to learn about in this topic. Ms E has already learned how Morse Code works- maybe I can get her to actually learn it? And I found lots of fun looking links on Pinterest that teach about forensics detective work- such as fingerprinting and shoe printing, DNA extraction, etc. Maybe I can convince them to do a couple more things. Should be fun!