I loved the book “My Favorite Pets by Gus W. for Ms. Smolinski’s Class” by Jeanne Birdsall. It’s all about Gus, who lives on a farm with 17 sheep. The sheep are like his best friends, but they don’t talk and even though he has tried, Gus can’t get them to climb a tree, or ride a skateboard. Gus does fun things with the sheep like using one as an umbrella and he tries to get his little brother involved, but he doesn’t like it and cries a lot.
Did you celebrate the 4th last month? There are many people in the United States who do not understand why we celebrate the 4th of July. I have done some research to better understand this holiday. I found the history of the 4th of July, why and how we celebrate it, and some interesting facts about the holiday.
In 1776, Richard Henry Lee suggested that the 13 colonies come together to create their own nation separate from England. This huge meeting was in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. On July 4, 1776, the Declaration of Independence was adopted.
My family took the Bottle Battle Zume Game to the beach with us this summer. We almost didn’t take it because my parents thought we wouldn’t have room in the car for it. As it turned out, it didn’t take up much space and we were all so happy we’d brought it. The game was lots of fun and we all played many hours on the beach with it. It was easy to set up, but my cousins and I used lighter plastic toys, instead of the bottles. It was easier for us to throw the disc and knock them down. When the adults played, they used the bottles that came with the game, and that worked well for them.
College football is starting soon! For 2015-16, the National Championship Game was held in Phoenix. Earlier this year I took a trip with my mom, dad and brother, Chase, to the Phoenix Convention Center to be a part of Playoff Fan Central. The Playoff Fan Central is a multi-day fan festival that gives lots of kids an opportunity to experience the College Football Playoff National Championship. There were bands, cheerleaders, interactive photo booths and sports games. My brother and I got to play at different games.
![Golfland Sunsplash by Golfland Entertainment Centers (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons](http://bearessentialnews.com/sites/default/files/scoops/2016/Jul/golfland_sunsplash.jpg)
Sunsplash is a water park that is fun for all ages. There are crazy, insane water slides—there are scary slides and steep ones and some that go really, really fast. You have to be 48 inches tall to ride any slide or to go into the wave pool without a life jacket.
I went on every slide because I was big enough. I spent hours at Sunsplash riding slides and having so much fun there!
There was an ice cream shop and boys could go in without a shirt or shoes on. I got a huge ice cream there. The wave pool made huge waves that are deep.
![Pennies by Roman Oleinik (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0) or GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html)], via Wikimedia Commons](http://bearessentialnews.com/sites/default/files/scoops/2016/Jul/U.S_pennies.jpg)
Do you know someone who has had a blood cancer? Chances are, if you do, they may have been helped by the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. One person is diagnosed every three minutes with blood cancer. Another 171,550 are expected to be diagnosed in 2016 according to the Leukemia-Lymphoma Society.
Christina Szilvassy, campaign assistant for Pennies for Patients, says the society began in 1949. Its mission is to find a cure for blood cancer. It supports families and patients fighting cancer by assisting them with co-pays and travel programs.
Childsplay began 40 years ago. David Saar, graduate student at ASU, wanted to bring a group of actors together to put imagination and wonder in the minds and hearts of children. The mission of Childsplay is “to create theater so strikingly original in form, content or both that it instills in young people an enduring awe, love and respect for the medium, thus preserving imagination and wonder, those hallmarks of childhood that are the keys to the future.”
I went to the International Spy Museum in Washington, DC. I interviewed Lucy Stirn, the Museum Educator who teaches all of Spy Museum’s student workshops and assists with the development of curriculum and education resources. She says, “the museum started in July 2002 by man named Milton Maltz. His idea was to create a place where people can learn about intelligence or spying. There had never been a museum open to the public about spying.” She says, “there is another big spy museum in America, but it’s closed to the public.
