Destination Imagination 2016 (Siobhan)

~Destination Imagination 2015-16~

Ethan and I have had an incredible time participating in DI. This was my 7th year of DI, and Leo's 6th. We've both benefited so much from this program, especially this past year!

Before I get started, here are the links to our previous DI posts by year: 2008-9 and 2009-10 and 2011-12 and 2012-13 and 2013-14 and 2014-15.

This year our challenge was to:

• Present a mystery story set on Earth in a team-chosen time period before 1990.
• Discover, live on stage, which of the three suspect characters is responsible for the mystery.
• Include a TechniClue that helps solve the mystery.
• Present in the style of traverse staging.
• Create and present two Team Choice Elements that show off the team’s interests, skills, areas of strength, and talents.

We decided to write a medieval parody based on the Legend of the Sword and the Stone. We had so much fun learning to speak in the medieval dialect and researching the time period in order to incorporate it into our presentation.

First we had to design and build our backdrop. We decided we wanted to make it a medieval book. We cut stones out of 100 square feet of styrofoam which was donated to us by a furniture store.

 Our 'styrofoam blizzard'

We nailed canvas onto a wooden frame Ethan made out of 2x4s and painted it black. Then we hot glued on the styrofoam stones and sealed them with modge podge.

Every good medieval backdrop has a suit of armor, so Ethan offered to make one out of cardboard.

Cardboard Armor

Jon made chainmail out of soda pop tabs for us. This took about 6-7 hours to complete, as he had to bend each of the tabs individually and then slit them and attach them to each other!

Next came working on our techniclue. Ethan is our 'technical' team member, so he built us a mechanical wooden table. It operated via levers, pulleys, and weights. We nailed a tablecloth into the levers on the side of the table so that when you pulled the tablecloth it released the weights, activated the pulleys and caused the crystal ball to 'magically' rise out of the middle of the table.

Our first team choice element was our scenery; our second was our music! Jon learned the mandolin so that he could play it during our skit. He came up with some music and Noah wrote the lyrics. Ethan played the tin whistle for our introduction music. Jon and Noah also came up with a rap sequence.

Meet the Cast...

Jon aka Rob, our narrator who is always ready to lighten up the story with some music

Ethan aka Geoffrey, our King Arthur figure, who pulls the legendary butter knife out of the bread

Asia Grace aka Beatrice, our 'Visagothic' princess. She'd be the first to tell you, "Belike, I don't do the whole excitement thing."

Siobhan aka Paige the Page

Noah aka Edward, replaced by Geoffrey as king

Lily aka Megan (not Morgan!) le Faye

We placed first at our regional tournament and went on to compete at States. We then won 1st place out of 40 teams in NH and qualified to compete in DI Global Finals 2016. Thanks to many incredibly generous friends, family, and businesses, we were able to participate in this amazing event.

Click here to see our DI 2016 Globals post!

Destination Imagination Global Finals 2016 (Siobhan)

Global Finals 2016

Our DI team was totally shocked and excited when we found out that we placed 1st in NH and were eligible to compete in the DI Global Finals competition. We were also in a rush to fundraise the $8000 needed to get our entire team down to TN and pay for our registration fees in less than a month! We set up a GoFundMe page and went door to door asking businesses for donations. Everyone was very supportive and encouraging, and thanks to our amazing family, friends, and local businesses, we raised the full amount of money and were able to compete!

Globals was a phenomenal experience, and we are so grateful we were able to participate in it. Here is a description of the event from the DI website:

Global Finals is the world’s largest celebration of creativity. Each May, more than 8,000 of the world’s most innovative minds compete in teams to showcase their Challenge solutions in our international competition, celebrate their creativity and have fun.

This year, we will have teams from 20 countries, including: the U.S., Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Cayman Islands, China, Colombia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Japan, Jordan, Korea, Mexico, Poland, Qatar, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Turkey and the United Kingdom.

After we fundraised the money needed for our trip, we had to fix up our props and scenery. We also had to rearrange our skit's characters, because one of our team members was not able to make it to Globals. We had a lot of fun working together in the last weeks before we left, and we made lots of great memories.

~Canterbury Tale Bearers~

Asia's uncle offered to drive our entire team down to Globals in his 40 foot long luxury RV. We all had an awesome time driving down.

While we were in Virginia, we stopped at La Ray Caverns. The formations were breathtaking!

 The above picture is a reflecting pool, which was definitely my favorite part of the tour. The water looked as deep as 18 feet in some areas but was actually only 18 inches deep. The reflections of the stalactites in the water made it look like there were stalagmites coming up out of the ground.

We also tried out a garden hedge maze which was right outside the caverns. It was really fun, but definitely much more challenging than a cornmaze!

 The Gentilhommes (who brought us down in their RV) stayed at a campground in TN. We spent an afternoon there while Mrs. Foreman registered our team. It was a gorgeous campsite, right by a lake.

 We played volleyball and tetherball, grilled some yummy hamburgers and hotdogs, and enjoyed sitting around the campfire.

 We finally made it to Knoxville, TN!

 Tennessee was gorgeous! This was our view every day when we went to lunch

We went up into Knoxville's Sunsphere which was massive! It has several floors and even holds an Italian restaurant.

It turns out that scenery doesn't hold together well on a 16 hour drive! Thankfully we were able to pick up some paint and styrofoam and fix it.

 Ready to perform!

 Opening ceremony was huge! It was so cool to see 20 countries come together to compete.

15,000 people!

 We went to the Innovation Expo where we got to see exhibits set up by 32 exhibitors, such as NASA, Ford, National Geographic, Microsoft, Scholastic, and many more!

We loved the virtual reality and 3D exhibits, where we got to dissect certain objects such as the heart shown above. It looked like the objects were coming right out of the screen.

We went to the Evening Under the Stars event where we got to see a performance by Step Afrika.

 The University of Tennessee was where the events were located. The campus was beautiful!

 Pin trading is always a big part of Globals. It was really fun to see pins from all over the world. We made some great trades and met a lot of people in the process.

Waiting in the rain for our IC (Instant Challenge) to start :)

My favorite event at Globals was the duct tape costume ball. We all went as wizard of Oz characters.

 We also got to do the 'Try DI' challenge where we had 30 minutes to design a car, build a prototype of it, design a logo for it, and come up with a 1 minute sales pitch to present to a board of Ford designers. It was challenging but a lot of fun.

Our Ford 'Caht' (a car/yacht)

Closing ceremonies were very bittersweet. We were sad to see it all end, but we were so happy to have gone to Globals!

We placed 16th out of 80 teams for our Central Challenge and 7th for our IC!!

We have had an absolutely fantastic year in DI, and we've made so many lifelong memories and friendships. We've grown so much as a team this year. Go Canterbury Tale Bearers!
To read our Central Challenge post, click here