Week in Review: Rhyming Play, Cute Quotes and Skiing

So, I started this week in review thing in part to remember cute kid quotes.

Hence, a few moments of dialogue from the past week:

(After mooching a piece of catfish off her father's plate during our Sunday dinner out): "I hope it's not made out of dead cat!"

(Same dinner, after taking a bite of corn on the cob and managing to squirt me -- sitting next to her -- in the eye with corn juice): "It wasn't in my eyes, because my eyes are up here, and my mouth is down here."

(At dinner at home, after commenting that her chicken was a bit spicy, and my comment that some spices are healthy for your body): "Like bacon?"*

(After singing a song learned in church choir, "I Just Wanna Be a Sheep" -- a song that alludes to following the Good Shepherd): "Mommy, I'm Jesus's horse. Are you Jesus's bear?"

The ridiculously bitter cold finally ended toward the end of last week, easing into some unseasonably warm weather in the 40s! During the deep freeze, there was a lot of playing with blocks at our house, building "houses" for a couple of rubber mice. There is apparently a lot of play value in these mice -- they've since moved into the play kitchen, where they are residing in the pretend coffee pot, occasionally being served dinner, and occasionally being baked into a mouse pie.

They also participated in the "play" that the four-year-old requested we perform with last week's hit of the library books, Rhyming Dust Bunnies by Jan Thomas. She found the book hysterical, memorized it quickly and, since there are four characters -- three dust bunnies who occupy themselves with rhymes and a fourth who tries to warn them of the advance of the enemy vacuum cleaner -- it worked out perfectly, in her mind, for she, me, and each of the rubber mice to say one of the characters' lines upon numerous readings of the book.

(Part of the reason we acquired this book from the library is that she's been obsessed with rhymes for a while, constantly asking "does __ and __ rhyme"? And, it's hard to tell if it was merely the memorization of the book -- but she may have been sounding out and actually reading some of the simple three-letter words, like "hat," "mug," etc!)

Part of our weekend activities included another literary event: the Borders bookstore kids' party for Silverlicious by Victoria Kann, the latest in her Pinkalicious series (a huge hit with little girls: how can you go wrong with books that so prominently feature things like the colors pink and purple, rainbows, unicorns, etc.?) I was informed a few days later that she enjoyed that party, so I think it was a hit. :) It consisted of a Borders employee giving a very animated reading of the book, and then some crafts (very glitterful) based on the book, and some take home prizes -- like stickers and shiny pencils. I had also budgeted for a book purchase while there, and made sure to take my Borders coupon with me -- although the idea of so many books rather overwhelmed the four-year-old, and I had to help her make her choices after we had read a few in-store. (We ended up with a couple of Little Golden books -- The Little Mermaid (Disney version), Barbie in a Mermaid's Tale, and a My Little Pony title.)

Prior to the Pinkalicious party, we had attended a showing of free animated films at a nearby library. This month, they focused on winter themes, with a European short about a mole and his snowman, a Swedish one (with subtitles) about two Claymation rabbits building a snowman then getting lost in a winter storm, and the Chuck Jones 1970s version of The White Seal by Rudyard Kipling. (That last one was a little bit long and slightly scary for the preschoolers in the audience - lots of true stuff about hunters and seals --  but I think they try to make these appeal to a wider age range.) She thought the other films were funny, though, and also enjoyed the cupcake the health food people who were cooperating on this event helped the kids make -- they made faces or designs with strawberry slices, blueberries and raspberries, and they provided granola bars and juice boxes for "movie snacks."

We attempted to be even more healthy on our Sunday afternoon excursion to the park -- we started out sledding, but were distracted by the many, many people out on cross-country skis on such a nice day. The four-year-old asked to learn to ski, and I thought it was a good idea -- after all, she lives in Minnesota, so she's going to need to embrace winter, and the sooner she gets used to being active, the better. (Also, I hadn't cross country skiied for a long time, and have been really wanting to -- it was part of my physical education requirement in college and, although I initially signed up because the one-weekend trip allowed me to take more academic courses in my schedule, I ended up really enjoying it. I'm just not very good. :) )

The park rents skis and boots, including kids' sizes, and, after we finally got her boots into the bindings of her skis, the four-year-old actually did really well for the first time -- even figuring out on her own that it was easier to ski in someone else's' tracks. I was not the most graceful skiier ever -- especially since I knew she was losing patience, and finally gave up on actually getting my own left boot into the binding - I just stood on that ski the whole time without it being truly attached -- but I definitely got some exercise. Even more because I had to haul her up from her falls, including the (at least) 15 falls in the same spot that pretty much ended our excursion (every time I'd hoist her up, she'd immediately fall down again, which led to a meltdown).

I suppose it didn't help that her socks were evidently soaked -- becasue she insisted on splashing through every puddle in the parking lot on the way into the park, to the point that we had to scrub purple dye from her boots off her feet at home that night. Still, I'd like to go skiing again.


 * There is an explanation as to why she thinks bacon is a spice. I will provide it if asked.