Suddenly, It's *Last* Summer

So, it seems that I took the summer off from blogging. That wasn't exactly intentional (at least at the beginning), but we had a good summer full of beach visits, berry picking, birthday parties, family reunion, festivals, parks, picnics, pony rides, science experiments, State Fair, swimming lessons  -- and a weeklong stay with family at a lakeside cottage. (There was debate as to whether it was properly a "cabin" or a "cottage." The dictionary was consulted.) With the travel and the activities -- and the soaking up the sunshine before a Minnesota winter (we're supposed to get a light frost tonight) -- wow. that went fast.

(Almost a Month) in Review - Part One

Aaagh! It's snowed again today. I am so ready for this to be done with: I completely agree with the comments posted on a local news channel's weather section, in which someone identified Minnesota's seasons as including Winter, Still Winter and Enough Already!

I do, however, feel vindicated that I had not yet got around to packing away winter coats and boots or doing the seasonal wardrobe switch. Truly, my distrust that snow season is over until some time after Easter -- no matter how late Easter occurs -- has proven wise this year.

We have, however, had some quasi-warm days in the past couple of weeks: warm enough, at least, for the four-year-old to engage in bike riding. Before (most of) the deluge of snow from the winter melted, she was fancying herself a tracker on some of those rides: she'd stop the bike to examine animal tracks in the remnants of snow left near the sidewalk, count the toes, and speculate on the animal that had caused the tracks. (Note: my vote is for a dog going for a walk.) She also directly transferred the sand buckets and shovels from use in the front yard -- where they had been building snow castles, pretend ice cream, etc., this winter -- to the sandbox in the backyard, where she has been spending much time. She gathered pinecones from a neighbor's tree that overhangs our fence and drops them into our yard for use in the sandbox as well; for what purpose, I'm not exactly clear -- although I do know that she's been playing "pirate treasure," which involves burying things and then digging to look for them.

Birds have been spotted in our yard, too -- we've seen robins, cardinals and mourning doves -- and we paid a visit to the Minnesota Zoo for their "spring babies" exhibit, which involved petting a baby rabbit and admiring baby chicks, calves, a camel and more animals. We had several conversations that the zoo would likely not be having any baby horses, since - I'm pretty sure -- all of their grownup horses are "daddies," and you need both a mommy and a daddy to have a baby animal.

I've made some minimal progress on spring cleaning. One thing I did accomplish was cleaning out the Tupperware/plastic dishes cupboard, doing such things as identifying which repurposed containers actually had lids, which lids fit what, and containing said lids of the repurposed containers in a Ziploc bag so they don't spill all over the cupboard. I also found the popsicle molds in the back of the cupboard and had to fend off a request from the four-year-old to make popsicles -- for one thing, it is not warm enough yet for popsicles (see note about snow!); for another, I refused to start on this year's batches of popsicles until I had cleaned up the sticky mess in the freezer from where last year's popsicle juice spilled. (She does not know that I also successfully cleaned out the grime from the fridge and its on-top freezer while she and her grandma were watching the movie "Secretariat" -- again. Complete with pretend horse races starring the four-year-old. It's a shocker that the knees get blown out of so many of her pants, I tell you ...)

Grandma's visit to us was in part to do fittings on the new spring dress and skirt she was making for the four-year-old and me, from matching fabric. (Four-year-old N has been wanting to have matching outfits for a while now, and I figured we'd better do this while she still thinks it's cool. I let her pick the fabric -- within reason -- which ended up being a purple background with a spring floral print.) I was also able to delegate her to four-year-old haircut duty, and to send home my yard waste from bushes trimmings with her (the lazy woman's way of getting rid of it before our yard waste season). Grandma also accompanied us to the movie "Hop" that weekend (meh. It was OK.) and to a spring craft show where I purchased some cleaning cloths and some Easter-themed cloth napkins, my mom purchased a couple of metallic garden flowers for outdoor decor and the four-year-old, after energetic play in the indoor playground of the community center, plus rearranging nearly every single one of the (possibly former kindergarten teacher, or at least blessed with patience) vendor's plastic eggs in her display, convinced her grandma to buy her one of these items: a washcloth folded into a bunny shape whose tummy holds a plastic egg which, in turn, contains a tiny ice pack, to be used as a "boo-boo bunny."

We've also remembered this month to get out our Easter books for our seasonal reading basket, and we made a plastic egg garland -- as suggested in Amy's Notebook of March 16 -- for a household decoration. (Plastic eggs saved from previous years' egg hunts, plus the four-year-old's crafts stash of yard sale yarn, provided easy supplies for this.)

Week in Review, Part Two: Biking and Other Spring Exercise

So, spring was on the calendar last week, and it made a brief foray into Minnesota weather patterns as well. (It's back to snowing again now.) In fact, there was enough snowmelt that we went from sledding one weekend

to bike riding the next. (For a couple of days, anyway. And then complaining all day the next day about not being able to ride the bike because it was raining.)

The four-year-old is enjoying some newfound bike freedom this year: she gets to ride on the sidewalk up and down our block all by herself. It is not a short block, so this is some good exercise. She's not allowed to cross any streets on these forays, though -- as she informed our dog-walking neighbor when inviting herself and and her bike along on their walk, to the end of the block.

This is another spring phenomenon in Minnesota: not only does the snow melt and the grass green up (eventually), but neighbors you haven't seen since trick-or-treating suddenly reappear, almost as if they, themselves, are spring shoots of bulbs that have spent the winter buried underground (most likely, in the basement next to the fireplace).

And, with the reemergence of neighbors, my social butterfly seems to find new friends each year. This year's new playmate is an eight-year-old who lives a few houses down from us (and who has shown amazing patience in playing with my four-year-old). They were out this weekend biking, blowing bubbles and having a party on a blanket in the neighbor's driveway with Barbies and other dolls. And, in one of those transitional season things, also playing with our snowball maker in the remaining piles of snow. (I'm pretty sure the snowball maker at our house is one of the attractions for the eight-year-old.)

Meanwhile, the eight-year-old's mom was cleaning out the winter debris from their car in the driveway (I haven't tackled that spring task yet), and I was trimming back the bushes that line our front sidewalk -- the ones that, if you don't trim them, grow to proportions that take over the sidewalk and engulf small children. At least, I trimmed the ones that had emerged from the snow: there were still piles a foot or two deep on top of some of them, and it is way too hard to pull the branches out from under such piles for trimming.

That was my exercise for the weekend. The four-year-old, in addition to all the bike riding, had soccer practice at church on Saturday morning. This is soccer for pre-K and kindergarten age. Which means things like three of them standing in the goal (regulation size goals, so they really fit in the goal), holding hands -- while the other team's ball sails right past all three of them into the goal for a score. Also, when not directly interacting with the ball, the four-year-old and a friend were entertaining themselves by doing handstands against the gym wall.

At this age, as another of her friends reminded us as they engaged in church hallway pre-choir practice entertainment of lying on their backs on the floor and stretching their feet above their heads so their toes touched the floor, they are "more bendy" than grownups.

Week in Review: Singin' in the Spring?

I did a bit of cleaning this past week -- I suppose one could call it spring cleaning, as I did take most of the winter decorations down, and redid our seasonal table with some more spring-like decor. (The bird dresser scarf is from my grandmother, and some of the artificial tulips -- the silk ones -- in the vase were decor at my bridal shower several years ago.)

Part of the reason for this was that I hosted a "Sing in the Spring" brunch on Sunday. I really enjoy entertaining every so often, and used another of my grandmother's linens -- an card-table-sized tablecloth embroidered with spring flowers -- to cover up some of the scratches on my coffee table, which served as one of the eating surfaces. (It has also seen semi-regular use as a racetrack for toy cars, dumping ground for wooden blocks and puzzles, etc. -- hence, the scratches.) Menu consisted of orange juice and water served in pitchers -- as well as peppermint tea in a spring green teapot, but I don't thin most people noticed that -- fruit served in a cut glass serving dish that I think was a wedding present, microwaved sausages served in one of our wedding china bowls, Almond Cake (recipe from my grandma) served in a Tupperware® cake keeper, and Spinach-Egg Casserole served in the glass casserole dish I baked it in (the one with the lid; to make it easier to store leftovers).

After some time chatting and eating, a former coworker of mine, who left to actually pursue her dream of a career in music, led us in some semi-structured singing and in some singing exercises. (She's now running a "spontaneous singing" business, designed to teach people improvisational skills that can transfer to other areas of their lives -- whether they "can sing" or not.) I don't think anyone really knew what to expect, but we ended up learning a beautiful song in the Zulu language (the lyrics, which she eventually translated for us, translate to "every burden rolls away"), having a hilarious "story" communication around the circle which took place completely in invented language -- emphasizing the importance of nonverbal communication -- and created a samba rhythm with various groups counting different beats and combinations of "1 and 2 and 3 and 4." It was great fun to spend this time with friends, and to spend time singing -- and our singing experience used much more energy than I thought it would!

The four-year-old and the husband were not home for much of this event, but the four-year-old did help prepare the spinach for the egg casserole the previous day by helping me cut it into smaller pieces: I used the kitchen scissors; she used one of her pairs of safety scissors -- which I washed afterward, because she complained that they turned green.

And, despite the new decorations and the spring theme of the brunch event, spring has not yet arrived here -- it snowed again late Sunday afternoon and evening. Which is one reason why it's a good thing that our church is offering a youth soccer program on Saturdays in March: it's the time of year when parents and kids are getting desperate for opportunities to run off some of that pent-up energy. (We've played some Gator Golf in the house, but it's just not the same.) In fact, at last Saturday's first session of the pre-K and kindergarteners' soccer, as soon as the coach said, "Now I want you to run--" all the kids took off immediately running in the church gym. They didn't bother to wait for further instructions. The four-year-old actually did pretty well with the "skill drills" in practice, and played enthusiastically -- at least until she wore herself out.

Earlier iin the week, I also went to a Craft Night with friends, where we worked on various crafting projects in one woman's living room. I have a few cross-stitch things I'd like to get done before Christmas (especially since the original intent was to finish them for last Christmas...), but at least I'm not working on a needlepoint project begun 30 years ago. :)

And, last Wednesday evening, I saw four trumpeter swans flying north in the early evening. Perhaps it's a sign that some spring-like changes are on the way.

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.

Week in Review: Cold, Grocery Shopping

First, let's get the weather out of the way: it has been coo - ooo - ooo -ld here this past week. When I looked at the thermometer outside of our kitchen/dining room on Friday morning, it read 20 degrees below zero.

Of course, that thermometer is in the shade.

On the up side of winter, the days are getting noticeably longer -- the evening sky around 5:00 on Tuesday was a beautifully glowing blue, seemingly moonlight-infused in all areas of the sky. And the full moon itself was absolutely stunning as it glittered in the sky. (I believe the most appropriate name for this full moon of January is "Moon of Strong Cold.")

We had no babysitter on Wednesday (somehow, she didn't feel like dealing with preschoolers on the day of a double root canal. Huh.), so the four-year-old and I were sort-of home together all day -- except that we went to the grocery store in the morning and her church choir in the evening. We also made cookies (peanut butter cookies with Hershey's kisses on top), and played Play-Doh®.

At the grocery store, I replenished supplies of things like frozen pizza and hot tea, and put her in charge of finding six General Mills cereals that had a "10" on the sign -- since they were running a deal where, if you bought six G.M. cereals, it took $10 instantly off your bill at checkout, plus you got coupons for free milk and eggs on future trips. I required that two of the six choices be varieties of Cheerios, and only ended up with Cocoa Puffs as something I wouldn't normally purchase. We also picked up a tad bit of guacamole from the deli, since it was being prepared on a cooking show the four-year-old and her father were watching in the past week, and one of our dinner table conversations was about how avocados are "healthy for your body." She also helped unload the cart at the checkout lane; as she was hoisting full jugs of milk and 64-oz. bottles of juice out of the cart, the elderly couple behind us commented, "Wow, that looks heavy." To which her response was a confident, "Yep. But I'm a strong girl."

I also had a book group meeting (to discuss The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck), and a women's group meeting this week. I used a bit of time before book group to go to Bath and Body Works in the nearby mall and smell the scents of spring.

Week in Review: Happy New Year! Sledding and Epiphany Bonfire

After spending much of a Christmas vacation naptime (the kid's, not mine -- moms don't get to take naps) writing down memories from the past holiday season, I have decided that it would be much easier to do a week in review type entry on my blog, keeping track of things we've done, experiences I want to remember, cute kid sayings, etc.

Because I know that I will definitely want to remember, when she's 18, that a lesson learned at the rehearsal for her Sunday school Christmas program was that I needed to make a "no headstands in church" rule. You just don't think of these things in advance.

This week, I learned that, if you decide to incorporate kid-friendly New Year's celebrating by letting the four-year-old dig out a party hat and a noisemaker from her dress-up supplies and shout "Happy New Year!" on New Year's Eve, you will pay the consequences in having to listen to this at least 25 times over the course of the next couple of days.

Also, even though the temperature is zero degrees Fahrenheit or below (I failed to check the windchill), if you force said four-year-old to dress for outdoor play in long underwear + shirt + sweatshirt + pants + two pairs of socks + snowpants + boots + parka + hat + mittens, you will end up with a sweaty little thing after an hour and a half of sledding at the really cool sledding hill at a nearby park.

It is a really cool hill, though: big enough to be fun, but with a gentle slope and a wide "landing area" that is mostly treeless -- and the park service has thoughtfully wrapped some foam "bumper pads" around the trees that do surround this area. Surprisingly, only one other family was out there sledding with us this weekend, although there were quite a few people on cross-country skis on the park's trails. This prompted the four-year-old to quote from one of our family books that comes out at Christmastime, Olivia Helps with Christmas, "Time to hit the slopes!" (She is also quite fond of quoting the page, "Olivia liked to let loose on the chorus, 'Gl-OOOOOOO-RIA!'" I do not have a quiet child.)

Since it's wintertime, though, we have needed some indoor activities -- we've played a few rounds of UNO this week (we could look at this as working on math skills...or sportsmanship), and have been regularly reading out of her new Mary Engelbreit Fairy Tales book. The pictures are beautiful, and it contains a nice selection of fairy tales to give her a literary/cultural base (plus, I really like fairy tales). It even has one of my favorites in it, "Snow White and Rose Red." Her favorite fairy tale remains "Sleeping Beauty" in all its incarnations, and we've also discussed how yucky it would be to have a frog in your drinking cup, a la "The Frog Prince." She has so far refused to read "Rumplestiltskin," on the grounds that, "It doesn't even have a princess in it!" and "Rapunzel," because of the "mean witch." We also still have a Care Bears Bedtime Stories collection checked out from the church library, which contains a Care Bear introducing each selection, among them another favorite fairy tale around here, "The 12 Dancing Princesses."

Our church had a few Epiphany activities on Wednesday night, including a bonfire outside on the snow which burned people's non-artificial Christmas trees. Several people gathered around to watch the bonfire and sing Christmas carols like "Joy to the World," "Silent Night," "Away in the Manger," "Hark the Herald Angels Sing"... and "Rudolph." I really enjoyed this, and the four-year-old was impressed by the "sparkles" (sparks) we could see going up into the dark night air from the fire.

Epiphany marks the end of the Christmas season in the church year, and things are getting back into a routine in the rest of our lives, too. The Avon bath paints from the four-year-old's stocking are all used up, and she has completed all of the dot-to-dots in the Crayola book from her stocking as well -- within the first day after she received it. (Santa knew she liked dot-to-dots. Santa didn't realize she liked them that much.)