Approaching Normal

BACK TO BALLET: Today we started making our way back toward a "normal" schedule following the Christmas chaos.

For starters, we headed to the village for a ballet class this morning. Though her normal Monday ballet class was off due to the holidays, Annabelle did enjoy a special dance camp today. It's theme was "Jumpin' Jeremy." During it, the kids watched a ballet video about a frog named Jeremy who "had to jump from lily pad to lily pad to get to the best fishing spot in the pond - the middle." There, he promptly fell asleep and when a fish bit his line, he got pulled into the water with it. He made it back to land safely, and lived happily ever after, by Annabelle's telling. The take away was a cute little stuffed frog, which she loved.

TABLE TIME: Once ballet was over, we got right down to business. First, the kids continued their first chapter dealing with multiplication. It went mostly, OK, except poor CJ was having a complete mental block on one problem.

He kept getting it wrong over and over and over. Meanwhile, Annabelle had finished up, so she was keeping herself amused by playing her new accordion ... while jumping on the trampoline.
Apparently CJ found this a tad distracting, so a dejected Annabelle trudged off to the top of the spiral staircase to play the blues.
FINALLY, CJ figured out that 6x4 = 24 and we were able to continue on.

DANKE SCHÖN: Next up, we got started on the many, many thank you cards we have to write. First we took inventory of gifts received and who the kind gifters were. Once that was figured out, together we designed the cards and then the kids worked collaboratively on writing on their insides. While they worked, I played one of my Christmas gifts, composer Christopher Tin's "Calling All Dawns" CD. Tin is a California native of Chinese descent.

"That's wonderful music - really good music tracks," assessed Annabelle.

CJ asked, "Is this from 'The Lion King' " during the first track, "Baba Yetu," which is the Lord's Prayer in Swahili. A couple tracks later, during "Caoineadh," a song with its lyrics rooted in Ireland, CJ asked, "Is that part of the 'Beauty and the Beast' song?"

Many of the songs were hauntingly familiar though we'd never heard them before. The lyrics paired with Tin's compositions takes listeners on a journey through several cultures - Swahili, Japanese, Mandarin, Portuguese, French, Latin, Polish, Hebrew, Farsi, Maori and Sanskrit. Together, the CD is an amazing artistic accomplishment. When the last track came on, it was clear the musical journey had come full circle, but not until reading Tin's Web site did I find out that "Calling All Dawns is a song-cycle in three movements: day, night and dawn. Each movement corresponds to a different phase of life--life, death, and rebirth. In short, it's 5 songs about life, 3 songs about death, and 4 songs about rebirth. There are songs of joy, mystery, and hardship, reflecting the complexity of our mortal selves. There are songs of the deepest, darkest sorrow to accompany us through death. And finally, there are songs of triumph and exultation that bring us roaring back to life, beginning the cycle anew."

The CD, which has been nominated for two Grammys, was recorded at the famous Abbey Road Studios with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. It's Tin's debut album. We're sure looking forward to his future projects.

NO YOGA: In an email from snowy New York, we learned that there would be no yoga this afternoon. Ironically, not because the kids' regular yoga teacher was snow bound and unavailable; it's because the substitute teacher was sick. Tonight before bed, CJ said, "I hope she feels better soon. And I hope she didn't get sick from us."

I assured him that wasn't the case. :)

MONKEY SEA: Today we launched a science experiment - we laid the groundwork for spawning Sea-Monkeys.

We found an intact kit at Value Village last week for $1.99 (score!). The kids were hot to get on it that day, but I told them we needed to be home to feed the Sea Monkeys, so it would have to wait until after Christmas. So, today was the day!

CJ filled the Sea-Monkeys tank with water and Annabelle conditioned it.
Bee was mad that we didn't get to hatch any Real Live Sea-Monkeys today. "I do NOT want this to be more than a one day process," she said, with an Attitude.

I offered up a "good things come to those who wait" type sentiment. Tomorrow, we get to add Step 2 - the Sea-Monkeys. Stay tuned. ...

LMAO: This evening, we were watching "Sunday Night Football," which had been postponed until tonight because of the wretched weather back East.

At one point, Annabelle asked, "Who do you want to win, Dad?"

Christian was non-committal.

At that point, CJ weighed in. "He doesn't really care who wins. He's watching it just for the hell of it." At that, CJ abruptly headed to his room for some post dinner YouTube. Hysterically (to us) about 60 seconds later he re-emerges and asks, "What does 'Just for the hell of it' mean?"

BRIGHT LIGHTS, BIG CITY: Not quite ready to call Christmas over, tonight we went out in search of Christmas lights. Having grown up around the Portland (Ore.) metro area, Peacock Lane is my frame of reference.

After searching the Internet, we decided to check out Candy Cane Lane.

We learned that Seattle's "Candy Cane Lane" grew out of a contest sponsored by the Seattle Times around 1950. The initial challenge was to create a display that shows the most Christmas cheer and "Candy Cane Lane," a circular block north of the U District, took the top prize.

According to a Seattle Times article, the 23 houses on Candy Cane Lane are the result of 1920s University of Washington architecture project, "which fashioned this block as a neighborhood community, with homes made of brick and arched doorways with tiny garages hidden in the back."

It certainly wasn't a huge display, but it was nice. We made the small circle three times (which took all of 5 mintues). Peace was the theme of the display (don't know if it's this year's theme or the ongoing one), but the word 'peace' was featured in several languages in front of the Candy Cane Lane homes.
We all liked the animated (his mouth opened) nutcracker at Candy Candy Lane.