Day of Discoveries

SLIME TIME: Right after breakfast this morning, the kids were all over the slime that Annabelle brought home from a friend's house yesterday.

Actually, it was more stretchy than slimy today, which made it better to play with, really.

I got some mats out and gave them each a pizza cutter and they had fun pulling and cutting it.NO REPLY: This morning an ad for a Dora doll came on TV. That sent CJ into a bit of an anti-Dora rant. He doesn't like how Dora the Explorer will ask a question and then stare out into TV Land, waiting for viewers to answer her.

"It's stupid. They can't hear you," CJ he said. "It would be smarter (to talk to them) if they could hear you," he pointed out.

I must say, the boy has a point.

OUR COUNTRY 'TIS OF THEE: For some literature and history learnin' we turned to the (library) book "America The Beautiful" which came with an audio CD - which ended up being a bad thing.

The book's words are the poem by Katharine Lee Bates which was eventually paired with a tune called "Materna" by Samuel A. Ward, producing the familiar patriotic tune still sung today.

The paintings in the book, by artist Wendell Minor, are gorgeous. But the s-l-o-w narration of the book was, well, off-putting. Obviously the slow meter of reading was to allow the kids to enjoy the scenery in the illustrations, but it just came off as awkward. It probably didn't help that the language is super stilted compared to today's standard. (Example: "God mend thine every flaw, Confirm they soul in self control Thy liberty in law!" isn't the stuff most kids' books are made of.)

But it wasn't just the meter that was odd. It was the manner. For instance, at one point facing pages read "America!" and "America!" However, they were read as nearly a whisper, and not imploringly or all that urgently, in our humble opinions.

"It doesn't sound like they're using the exclamation points," CJ astutely observed.

Clearly, the book was a bit of a bust with us - all because of the distracting audio accompaniment. I think I'll read it with the kids in a few days and just talk about the message of the words and what's in Minor's pictures (there's a neat guide at the end of the book that has info about each scene).

Next up was the very entertaining "The Scrambled States of America" a book turned into an animated short by Scholastic. In the story (by Laurie Keller) all 50 states go to a party, and there, they decide to switch places so they can each see a new part of America. It didn't turn out too well. ...

With all the switcheroos, "They won't fit together, and, well, the United States wouldn't look good," said Annabelle.

And in their new places, "They ended up having stuff they did NOT want," CJ said of the states.

Also on the DVD was "This Land is Your Land." Written by Woody Guthrie and sung by his son Arlo, it was a fun tour of the county "from California, to the New York Islands." I was able to cajole the kids into singing along.

Third up was "The Star Spangled Banner," illustrated by Peter Spier and sung by the amazing Aretha Franklin. How could you not like that?

There were also a couple of bonus features on the DVD - two tall tales the kids are quite familiar with. Samuel L. Jackson narrated Julius Lester's version of John Henry (illustrations by Jerry Pinkney). And last but not least was Reeve Lindbergh's telling of "Johnny Appleseed" (illustrations by Kathy Jakobsen).

LOVELY LUNCHEON: Just after noon, we headed to one of our favorite outdoor spots - the Olympic Sculpture Park - to meet a friend passing through Seattle for lunch. We love going there - every time there's something new and interesting.

While we were waiting at the rendezvous spot, a couple of freight trains went by on the very nearby railroad tracks. The train was less than a stone's throw away, so we could really see the wheels in motion and feel its power.

Soon, our friend came and we headed up a couple of blocks to the building on site housing a small cafe, restrooms and a rotating art exhibit. We stood and pondered the current installation. On the wall was a very pop art (to my eye) piece. On the floor (you have to look closely in the photo) there were clear acrylic containers in which you were supposed to deposit any plastic caps you might have on you. Interesting.We wandered outside and showed our visitor some of the sculptures and crossed over to the portion of the park that has lots of chairs and a fan-freaking-tastic view of Puget Sound. There, we sat on the grass in the shade of a tree and used a chair as our table for lunch. Big People enjoyed sushi while the kids savored Mighty-O donuts scored in the cafe.

Afterward, we strolled around the sculpture park, and found one path down along the waterfront we'd never even explored before.

Soon, it was time to walk our friend to her car - several blocks to the south on Alaskan. On our way back to our car, instead of staying on the streetside sidewalks, we ventured out around the backsides of a couple of buildings, including Anthony's (restaurant) at Pier 66.

I really wanted to take the kids to get good look at the HUGE cruise ship docked out back. Man oh man, what a big boat!!!! It was like a small city back there, bustling with activity. We watched cranes load and unload cargo for awhile.
Right there on Pier 66 we also discovered a sweet little wading pond in the shape of a fish. The kids puddled about in it for awhile, and also played in a Saturn-esque, low-slung fountain right next to it.

We headed home and took Kirby for a walk, much to her relief (ha ha).

ANOTHER DISCOVERY:
Though we'd walked many blocks today already, when Christian got home, I was raring to go for a run. I was also itching for more adventure. For years now, I've known that somewhere in 330-some acre Discovery Park there's a children's playground, but in all our trips out there (it's less than 2 miles from our house), we'd yet to find it. I decided today was the day to right that wrong. After about 15 minutes of Internet research, I was able to find a map online that showed where the park was (on the park's east side, near 36th street, and behind the Visitor's Center). We loaded the kids and dog into the VW bus.

We parked in the Visitor's Center lot and followed the trail to the southeast of it. Truth be told, I was expecting some crappy, land-that-time forgot playground with a tire swing or two, but I figured we HAD to check it out. Almost immediately we passed a pair of tennis courts that looked brand spankin' new. Hmm. ... That was promising. ... And then we came upon the play area.

There were lots of swings of various sizes and styles, a nice sized play structure with a couple of slides, a suspended bridge and some swinging/hanging apparatus and wait, what's this, off to the side?

Christian saw it first.

"A zipline!" he announced. Woooooohoooo!

Oh, we had so much fun! The zipline was about 50 feet long, and just enough of a decline to it to give you a good rush. The kids probably went on it 20-plus times apiece, and yes, Christian and I both gave it a go, too. What a wonderful discovery and so close to home. We've been here a couple of YEARS now. I could just kick myself that we haven't been to this play area sooner. Not only are the zipline and play structure great, there's a great canopy of evergreens over it, making it wonderful for a sunny day, or a slightly drizzly day - I think the trees would keep you mostly dry.

Also, there's a natural amphitheater right next to the park, and some great grassy hills for rolling down. And those tennis courts, they were, in fact, brand spanking new. A sign on them said they'd just been resurfaced and are set to open tomorrow. There was also a full basketball court and a volleyball court right there.

Did I mention that on a sunny afternoon in August, we had the whole place to ourselves?

By the time it was time to leave, daredevils CJ and Annabelle were both doing the zip line standing up.

It was a good day. :)

Droopy Boy

SHAPE UP: A few days ago I discovered a Web site that offers a nice explanation of shapes (one-, two- and three-dimensional). So today, Annabelle and I explored it, with CJ listening from the couch (more on that later).

It was great - the site even had patterns to download so we could make some three-dimensional shapes (which strikes me as a MUCH better way to learn about them, instead of just looking at a 2-D drawing of them!). Annabelle crafted a cylinder, a cube and a tetrahedron.By poking around, I learned the shapes lesson was a page on Birmingham Grid for Learning (BGfL) site. In their "About Us" section, BGfL claims to be "arguably the most comprehensive learning resource of its kind to be found anywhere in the UK."

Further, they say they provide "a wealth of information and activities that are not only educationally sound, engaging and fun, but are also highly focused on appropriate interfaces for each key stage and for teachers." Quite an ambitious undertaking by the folks in Birmingham, England, wouldn't you say?

There's so much on the site, it's overwhelming (as in overwhelmingly awesome). I think a good jump off place for us on future visits to BGfL is on their Primary site (for 5 to 11 year olds).

STRUCK DOWN: Out of nowhere, this morning CJ was suddenly stuck with a mystery affliction. At first he complained that he slept too long last night (he was up before 6!) and that made his heart hurt. Odd.

He continued to complain of midsection discomfort. "I feel like an old man, but I don't need a stick (cane)," he described.

Soon, his bottom lip and chin were quivering with chills. I sent him to the couch and got him a blanket. As he lay there trembling he asked, "Is God real?"

I asked him where that came from and he said, "I don't know. I just thought of it."

Soon after he said, "Great, now my brain hurts. The chills are getting around." CJ was convinced this new affliction was "because I'm tilted" (laying down).

Annabelle was pestering CJ. She just didn't know what to do without her partner in crime. It was a good thing she had a playdate this afternoon. ...

PACK UP YOUR TROUBLES: This morning I heard Annabelle singing, "Pack up your troubles in your old kid (sic) bag and smile, smile, smile." It surprised me. I didn't know that she knew that song.

I asked her how she knew it and she said "from commercials." Of course. Through the magic of the Internet, I was able to quickly find the ad she knows it from - it's for a Dell laptop.

Through YouTube, I was able to find a version of the song that's by a gentleman playing guitar. It's captioned, and it's fascinating to read the words (before today, I had never known any of the song other than the one line from the chorus!).

As it turns out, the song is a WWI era composition, first published in 1915. According to Wikipedia, its lyrics were written by George Henry Powell under the pseudonym of "George Asaf" and it was scored by his brother Felix Powell. It won a wartime competition for a marching song.

Naturally, we had to listen to a couple of different versions of it, including a really old one and one that appears to be from a movie (but unfortunately he poster didn't say which movie - but I have reason to believe it might be from "Oh! What A Lovely War"). And later, I found a 1917 recording of the song on Wikipedia.

Through further reading, tonight I learned that composer Felix was a staff sergeant in the British Army. However, lyricist George was a pacifist and a conscientious objector when conscription was imposed in England 1916. In a way, this made sense to me, really, because my take on the song is that it's rather sarcastic or ironic. Telling someone to "smile, smile, smile" while the Kaiser's army is raining down bullets on you seems rather silly, doesn't it?


PLAYTIME: This afternoon, Annabelle and I went to the home of a new friend she made while we were playing in the sand at Discovery Park last Friday. By the time I'd even made it over to say 'hi,' Miss Talkative had already told the child and her mother her name, my name, where we live, and that she's homeschooled. (Note to self - give the kids a refresher course in 'stranger danger'.)


Rick came and stayed with CJ while Bee and I went for the visit. The girls had a good ol' time. They spent a lot of the 90 minutes doing artsy craftsy things, including making some tissue paper flowers and enjoying a fresh made batch of homemade slime.
RALLYING: By about 7:30 tonight, CJ was starting to feel like himself. (He'd been down and out on the couch since shortly after sunrise.) He said he felt like playing a hack (a fan/programmer altered Mario-related game). First he played his own hack-in-progress and then Christian helped him download a couple of other people's hacks.

BEE TO THE RESCUE: Just before bedtime tonight, Annabelle came to the computer to fetch me. She informed me she'd set up an animal adoption center and wanted me to adopt a pet.

I ended up adopting a snail, a hedgehog and an echidna (a spiny anteater).

Wacky Wednesday

We all stayed up way, way too late last night due to the dual birthday celebration (the kids' Aunt Renee and big bro Kennedy). The kids weren't in bed until after 11 p.m. Christian and Jim were up past midnight, and Renee and I closed the place down around 3, I think. Yikes.

However, by 9:30 or so, we were up and at 'em. We decided to go out for breakfast, and you just know we had to go to iconic Beth's.

While we waited for our breakfast, most of us spent some time putting pen and/or crayon to paper. Annabelle had brought along the 18-pack of Mr. Sketch markers R&J gifted us, and I'd thought to bring some paper. CJ beat me (legitimately - I didn't let him win) in tic tac toe 3 or 4 times. He and Rick exchanged inflammatory notes about the superiority of Sega vs. Nintendo gaming systems and which character is best (Mario or Sonic).

Annabelle and Renee kept busy creating artwork (the walls at Beth's are covered in customers' creations). In Bee's drawing (pictured to the left) , "The sun is wide awake and the moon is going to sleep, because it's daytime," she explains.

We didn't have omelettes bigger than our freakin' heads, but all of our breakfasts were way too big. Annabelle's face in this photos tells it all. This meal has her beat.

After breakfast we said our goodbyes to the big boys and Renee and Jim and then headed just a couple blocks due east to lovely Green Lake.

PEDAL POWERED: Our bellies too full from Beth's, I was desperate to get some exercise. So Christian rented us a 4-person pedal boat (it was $15 for one hour).

It was a beautiful, sunny morning and there was a nice breeze on the lake. Christian and I really worked it - we powered all the way across the lake in about 15 minutes. We weren't quite as fast on the way back.

The kids did a bit of pedaling, too, though they were really too short to pedal very effectively. So mostly they kicked back, enjoyed the scenery, and told us to hurry up and get them back to shore.

They were eager to check out the play structures in the park, which we did. Even though we've been to Green Lake multiple times, today was the first time the kids had a chance to check out the playground.
Annabelle played in a canoe that was stuck in an expansive sandbox, and CJ was intrigued by the "log roller" feature on the play structure.

It was too hot (IMHO) at the playground in the blazing sun, so we moseyed over to the park's wading pool - another feature we'd never checked out before today.

The wading pool was packed, mostly with preschool aged kids and toddlers/diaper wearers. I immediately wondered how many of those kids had diapers full of something other than water.

We had only been at the wading pool for a few minutes when I noticed a parks worker to my left taking water samples. About two minutes later she blew a whistle and started yelling through a bullhorn, telling everyone to vacate the wading pool. I don't know what happened next (do they drain and re-fill it? give it a 'shock' treatment or ???). We headed for the car and home.

Once home, I sent Christian upstairs to take a nap. I tried to doze myself, but Annabelle was having none of it. You see, Auntie Renee and Uncle Jim had brought a whole bag of neat-o things for the kids, including you-paint-it dinosaur kit. She wanted to paint the triceratops. CJ wanted to paint "the biggest one" (an apotosaurus, I believe). I made sure to put drawings of what scientists think each of those dinosaurs looked like in front of them for inspiration. Yeah, well, the kids found their inspiration elsewhere. CJ's dino was red and black; Annabelle's was pink and purple.
DANCING MACHINE: Another Wednesday, another special dance camp for Annabelle.

Today's theme was "Flower Dance." To that end, "We did all kinds of flower dances," she explains. They also watched a couple of videos, including Amanda McKerrow dancing "Californian Poppy."

When I came to pick her up, Annabelle was dancing up a storm while wearing a very frilly and flouncy tutu. She was definitely enjoying herself.EYE POPPING: This evening, we enjoyed "Encyclopedia Prehistorica Dinosaurs," another gift from Renee and Jim.

It is, without a doubt, the most amazing pop up book I've ever seen. The turn of each page reveals a large, intricate, amazing pop up element. But the book doesn't stop there. On each page are additional mini pop up pages to be opened. It's like finding a treasure box inside a treasure chest!
Photo from Candlewick Press

The book is full of facts about different types of dinosaurs, as one might expect. What I really appreciated was it includes info about the history of dino archaeology. (Early, major players when it comes to uncovering fossils.)

Tonight, on the publisher's Web site, I found some great resources related to the book, including an activity (PDF) where we can make our own pop up T-Rex and a teacher's guide (PDF) with a whole host of ideas and additional information. There's even a video interview with the author and illustrator. Cool!

Birthday Bash

CHECK IT OUT: I'm not going to pretend we did a lot of schoolin' today, unless you consider schoolin' majoring in fondant and painting off pinatas.

Trying to buy myself some time to decorate and clean (hey, just keepin' it real, here), I fed the kids several worksheets this a.m.
The worksheets were about fractions and telling analog time. After the kids were done, it dawned on me that I should have them check each other's papers. (I don't know why I never thought of that before!) By reviewing each other's work, they have to, in effect, do each other's work as well. Double bonus!

GUTTING IT OUT: In an all out push to finish the Luke-in-a-dead-tauntaun birthday cake, I employed CJ and Annabelle's skills. They helped me mix the right intestine colored fondant and then they rolled it out and we twirled and draped it.

Here's the nearly-finished product of our labors. ... PAINTERS: We also finished off our pinata. All that was left to do today was the accenting. We had a few hundred squares to paint. I decided to go old school and fetched a couple of potatoes from the basement. I cut a couple down, leaving rectangles protruding. We used those as stamps and got busy.
Apologies for the lack of content. We'll be back at it tomorrow, I promise. ;)

Sugar Coated Monday

PARTY PREPPERS: Pre-birthday festivities (translation: work) continue here at MPA. We've been working on a Death Star pinata and Star Wars themed cake for the past few days.

This weekend we primed and painted the Death Star. Today the devil was in the details. Specifically, painting shapes and shades on the orb to make it look like something other than a gray beachball. As of 10 p.m. tonight, I still have 2 layers of paint to do. :(

Yesterday we baked the layers of cake. Annabelle was the official taste tester. She liked the red velvet cake batter.

We stacked and crumb coated the layers. Also, the tauntaun cake topper was sculpted out of Rice Krispie treats. The kids enjoyed eating the scraps we cut away.
Today, it was all about the fondant. My kids probably play with fondant more often than they play with Play-Doh. Annabelle is getting really good at mixing colors. She came in handy today.

MASKED INTRUDER: Zoo Pals are a product that's being heavily advertised on many of the shows the kids watch right now. They're colorful paper plates with animal faces on them. The jingle goes "When you clean you plate, then you see their face!" and "Zoo Pals make eating fun!"

We've bought them before months/years ago, but lately we haven't found them in stock at anywhere - until yesterday. Annabelle spied them in the Ballard Safeway. She carried them throughout the store.

When we got home she looked at every animal in the collection and chose to make a mask out of this one.

CJ is less enthused Zoo Pals. In fact, he really really doesn't like them, as he does not like a face hiding under his food or anything staring back up at him when he's eating. Just one of his quirky CJisms. ...

FRESH AIR: The kids spent a fair amount of time outside today, enjoying the waning days of sunny August. They played in the alley on scooters and other ride on toys. They also played on the small climbing toy in our yard for awhile. It's pre-schooler size, but they still enjoy it.

They each had a chance to perch on the carport roof for awhile, too. Christian was up there almost all day, putting a new window in the south side of our house (hallelujah!). As I type, instead of staring at solid drywall to my right, tonight I can see the twinkling lights on the towers atop Queen Anne and a full moon in the cloud streaked night sky. Nice!I LIKE: I took the inspiration for this morning's writing assignment from a question Annabelle asked me yesterday.

"What are 10 things you don't like?" she asked. Making the list wasn't as quick and easy as you might think. I had to do a lot of soul searching. (And yes, "clowns" was one of the items on my list.)

Preferring to take a positive tack, I asked the kids to write down "I like ..." and then list 10 things. The kids took quite a while (a half hour plus) to come up with their lists. Maybe they were doing some soul searching. Their lists follow...

CJ: The park. Slides. Computers. Videos. Chocolate. Toys. The Wii. Art. Baseball. Mario.

Annabelle: Living in a hilly city. Playing Club Penguin, Mome and Dade. Pingazane (the friend they play Club Penguin with online). Parks. Computer.

(I just realized Annabelle only listed six instead of 10!)

MONDAY MATINEE: The kids had a rare treat this afternoon. Biggest brother Rick took them to a movie. They saw "Despicable Me," an animated film. CJ and Annabelle both said it was "Great!" which was pretty much the consensus of the reviews I read online ahead of time. Annabelle noted that there were "little girls, like me," in the film. That made me stop to think about the fact that more often than not, movies seem to have little boys as principal characters. Hmm.

POSTER BOY: We received an email from a graphic designer at Dechen Chöling, a European Buddhist Centre in France. She wanted to know if they could use a photo of CJ on a poster for an event they have coming up. I'm not sure what CJ flying a kite in Seattle has to do with their message, but it was fine by me. WORDS FROM THE WISE: "If you can't explain it to a six year old, you don't understand it yourself." - Albert Einstein