Pounding the Pavement

FRESH AIR EXPRESS: I'm not gonna lie. We didn't spend much time hitting the books today. Yes, we did some reading and yes, we did some math, but mostly we made up for lost time and a fresh air deficit due to recent illnesses and weeks-long crummy weather.

This morning we drove over to Queen Anne Hill and then jogged/rode along Queen Anne Boulevard and Highland Drive, enjoying the spectacular views.

There's a tiny park where QA Blvd. turns into Highland. We stopped there for a few minutes. While there, CJ and Annabelle contemplated some graffiti we found on the back of a park sign. I think they rather liked the emoticon-type faces, but as Christian and I explained to them, it's not cool to deface public property like that.
We also took note of a marker in the pavement. It let us know that nearly 220 years ago, Captain George Vancouver's vessel would have been visible to us where we stood today. We've been learning lots about Lewis & Clark's expedition to what's now the Northwest, but it's worth nothing that Captain Vancouver had them beat by a few years.
We continued our journey, heading past the stately homes on Highland Drive. That's got to be one of the most beautiful neighborhoods in America.

Soon, we'd arrived at Kerry Park and its fantastic vista of downtown Seattle and Puget Sound. The kids were more interested in heading down the stairs to Bayview-Kinnear Park, where there's a playground.

There were some other kids there, as well, so CeeJ and Bee had someone(s) to play with.
After CJ climbed to the top of this structure, a 20 something woman sat in the blue spinner sticking up out of the ground adjacent to it. As soon as she sat down, he said, "Ouch! You're sitting on my shadow!" She and her friend laughed loudly at that.

In our morning travels, we saw lots of signs of spring - cherry trees are starting to bloom, daffodils have popped up and the crocus are coming on strong!IN THE AFTERNOON: After our morning excursion, we headed home for lunch and before too long it was time to head into Magnolia. While Bee was in ballet, CJ, Christian and I walked to and fro. First stop was the library, where we returned a few books and picked up lots more.

While there, CJ enjoyed putting together very pre-schooly board puzzles. His favorite is one that is a girl and her teddy bear. Interesting. After the library we walked back across "town" to the hardware store and then CJ got to play in his second park of the day.

CRAFTY: The kids spent some time making some thank you notes today. They used rubber stamps for the first time.

Later, Annabelle slipped me a note.

It wasn't her best handwriting, but I couldn't bring myself to correct her. ;)

IN THE EVENING: Continuing our play day, the kids mostly dinked around on their computers and played together for the balance of the day, although right before bed they did read some "Popular Science" magazine with Christian. Topics covered included everything from solar flares to frogs in peril.

SOMEWHERE UP THERE: We checked in on the Discovery STS-133 astronauts today. They've said their goodbyes to the crew of the International Space Station and are slowly heading home.

This morning, the crew was awakened by the voice of Captain Kirk himself! Bet that got their attention! (There's even a great (1 minute) video to go with the salutation in the preceding link.) So cool!