Clothes Horses

FASHION PLATE: This morning we went to the mall. Yes, you read it right. THE MALL. 

My least favorite place on the planet (and yes, that covers *any* mall). We went because Rick needed a shirt for an interview and CJ and Annabelle just *love* going to the mall.

We were sooooooo lucky. We parked by JCPenney and we practically walked right in to The Perfect Shirt. Hooray! Mission accomplished. I was ready to leave!! But I didn't want to deprive CeeJ and Bee of the Full Mall Experience, so that meant we had to check out the food court. On our way there, we walked by a display of summer hats, and there I spied a white fedora.

"Is this something you'd be interested in?" I asked CJ, knowing the answer in advance. 

He answered in the affirmative. 

Why his fascination with fedoras? It's rooted in Roblox - he and Annabelle's favorite online game/social networking site of the moment/month.  (In case you're wondering, 'What's Roblox?' according to their "About Us" page, it's "a leading user-generated gaming site that makes players the architects of their own 3D worlds, drawing over one billion page views and 21 million in-game hours each month. The site is ranked #1 in the US for total engagement time within the 8-14 year old segment.")

Christian and I find it fascinating that on Roblox, CJ is a complete fashionista. He changes his outfits, accessories, his hair, his smile and so on several times a day, often consulting one of us for our opinions on his options, whereas in real life he'll wear the same t-shirt 5 days in a row if we let him. 

On Roblox, there is a voluminous catalog of clothing and accessories players can buy, and for weeks now, CJ has had his eye on the coveted rainbow fedora 

Usually he uses his Robux (the money system on the site) to buy his wardrobe items, but some items are priced ridiculously high. For instance, the rainbow fedora is $11,500 Robux. That translates to about $100 Real World dollars. Which is, IMHO, ridiculous and I'm certainly not funding that. 

I will, however, fund a sharp looking real life fedora (just $15).  

CJ was thrilled with his fedora and wore it all day, even in the 95 degree heat. And now he has Big Plans for it. Tonight we bought fabric paint to transform it into a real life rainbow fedora. Stay tuned.

INTO THE WOODS: This afternoon, Rick had a job interview down in Kent, and the kids and I tagged along - no, not to the interview, but just to the general vicinity, as I looked it up on Mapquest and saw there was a good sized park next door. 

And so, CJ, Annabelle and I spent an hour plus in shady Scenic Hill Park. The kids played on a play structure with a little girl, whose mother was fresh from teaching fourth grade in Sweden. We had an interesting conversation about Sweden's school system. 

After the play ground, we struck out into the woods, at the "Pine Loop" trailhead. 

We were hiking blind, as there was no map of the trail. We had no idea how long it was, how many legs there were, or anything.

We took note of what was growing (lots of fern, cedar, pine trees, some blackberries, a crab apple tree or two, and more), as well as tons of creepy crawly things. (I've never seen so many ants in my life. They were literally crawling all over the trail by the thousands.) We noted holes in the ground that might be homes for field mice or maybe even snakes.

The kids were a bit concerned at not having a trail guide of any kind, and I couldn't blame them. I did tell them that we had a couple things going for us, though. One was we knew the area was bordered on the south by a school, and to the north was a community swimming pool. I told them as long as we could hear the shrieks of the swimmers, we could always find our way to civilization. 

After just a couple minutes of walking, and taking a path to the south, we happened upon an outdoor classroom. I bet teachers from Scenic Hill Elementary get good use out of the spot!

From there, we continued heading west, away from the parking lot where we started. We walked and walked and walked. And, the voices from the pool became fainter, and we encountered many a spider web across the trail. I asked the kids how the spider webs could help us navigate. They weren't sure. I told them that if we were breaking spider webs it meant a) we were the first people through the trail in awhile, and b) that also meant that clearly WE hadn't been on that path before. 

With no pool voices, the kids grew more nervous. I told them to do a 360-scan and see if they could see anywhere where it appeared the trees cleared. That could mean there's civilization/a building there. They spied a spot to the southwest, so we headed that way. 

However, civilization it wasn't. Instead, the clearing was a cliff. The world dropped away, revealing a pretty partial view of  a valley and some mountains in the distance. The kids weren't too into the view, tho. They'd hoped we'd find a parking lot, I think. :)

Undeterred, I asked them to continue along the cliff's edge for a bit, so we could take in the sights. We walked another couple of minutes and came to a clearing with a fabulous surprise. A tire swing in the middle of the forest! Woohoo!

By the looks of it, it was quite obviously not official Parks Department equipment, but we took our chances. ;)

The kids said they felt like they were swinging out over the edge of the cliff while on it. Cool!

After the swing, we started making our way back to the parking lot. We took a couple of wrong turns (the spider webs let us know!), but soon we heard the pool partiers' voices and before too long found our parking lot - at the exact same moment Rick was emerging. How's that for timing?!