I took the girls for a Henry-free experience at the pottery painting place and we brought Anna's friend and her mom along, too. We also decided to have Anna's birthday party here in March so we are going to have a lot of pottery to display around here! Anna painted Tiana and then helped Sarah with her giant dinosaur. Sarah asked me to write "Zig Zag" on the dinosaur's toes (Sarah has been going by the name Zig Zag since November) and to paint eyelashes on her so we would know she is a girl. I painted a little tea set for the girls dolls.
January 2011 Archives
Anna did an awesome job in the fun run for her school today! The goal was to run between 20-35 laps and she did all 35 without taking a water break (I don't know why she didn't but this seemed to be something she was proud of). The kids were sweaty when they were done as it was in the mid-seventies. Even Sarah got a little warm watching the kids running!
Sarah & I spent a significant amount of time this afternoon working on these Lego dinosaurs. I made some videos of Sarah explaining each one in detail (what it is called, if it is a herbivore or carnivore, describing unique features, etc.). At some point I'll get my act together and start posting video again.
The girls have for months been eating their pretzels in this way: stick a finger through one of the holes and say, "uh-oh, oh-oh, bite" and then take a bite. Repeat and repeat some more. Henry has now started in on it. He sounds more like, "uh, uh, uh" and then he takes a bite. (Actually, almost everything he says sounds like "uh, uh, uh.")
I stood in line for our baby trees while Craig took the kids to the bouncy rooms. The girls were having too much fun in the bouncy rooms to join Henry on a pony ride and in the petting zoo. The girls loved their balloons but Henry was only mildly interested in his cat balloon. Anna's popped in the car on the way home and it was the worst thing that has happened in her entire life. Sarah was sweet and shared her balloon with Anna once we were home so that helped to soften the blow a bit. Anna & Sarah helped me plant the trees along the back fence while Henry napped & Craig went for a bike ride.
Henry reluctantly checked out the grocery store first although he had his sights on the firetruck from the moment we walked in.
Although less busy than the one downtown, this store wasn't really as well stocked and the register wasn't as fun.
This is what he wanted to check out!
Sarah got her fire-fighting gear on first.
Henry was in heaven here. The "dirt" is bits of tires.
This was fun until "too many" kids came by for Sarah's liking. Henry, on the other hand, was hanging out with other moms & kids like he'd known them for years.
Experimenting with wind and sails.
I took Sarah & Henry to the local children's museum this morning and it was just their speed. Not quite as busy (although it was rainy today so we were not alone for long!).
Sarah & I spent a long time in our blanket house this afternoon staying safe from wild winds and thunderstorms. Sarah would frequently run out to get supplies or get babies for us to take care of. I was "Big Mama" and she was "Little Mama Baby Keeper." (You can spy our pile of babies behind Sarah in the picture. They are really easy-going babies as they really just sleep in a big pile all of the time and need no further attention from us.)
We were going to meet some friends on the other side of town to paint pottery but when we got there the studio didn't open for another hour and a half and that timing was not going to work with Henry's napping schedule (I had tried to get a sitter for him but couldn't) so we ended up going on our own to one right by our house. The girls had fun and Henry & I attempted to paint a dump truck together. He got a few strokes in and then I mostly painted one-handed while holding him on my hip trying to keep him away from the shelves and shelves of irresistible pottery. Lucky for me the girls were quick painters today but I promised them another trip without Henry in the near future, too.
Craig is having a very hard time here waiting for his turn with the wave machine.
All three kids were in there together but I was slow with the camera.
We all had fun at the Children's Museum downtown today but it was a bit too crowded for our taste. It was geared more toward Anna's age and up although there were still many things that Sarah & Henry enjoyed. We will definitely go back but we'll wait a while before we do.
Anna is pretending to be "really rich."
Henry does a good job sitting in his chair reading or playing with toys while I prepare dinner. If he is on the loose he will climb on the chairs & table and get into all sorts of trouble.
Sarah got in on being rich, too.
Henry's sunglasses were in the car but he seemed happy with these so he could be rich, too.
The girls had fun with their kits today but Craig and I had to do a lot of the digging (as anticipated: Sarah's kit was for 5+ and Anna's kit was for 7+). Anna was disappointed that the gold in the kit was nothing at all like what was pictured on the box. In fact, I was disappointed, too. Yes, it does say in fine print that what is inside my differ from what's on the picture on the box but the box showed something really flashy and inside we found black lumps of coal (basically).
Anna still has two more nuggets of pyrite to get out and Sarah still needs to assemble the T-rex and do the growing & shrinking dinosaur that came with the kit. The glow-in-the-dark dinosaur that came in the kit is kind of lame but she doesn't seem to mind too much. (It doesn't fit together well so it keeps falling apart. I'm not sure if glue will fix it.)
Sarah was so fascinated that we were "real paleontologists" when we were digging. When we were not, we were not paleontologists any more.
*Anna's kit is not called a "gold-digger" kit it is called a "gold mining" kit but I couldn't stop calling it the other name and laughing every time I did. I might be going insane (or I might already be there!).
I was hoping that I had a portrait of the girls from last January, but we did those in February, apparently. Still, I'm going to show you Henry in January 2010 to compare with Henry in January 2011. I'll see if I can get portraits again next month for a comparison with the girls, too.
Watching the pendulum swing. We did get to see it knock down a block a little later on in the morning.
These were amazing. I'm planning to make a little photo book for the girls of these since we took approximately one zillion pictures in this exhibit.
Anna was thrilled to see a real tiara from a real Russian princess! (She has a fascination with Russia.)
Checking out different crude oils.
Checking out how heavy different elements are.
We always love a good "will it float" experiment!
The girls loved the Museum of Natural Science. We went for the dinosaurs (Sarah) and the gems (Anna) and stayed for the oil & chemistry exhibits and a planetarium show. Since Sarah got a dinosaur digging kit for Christmas I picked up a "gold mining" kit for Anna there. I think we'll check those things out tomorrow afternoon while Henry is napping!