tooth loss

Aria lost her third tooth last night in the bath. Bottom left canine.

Why? and Bath Math

A couple neat things happened in the last few days.

First, Audrey went full-bore into the "WHY?" stage. She's suddenly asking about everything. She asked me why the sky is blue. She asks why we're wearing what clothes we're wearing. She asked Hosie why she's a girl. She asked why a tree is called a tree. So we're entering that time where you have to bend your mind around all these inquisitions. Sometimes, we're lying in bed at night, and I think she's asleep, when suddenly, I'll hear this little tentative whisper: "Daddy?" I whisper back: "What, honey?" "Why do you always call me sweetie pie?"

The second thing arose out of a question that Audrey asked Hosanna earlier today. They were all taking a bath together (hair washing day!), when Audrey said "What does even mean?" So Hosanna started explaining that "even" has two meanings: even vs. uneven, and even vs. odd. Hosanna made an example using a bunch of farm animals, showing that four animals could be split into an even number of groups of two.

So then, later, Aria was downstairs playing with some other toys, when she stumbled upon the concept of division. She came into the kitchen and said: "Mommy, I figured out that 12 is 4, 4, and 4!" So then Hosanna got out some Legos and showed her how 12 could be divided into three groups of four, four groups of three, two groups of six, etc. And that, my friends, is home school. Aria learned math in the bath. Learning happens at the kid's pace, in unexpected places, in ways that will constantly amaze you.

(By the way, Aria's reading this over my shoulder as I type it. Yeah. The kid can read.)

Crissmuss

I'm on the best vacation of the past couple years. Lots and lots of time sitting at home and doing nothing much of anything. Seeing lots of old friends and hanging out with my family. Plus two trips to San Jose to see my parents, my sister and her family, and other friends too. My parents had their 50th wedding anniversary in there somewhere and we threw them a big party. In short, it's been a really good, relaxing time, and just what the doctor ordered.

I didn't take too many pictures this year; I wanted to be more involved in the proceedings this time around. But, here's one little video I got a couple days ago. For Christmas we got the girls another play contraption for the yard. Aria has dubbed it "The Stirrer" because she invented a game where it stirs up their food. Here they are showing it off:



Anyway, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all.

Aria's play

Aria has been taking a drama class for the past few weeks. They are doing a play called "Stone Soup," in which Aria plays Martha. She wasn't satisfied with this role, however - she doesn't get very many lines. To rectify this situation, Aria decided she would write her own play, and make roles for all of her friends. Hosanna helped her write the words by telling her how to spell them; in this manner, Aria wrote the first few lines down herself. Then, she finished by dictating the rest of them to Hosanna, who wrote it down. All of the words are Aria's.

CHARACTERS

Crystal: Aria
Rainbow: Autumn
Narrator: Hosanna
Flowers: Audrey
Martha: Danielle

Narrator: Once Upon A Time, there was a mommy named Crystal and a mommy named Rainbow, and a big sister named Flowers and a little sister named Martha, and they were really healthy.

Crystal: We have to go to the store to get bread for our toast that we dip in our lentil soup.

Martha: (Upset) We have to go to the store? Oh! I don't want to go!

Narrator: So she cried and she screamed when Crystal put her in her car seat.

Crystal: (Mad) So I said that we were going to the store and you are getting really upset because you are really hungry, but we don't have any food.

Rainbow: (A little mad) Yeah, we don't have any food, and we are in a struggle to get to the store.

Flowers: Yay! We're going to go to the store!

Crystal: We need to get a whole bunch of food.

Rainbow: Finally we are going to the store.

Narrator: So they played games while they were going to the store.

Martha: There is a red car.

Flowers: I see a white car.

Crystal: And I see a blue car.

Rainbow: I see a brown car.

Narrator: And so they played a lot of games and Martha was not upset.

Rainbow: We are finally at the store, but it is dark outside, so we have to get just a few snacks and eat all of them up. And then we will go right to bed.

THE END

Halloween 2011

Misc pictures from Halloween 2011, where Audrey was a bumblebee, Aria was Tinkerbell, many pumpkins were carved, and we all had a blast. I have decided that there is nothing in the world as entertaining as taking my kids out trick or treating. Audrey got so excited anytime there was any moving decorations, while Aria spent a lot of the night in sheer disbelief that people were giving her candy for free. After trick or treating, we went to the Pumpkin Path at the local Waldorf school. They put on quite a show there, and the girls both loved it. It was Aria's second year going there, and Audrey's first time. We went with Autumn, Danielle, Amanda & Virgil.












Also, a couple misc pictures from earlier in October, when Hosie did the girls' hair and they were being super sweet:

Audrey's 3rd / Aria's 6th birthday party

We celebrated the 10th anniversary of 9/11 by paying no attention to it at all. Instead we had a birthday party. Now that's patriotism. So the happy park of Funderland was overrun by cute girls and boys, including: Autumn & Danielle (accompanied by Amanda & Virgil), Juliette & Amelia (with Debra), Tobin (with Manny), and Jenk & Tavi (with Kyle). And of course, Nana & Uncle Gabriel were there too.

First we got a table in a nearby park for lunch & cake...





Then we spent a couple hours on the rides...











Then back to the park for presents. We asked everyone to bring toys they were tired of, so no one had to buy anything and they got to clutter bust a bit in the process. It was a big hit.









In particular, the dinosaur that had been hiding unused in the back of Tobin's closet for a couple years became Audrey's #1 favorite thing in the universe. She carries it around everywhere now, saying it's her baby.





Hey, there were even some pictures of adults!







And finally, when it was time to head home, Audrey & her new baby were tuckered out:

The rest of summer

So, the rest of the summer came and went, thank God. I couldn't wait for it to end. I was still recovering from the whole Uncle George thing, I was having a career crisis and mid-life crisis all at once, and then to top it all off I crashed really hard on my bike in the last week of July, smashing up my face, arm, and leg. It was really ugly. I didn't feel like doing much besides hole up in my house and wish everyone and everything would just go away. And pray for summer to end.

Now it's nearly November, and I've finally hooked the camera up to the computer to see what the hell happened while I wasn't paying attention. Hadn't done that since July 24th. Turns out, there were some good moments. And I'm going to talk about them for a bit now, as a reminder to myself that I am blessed with a beautiful family, an extraordinary wife, and a charmed existence. (Seriously, the crash should have broken limbs and/or nose and knocked my teeth out. Very lucky, me.)

Way back in early summer we bought some K'NEX kits. If you haven't seen these before, they are for building models of roller coasters. They are really fun to build. Kind of like Lego, but a bit more advanced. The girls have found so many oodles of creative things to do with the pieces, but this one is my absolute favorite by a mile: Aria placed them on a table like notes on a staff, and turned them into a melody. Watch:



Then one day in early August I caught Audrey "reading" a book to herself. This girl is crazy about books. She yanks them off shelves, devours them, and yanks more. Some days she'll go through every single book in the shelf. I feel very lucky to have finally caught it on camera since she doesn't like to be filmed.



I was doing a little bit of music earlier in the summer. As a gag gift for Dave's birthday, I made a techno cover of "Ten Years Gone" by Led Zeppelin. Although the whole thing was tongue in cheek, it was a good introduction to Logic Studio for me - it's been sitting on our computer for years and I've barely used it.

At some point during that time, Audrey got on the mic and we got this picture of our budding superstar:



Hosanna took the girls on a camping trip in late August, along with her friend Amanda and her daughters Autumn and Danielle. The girls had a great time - especially making S'Mores over the fire. When they got back, Aria drew this picture of their trip. It is a self-portrait: Aria is at the campfire, with a bag of marshmallows at her feet, and one on a stick that's she holding in the fire. The sky is blue and the grass is green, and all is well.



One of the sillier things that happened as a result of my bike crash is I finally learned what I look like with a full beard. I couldn't shave for several weeks while my face healed up. I was too embarrassed to take a picture of the wounds, which in a way now I sort of regret, but here's a picture of the short-lived beard. I couldn't wait to shave it off; it was hot, itchy, and abominably uncomfortable. I think Aria took this picture.



For their birthdays this year, we got Aria a bike and Audrey a trike. They love them. Aria loves to get out and ride the bike at the park or around the block, whereas the trike has become something they ride around in the backyard (or occasionally, around the house).