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With the sun shining on our backs, my children and I were trying to grab a little bit of shade in the picnic table area of Lake Fairfax’s Water Mine as JavaDad stood in line to grab us an early dinner. We were trying to squeeze in a little bit of summer fun — after [...]
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Before I knew what happened, Silly Bandz, those shaped, silicone “rubber band” bracelets that are the hot new fad item, swept into my life. My kids are not usually into fads — in fact we were probably one of the few families not looking for ZhuZhu Pets this Christmas — and they are quite young [...]
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As a mom, there are some things that come naturally, and there are some things that definitely do NOT. Teaching my kids to ride a bike is one of those things. I wasn’t even aware I was supposed to be teaching my kids to ride a bike yet. For whatever reason, my parents didn’t teach [...]
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… but he spells everything correctly and even uses a hyphen appropriately? And it makes you laugh every time you see it?
I’m still not clear on the details, but apparently JavaBoy (almost 6) was a bit overly tired and wanted popcorn while JavaDad was also overly tired and getting ready to make dinner. JavaBoy asked for popcorn, JavaDad said no because he was about to make dinner, and I guess in a fit of frustration, JavaBoy whipped up this sign that says, “Go and get pop-corn! Got popcorn?” (Hyphenated pop-corn because he ran out of room –I’m quite impressed!) He then found masking tape in his secret stash of masking tape and put this on our bedroom door.
While the sign is inappropriately sassy, I am quite proud of his spelling and use of punctuation. Would it be wrong to send it in to school as a writing sample for his teacher?
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What’s that you say? The Cat In The Hat hasn’t visited you today? How sad, how terribly, terribly sad for you! Come to our house, and join in the wackiness too!
Okay, Dr. Seuss I am not — but JavaMom’s silly mom, I am! I am. Here and there, and everywhere. (Oops, sorry, read Green Eggs and Ham a few too many times today!)
In case you have been under a rock — or don’t have very small children — Dr. Seuss’s birthday is March 2, and for the past few years my son’s preschool and now his kindergarten has used this as a time to celebrate all things Seuss. His preschool (now JavaGirl’s preschool) used to also have Wacky Wednesday the first Wednesday of Seuss week — the kids would show up dressed crazy (two different shoes, mismatched clothes) and were quite delighted to find that the for some reason their classroom was topsy turvy as well.
Somehow this morphed into wacky things happening in our house as well on these Wednesdays and when a very young JavaBoy asked who was responsible for such shenanigans, we shrugged our shoulders and asked him, and he said, “I think the Cat In The Hat did it!” And thus, a new tradition was born! Sometime late Tuesday night, while we are all asleep, the Cat sneaks into our house and makes things wacky!
The Cat In The Hat seems to like to do a lot of things with shoes — he’s put them up on walls, on ceiling fans, and on the legs of chairs and tables. But he’s done other things like put dolls and stuffed animals in all the chairs and seats in the house, turned things upside down, and made some subtle changes to see if JavaBoy will catch on. (JavaGirl is just now old enough to start enjoying Wacky Wednesday.)
Since JavaGirl’s preschool is not have a Seuss week this year, I had almost forgotten about our annual visit from The Cat until I heard JavaBoy mention it to his kindergarten teacher. Apparently this visit holds a lot of meaning to him as he not only mentioned it yesterday, but many times today. Fortunately I was able to confirm with The Cat that he does have us on his schedule for this evening.
I wonder what he’ll do tonight…
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These are the kind of photos my husband bring home that make my heart stop.
“Look at the AIR he got under him!”
Oh. My. Goodness.
He’s supposed to be sliding down a smooth school hill, no one said anything about AIR! Apparently some teenagers decided to add some moguls or whatever they are called (I’m from Miami, remember?) to the “gentle” sledding slope.
“Look, see that shadow, see, he’s lifting off from the snow there.”
Great, honey.
“And then he got very, very far away…”
Uh-huh….
“And he said the cutest thing… He said, ‘Daddy, can you see me?’ And I said, ‘Yes!’ And he said, ‘Am I really, really small?’ And I said ‘Yes!’ And then he said, ‘Is my voice small like an ant’s?’
So what did you say?
“I said ‘Yes!’ because I didn’t want him to go any further away.”
At last, sanity prevails.
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Usually he’s busy asserting his independence. Although he’s 5, he reads at a second-grade level and his father and I can no longer use spelling as a secret code. And yet, today, as he languished in bed with a high fever, JavaBoy seemed more like my baby boy again than the boy who has been losing teeth and growing legs longer than his pants.
He needed his Mommy today.
I hated watching how pathetic he looked, at times complaining about how hot he was and other times feeling chilled. Too sick to be interested in food — much different from the child who says, “I’m hungry” practically every 10 minutes including yesterday.
As I snuggled up next to him in bed, and scratched his head and buried my nose in his hair, I almost felt like I caught a whiff of that scent babies have — a scent JavaBoy lost long ago now that he’s a Big Boy. But I remembered all those nights that I held him in my arms, rocking him or just snuggling him at night, worrying about the things new moms worry about, while taking in that baby smell.
We play a game, where I sometimes try to scoop him up, long legs and all, and I say, “Ohhh, where did my baby JavaBoy go? Where did he go? Can I smoosh you all up back into a baby and stick you back in my tummy?” He finds this quite hysterical because of course this is quite ridiculous — the thought of him ever being that small seems so very silly. And yet he knows he’ll always be my baby boy.
I look at him tonight, fever temporarily quashed with Tylenol, but fitful in his sleep, and I realize that Moms still worry, even when they aren’t new moms anymore.
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A late-breaking entry to the Fall Fun Guide:
Library of Congress National Book Festival
Saturday, September 26 from 10am to 5:30pm
Join PBS Parents and PBS Parents Supersisters at 9am for a “pre” Book Festival meetup at the
PBS KIDS Raising Readers Pavilion.
You will have a chance to meet Elmo and Chris from SESAME STREET, Steve Songs, PBS KIDS favorite characters Clifford, WordGirl and many others.
The PBS KIDS Raising Readers Pavilion will be located in the middle of the Book Festival on the National Mall, near 10th St. and the Smithsonian Castle.
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Fall began yesterday and the Fall Gun Guide is now officially up! Just like its Summer companion, the Fall Fun Guide is filled with classes and events for kids and families. Some are free, some are not, but somewhere in the guide there should be something for everyone. I am always looking for new things to add to the guide, so please contact me if you know of something that you think should be on there. And please check the guide frequently. The Fall Fun Guide is “younger” than the Summer Fun Guide, so it is still maturing and is not quite as far-reaching yet — it has lots of room to grow!
It includes a list of children’s consignment sales (coming up – My Child’s Closet and Catholic Consignments), pumpkin patches and corn mazes, a list of activities by dates, classes and events, day and weekend trips, and so much more!
Go check it out and then tell all your friends about it!
Oh — and start letting me know about events you think should be included in the HOLIDAY FUN GUIDE!!
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When’s the last time your family really sat in close proximity with all screens (TV, computer, cell phone, etc.) off, and had a really good time together? Are you looking at your watch… or are you looking at a calendar? Or can you not remember it at all?
Every summer we go on a trip to a huge beach house with several families and though I love the sea and the sand, one of the things I most look forward to is playing games together in the evenings. It’s actually the adults who play, after the children are asleep, but it won’t be long until the kids will be old enough to join in. These evenings remind me of countless rounds of Parcheesi, Monopoly, Yahtzee and card games my family played while growing up. I can’t remember a Thanksgiving that didn’t end with a rousing game of some sort.
It’s these simple pleasures, these unplugged moments that are the inspiration for National Family Game Night on September 23, sponsored by Hasbro Games. Of course they have a reason to encourage game play, but in an age when the economy is tight and technology sometimes makes us forget to look at each other, isn’t the idea of spending a night of old-fashioned fun a bit appealing?
Whether you just dust off some games you already own, or decide to go out and purchase some new ones — consider indulging in National Family Game Night this Wednesday and then turning it into a regular habit. If you want to go all out, Hasbro even has some tips for planning game night on their web site.
We actually held ours a little early — we tried two new games, Bop It! and Connect 4X4. Bop It! is this crazy little device that issues commands to press a button (bop it!), twist a knob, pull a knob, or yell into a microphone, in a rapidfire succession in a random pattern. We are clearly a very uncoordinated family and this generated tons of laughter! Connect 4×4 is an updated version of Connect 4 where there are two grids side by side and you can get your 4-in-a-row in all the traditional ways but also by weaving between the two grids. This was a HUGE hit with the kids. They are already clamoring for another game night and I’m happy to indulge them!
In every situation where I have played games with people — whether my own family, as part of a team-building exercise at a business retreat, with a group of grown-up friends — I have found that the after-effects last far longer than the game itself. People always seem to feel more closely bonded, more patient about listening to each other, more interested in working through things. Which makes me wonder, during these times, what would happen in this nation if we dumped a truckful of Bop Its outside the US Capitol building? (Oh no, I fear this post could take a dreadful turn for the worse… perhaps I should’ve suggested Cranium?)
I was at a retreat of local business leaders and when asked to “dream blue skies” about things to change in the county, one thing each round table came back with was that we don’t have enough fun as a society. How sad is that? We all agreed our county had terrific parks and recreation centers, and yet people were feeling like there was never any time for fun. The barrier wasn’t access to fun, it was prioritizing fun. CHOOSING to have fun.
Will you choose to have fun? Whether this Wednesday or another night, will you participate in some form of a game night in the near future?
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Bop It! photo is from the Hasbro Games web site.
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