December 2014

Merry almost Christmas! Here are some of the events that have been keeping us busy the past few weeks:

 

• Allergy-friendly dinner with Ren, Matt, Amalia, and Sabrina

 

• Final rock-climbing class in the campus gym, including a timed climb to the top

 

• Winter playground time, Samantha's first Sunday School class, Marcus in the junior choir, Friday night kids' night friendships, and lots of subway trips back and forth around town

 

 

• Time with Sarah and Sean, including a video game date at their house after catching the Mayor's Christmas Trolley in JP (mmm, Red-Eyed Pig delivery and When Pigs Fly bread and butter), and sushi and udon dinner out before stuffing backpacks for the homeless together

 

• Samantha's third birthday party! We had 8 kids, including ours, and 13 adults, and the theme was "A Few of [Her] Favorite Things." Goodie bags contained an owl bracelet, turtle stickers, puppy tattoos, a chocolate, a penguin notepad, and a dinosaur stamper--all her favorite animals. The menu consisted of all of Samantha's favorite foods: carrot sticks, pretzels with cheese dip, edamame, udon noodles with crab sticks on the side, mini frittatas with cheese (and "no stuff" in them other than cheese), chocolate popcorn, snowman cookies, and chocolate puppy cupcakes (her request). Samantha licked the beaters, Robert cut tongue-shaped pieces out of individual Swedish fish for me, and I made puppy cupcakes for the kids and the less-fussy pawprint cupcakes for the grown ups.

Puppies and robots and penguins and owls,
Cupcakes and chocolate, edamame and carrots,
Crab sticks and udon like fat little strings,
These are a few of my favorite things.

Pretzels and popcorn and even more chocolate,
Turtles and chicken wings and cheesy omelets,
Dinosaurs who stand on wide chubby legs,
These are a few of my favorite things.

Hot dogs all wrapped up in cute little blankets,
Projects and artwork and writing and beading,
Silver white snowmen that melt in the spring,
These are a few of my favorite things.

When the doll drops,
When the food falls,
When I'm feeling sad,
I simply remember my favorite things,
And then I don't feel so bad.

I set up beads at the dining room table with some pipe cleaners, and the kids and some moms got really into making ornaments in the shape of candy canes, Christmas trees, and wreaths. Pop-pop played some Christmas carols and then "Happy Birthday," and we all had a great afternoon.

 

At three, Samantha knows lots of letter sounds, can write and spell her name, can count to thirty, can recite several score of books by heart, can draw a decent human figure unprompted, and can sing pretty much any song she has ever heard me or Pop-pop or Marcus sing. She loves puzzles, "reading," and, of course, acting out Baby School.

 

• Breakfast with Santa at the zoo, with Samantha terrified, eating a buttered bagel and three sausage patties under my sling with occasional peeks out to check if the scary Santa was still there; she finally warmed up enough to let me move in for a picture, though.

Robert tried to lose another child into the exhibit in the zoo, and the kids loved watching the gorillas (nowheres near as scary as Santa, by the way) attacking their Christmas present popsicles (juice, food coloring, and bananas--yum).

 

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Created: 12/16/14. Last Modified: 12/16/14.