Santa Claus

We decided to go see Santa Claus today. We went to MacArthur Center, where they have a very neat little set-up. Prior to seeing Santa, you walk through a mini-village with Polar Express decor - you can pull the rope to hear the train horn and turn all sorts of noise-making wheels and handles - and then through a giant snow globe. After picking as much 'snow' as we could out of the kids' hair, they got to see Santa. Emma asked for "That fluffable bears video game" (aka Build-a-Bear Workshop), and Brandon asked for an Electric guitar. Santa informed Brandon that an acoustic would be easier to practice on.

After that, we were all (well, I was) pretty wiped out, so we came home, and Mom and Dad took a nap. I'm so ready to say farewell to this mono crap.

So, here is the photo that we paid WAY too much for (seriously, when did they start charging $30 for the smallest photo package that includes a couple of tiny pictures printed off-center on cheap photo paper?) I suppose you can't put a price on memories. But if you could it'd be $36 plus tax...

Random Thoughts

One of my friends has started posting her children's random thoughts every week. You know, those "did you know" kind of things kids come up with? So, tonight at dinner, Brandon had a "did you know" moment, and I thought I'd share it.

Brandon: "Did you know that the reason a whip makes that snapping noise is because it actually breaks the sound barrier when you crack it?"

Me: "Um, no I did not know that. Are you sure about that? It doesn't sound right."

Brandon: "Yep, I saw it on the Discovery Channel."

So, being the skeptic that I am, I looked it up. According to Wikipedia, "The tip of the whip breaks the sound barrier and causes a sharp crack—literally a sonic boom." He's like a sponge, that kid.

Emma's Paper Dolls

So, what does any decent mother do when she has to get rid of the beloved family pet, and the children are distraught. Well, I don't know, but I decided on bribery. Emma was in tears and all I could think was to say, "What can I do to make this better? If you could have anything at all right now, what would it be?"

Magic. The tears stop almost instantaneously, and she looks up at me. "Paper Dolls." Really?!? Well, not just any paper dolls - these are $25 paper dolls.

So, these are the dolls. I have to say they're really cute, and it's fun making the clothes. It's a little more than Emma can do at this point (she puts the little doo-dads on them after I make the clothes from fabric), but it reminds me of when I was young and my mom used to make clothes for my Barbie dolls.

Doesn't she look happy? It was totally worth the $25.

They're very sturdy made of this thick board-like stuff, so there's no danger of ripping off a limb or anything.

Emma picks the fabrics and the pattern (there are over 100 different patterns for tops, bottoms, dresses, bathing suits, etc, and also shoes, purses, and other accessories) and I make them.

It even came with a boy, but all he seems to want to do is kiss the little blonde girl. Seriously, Brandon is almost 11, and he still covers his head and makes disgusted noises when people on tv start kissing, but my girl...well, she's all about the love.

Our first fashion show. Did you notice the little blonde people holding hands?

Macbeth Through the Eyes of a Ten Year Old

Brandon recently read the story of Macbeth (an abridged version) as part of a history assignment, and here's what he had to say when asked to give a summary:

Macbeth wanted to be the king of Scotland. Three witches, called the weird sisters, told Macbeth he wouldn't be king.

So, Macbeth and his wife, Lady Macbeth, decided to kill the king of Scotland. Their plan worked, and they blamed it on the servant. The youngest son ran away to Ireland. The eldest son's army attacked. Macbeth was killed by Macduff.

I really like this curriculum (it's History Odyssey by Pandia Press). I certainly don't remember reading Shakespeare in elementary school. After he finished his summary, we watched the animated version of the play. We stopped it occasionally to discuss the language (it was the original phrasing). The graphics were pretty old school, so I don't think they (Em watched, too) were terribly impressed, but Brandon did check out a graphic novel of The Twelfth Night from the library, so at least he's interested.

Ancient History

Remember I said Emma's favorite class is Ancients. Well, now I can see why. Look at these great photos her teacher, Miss Cynthia, took of the class and their project: The Hanging Gardens of Babylon.

Emma and her first grade friends.

Emma and friend J. (Stan says our daughter has a very big mouth.)

Front view of the gardens.

Side view of the gardens - see the cute little figures? Isn't it great?

7 Random Things

So, Kari, one of my friends from co-op (yep, I have friends now, thanks to a brilliant move, and two unsuspecting Virginians that made it all possible) apparently doesn't like that I've not posted anything in a while. I have things to tell about, but all my pictures of said things are still in the camera, and I've been waiting for my husband to put them on a flash drive so I can upload them...anyway, I'll be posting like mad once I get my pictures.

So, back to Kari - she tagged me with this 7 random facts about me thing (if you don't know what tagging is, think of a cyber chain letter with survey attached, and you kind of get the idea). So, I'm supposed to:

• Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird. (Since this is our family blog - I'm going to bend this a bit and do 7 facts about us)
• Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs. Let them know they have been tagged by leaving a message on their blog. (Like I know seven people. I figure if you see this and want to do it...consider yourself tagged. There.)

Here are my 7:

1. Brandon was born one month early but totally healthy.
2. Emma was born one day late, but I'd been having contractions for 3 1/2 months.
3. We watch The Amazing Race together as a family every week.
4. Stan has a black belt in Choi Kwang Do.
5. The last time Brandon lost a tooth, Emma wrote the tooth fairy a note explaining that though she was 6 1/2 years old, she'd yet to lose any teeth, but could she have some money, too, please...the tooth fairy was very generous and left our savvy girl (who still has all of her baby teeth) $5.
6. I knew I was going to marry Stan on our third date. It was Valentine's Day, and he brought me a single rose, a very sweet card, and a bag of Reese's peanut butter cups. The rose was nice and all, but the Reese's sealed the deal. I went home and told my mom that I'd met the boy I was going to marry. We were engaged 6 months later and married 3 months after that.
7. Emma's Favorite books right now are the Little Critter series - she has to get 2 or 3 on our weekly trips to the library. Brandon's current favorites are the Shadow Children series.

First Day of Co-op

Today was our first day back at co-op. Our day began early - Emma was up and had dressed herself by 7:30, and Brandon had gotten up at 2:30 (after waking up and being too excited to go back to sleep, he came downstairs and spent the rest of the night on the couch - we didn't know this until much later, by the way). Classes started at 10am, so we headed out about 9:30, and we got there just in time.

Brandon started the day with Latin. He really enjoyed it - his teacher is a retired military guy who seems to be really excited about introducing the kids to Latin (he was loud too. I could hear him on the other side of the building). Emma started her day with Around the World Literally, where they'll be studying geography through picture books. I walked her to class, and one of the other little girls yells "Oh, Emma sit here by me!" Friends are a very good thing.

Emma's other classes are Life Science, Art, and Ancient History. She said history was her favorite because they got to play I Spy. The rest of Brandon's day included Biology 2, Drama, and Quilting (guess who's teaching that). He said Drama was loads of fun - lots of games and stuff.

I'm teaching Lego League to ELEVEN 6-8 year olds (all but 2 are boys). It's a bit rowdy, that one. And, I'm teaching the Quilting class with 6 little girls and Brandon (I keep thinking he'll change his mind about that, but he seems happy with his decision). That class went a lot faster than I thought it would, so the last 15 minutes was spent with much discussion of the Jonas Brothers - Brandon wasn't particularly moved by the conversation. We start cutting out our quilts next week, and I'll try to plan enough activities so he doesn't have to endure the "who's cuter, Nick or Joe?" debate again.

All in all, it was a pretty good day. Is it bedtime yet?

Our First Postcards

We sent out our first postcards this week. So far we've sent to Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Holland, and England. This is the map we're using to track all the postcards we send and receive.

Today we actually received a postcard from Seelze, Germany. The funny thing is that it wasn't a postcrossing card. I had won a book from a blogger over there a couple of weeks ago, and when she shipped the book, she also sent a very nice bookmark, and the postcard that Emma is holding. How cool is that?

The very pretty card (held by the very pretty girl) shows the gardens of Herrenhausen in Hannover.

The white and yellow pins are our sent postcards. The green one shows the one we received. Along with the map, we're going to be creating a scrapbook to showcase our collection.

Nauticus Museum

We spent a very pleasant Saturday afternoon at the Nauticus museum in Norfolk. Here are a few pictures:

If you didn't know this already, there are mermaids all over Norfolk. They're all decorated differently with themes and colors unique to their location. There's one in MacArthur Center that looks like a giant chocolate mermaid complete with a partially opened silver wrapper (and a bite taken out of her tail). The one in the photo resides in front of the Nauticus Museum.

There were more mermaids inside the museum.

Some more funny looking than others.... (according to Emma, the kids are 'glubbing' in this picture).

This is the USS Wisconsin. The kids thought it was pretty cool that this cannon shell is taller than both of them.

We spoke to a very nice man on the ship who was retired navy. He taught us a lot of neat things like how, when it was in the South Pacific, it got so hot and they were there so long, they raised the poles on the sides of the ship (where the life-lines keep you from going overboard) and attached tarps across to keep the sun off the deck. He also said they lost quite a few sailors over the years who just 'fell off the boat.' Yikes.

What a great day!

Sleepover

Emma had a sleepover last week with her friend Bekah. Brandon spent the night with Bekah's brothers, Will and Addison.

They always have such fun together. They played Barbies and put on a Hannah Montanna puppet show for us.

They also acted like the silly little girls they are.

Around the World in Postcards

I came across this website, Postcrossing, which allows anyone to exchange postcards (paper ones, not electronic) from random places in the world. You sign up (for free), request an address to send a postcard to, send your postcard, and when they receive it, your name goes to the top of the list to get a postcard. You can set up your profile to receive postcards from within your country or only internationally - we went the international route for now.

We requested 5 address - the most you can request when you first start out. We'll be sending postcards to:

Finland

Netherlands

Germany

Lithuania

Latvia

We don't know where we'll be getting postcards from (they don't come from the people you send them to), but I'm sure the kids will be camped out at the mailbox until one comes in.

First Day of School Photos

We started off our first day of school in our new back to school clothes. Doesn't Emma look adorable in her cute little sweater vest and plaid skirt?

Brandon dressed up in his nice new button down for the occasion.

Notice neither of them felt the need to wear shoes to school.

Cosmo teaches a math lesson - "How many dogs does it take to screw in a lightbulb?"