Groovy.

S7 loves to make signs.  She has recently combined her love of sign-making with her love of “teaching other kids how to do all this stuff I’m already great at”.  Ergo, we have the “Learn to Be Groovy Lessons” summer camp.

In case you need a translation, it says:

Free! I’m not joking! Learn to be groovy with lessons from Sam! Starting Tuesday, May 31st, to June 19, Sunday, 4-9. 2 to 5 kids each day. [address]

I am super impressed that she looked up the dates on the calendar.  May 31 really is a Tuesday this year, and June 19 falls on a Sunday.  That’s pretty good.

She’s written a few others.  I came across this one today:

Zebra, apparently, is a prospective Jazz student in S7′s upcoming Jazz classes.  Here is her note:

Zebra, here is a note for Jazz lessons.

1. Pay Attention!
2. Be Good.
3. Wear Jazz Shoes
4. Black shirt.
5. White socks.
6. Purple pants.

Do the top and wear the bottom.  Here is my address:  941897 Jewel Circle, Jazz Town, Alabama.  412396*  Love, Sophia Vutaski. I love you!

*US ZIP codes are five digits.  Oops, Sophia!

** a totally made-up last name

Reproduction According to Children

The girls are playing with a bucket of plastic wild animal figures.  From the other room I just heard this:

S6: When the rhinos want to mate, they put their horns together!

O5: When the giraffes want to mate, they put their necks together.  Then they kiss, like this!  mwah, mwah, mwah!

S6: When the cheetas want to mate, they run in opposite directions, really fast!!

O5: When the elephants want to mate, they throw water on each other!!!

Future Perfect Husband

My nephew J, who just turned 4, is already shaping up to be the perfect husband for some darn lucky person someday.

He is over and playing with the girls, who are so excited to have a proper boy to play house with.  I mean, it’s fun for them to be the mom and the baby, but who really wants to be the dad?  So boring.  But J is gamely playing along.  It’s vaguely Big Love-ish, as I believe both girls are Mom and J is the lone Dad, but who’s counting?

Just a moment ago they decided it was time to have dinner.  The girls were fussing in their play kitchen, digging through unsorted boxes of toys looking for meat-related play food (because Dads eat meat, right?)  They have spent a considerable amount of time doing this and I was afraid J would start to lose interest.  But he’s a good sport and instead of just throwing in the towel, he cheerfully announced:

“So…. who wants to go out for dinner?”

Too bad he’s related.

On Your Marks, Get Set… TORTURE!

A while ago, DH showed the girls how to play an old snowboarding game that’s on our XBox. All of a sudden, they are obsessed with snowboarding.

All of their toys have caught the snowboarding bug, too. At random moments during the day O3 will have a Little People horse on a playing card, or her soft doll standing on a small book, or some miscellaneous little puppy perched on a plastic dish, and she’ll yell, “Ready? Set? SNOWBOARD!!!!” The toy will slide around the floor/table/countertop on its makeshift board and do all sorts of tricks. The girls have contests, races and snowboarding games with each other. And, of course, they beg to play “the snowboard game” on the XBox.

Tonight, in the bathtub, all the toys in the tub received their very own brand-spanking-new snowboards (foam bath shapes make excellent boards, apparently). There was only one small problem: we were in the tub. And everyone knows you can’t snowboard in the tub.

Imagine, had you not known the detail of these first three paragraphs (like my husband, who didn’t realize that his snowboarding video game had carried over to today’s play), and you hear two little girls in the bathtub shouting:

“Ready? Set? WATERBOARD!!!!”

You can see how that could be a tad confusing.

The Afterlife Needs a Better Ad Campaign

My 8-year-old niece was here visiting the other day. She told us:

“Well, people grow old and then they die. And then they go to heaven. And then they have a… well, they have a deadly life.”

On a completely unrelated topic, S5 was building something with Legos.

“This is my standing-up volcano,” she announced, setting her triangle-shaped construct on the windowsill. “Don’t touch it, or it will interrupt, and kill everyone!”

Well, if we are Girls, Interrupted, then at least we’ll have a deadly life in heaven.

Better Luck Next Time

The girls got a hold of some yarn and were playing with it.  This is not new.  Normally, they like to wrap the yarn around and around and around a toy, until the toy is wearing a sort of fiber-fat-suit.  Or they will tie it around a toy, then tie that toy to another.  Or – most famously – they will tie it to a piece of furniture.  I should mention that a “tie” involves about fifty overhand knots, which are not terribly hard to undo but can become very, very time consuming.

Today’s adventure was slightly less benign.  It involved tying yarn around wrists and ankles, and running, and there were possibly staircases involved; and I could (with my keen mother’s future-telling sense) forsee such play disintegrating into something rather hazardous and potentially involving trips to emergency.

“O3,” I admonished, since she was closest and in earshot, “this is not a good idea.  You girls could get very hurt.  Be smart about how you’re playing with the yarn.”

Without missing a beat, she replied:

“Tomorrow, I’m going to be smart.  Today, I am playing this game with S5.”

It’s All In The Adverbs

We’re a little behind on the blog posts.  I know.  I’m sorry.  Things have been pretty hectic.  But we are home, and I’m busy uploading pictures and whatnot, and we’ll soon have a lot of annoying photos postcards from Florida to share.

Meanwhile, a cute snippet for you.

The night we got home, everyone was tired.  Really tired.  We were in bed at least two hours early, even.  S4 and O2 started out sleeping in their own bed, in fact.  They were that sleepy.

O2 woke up around 2AM and needed to go potty.  She then crawled back into bed with me, since I didn’t want her to wake up her sister.

But shortly after, S4 padded into our room.  She whimpered softly in the dark.  “Mama?”  I woke up in time to see her climbing into our bed next to her dad, who put an arm around her without even waking up.  As she snuggled in with all of us, I heard her tell him:

“I don’t want to sleep lonely.”

Singularly

My youngest demonstrates her grasp of plural and singular.

O2:  I love you, Mama.

Me: Oh, I love you too, Punkins.

O2: I not Punkins!  I just one punkin.

Me: You’re just one?

O2: No, I not one.  I TWO.

This is what too much Amelia Bedelia will do to your family.  You’ve been warned…

Winter’s Coming

S4:  Mama, I’m cold!

Me: Put a sweater on, then, dear.

S4: I don’t want a sweater.  I want YOU!

Avionics 101

“Mama,” S4 announced at breakfast this morning, “a plane that has a spinner on its head is called a helicopter.“

“Oh, yes, you’re right,” I agreed.

“And a plane that has a spinner on its nose is called an air-plane.”

Look out, NASA.