Weekend update

Long time no blog! Life has been even a little busier than usual around here... hence the long silence. In early November I took a new position at the bank, so work's been keeping me busy! It's a lateral move, but with more growth potential than my old position. I've also changed locations; instead of working in downtown Minneapolis, I'm in a suburban location now. I'm very happy with the change, but there's definitely a learning curve/adjustment period that's been taking up a lot of time and energy. Hence the lack of blog posts!

We had a great Thanksgiving at Gramma Liisa's house, and are now getting ready for Christmas! Every year FACA (Finnish-American Cultural Activities) puts on a Joulu (Christmas) celebration, which was this past Saturday.

There's a Joulutori (Christmas marketplace), children's Christmas movies and activities, a delicious dinner, and a sing-along of Finnish Christmas carols and songs. This year, a group of kids from Suomi-koulu performed songs and dances during the dinner and the Joululaulut - including Maisie!

Isn't she the cutest little Joulu tonttu (Christmas elf)? And Grandma Liisa made the vest and skirt she wore - she got a lot of compliments on them!

She had a lot of fun dancing and singing - she really loves performing for an audience!

On Sunday morning, I realized we hadn't been to the Science Museum in a while, and their butterflies exhibit was closing soon, so we had to go check it out! Maisie's not a big fan of any kind of insects, so Ella and I went to the butterfly house without her and Aaron.

There were a ton of Monarchs in the butterfly house, and the Omni theater movie is also about Monarchs - their life cycle and migration. It was really interesting and I learned a lot from it!

Ella is a huge fan of all kinds of insects, so she was happy to let them crawl all over her. She's very careful not to touch their wings and is very gentle. She loves all kinds of insects, and has talked about wanting to be a scientist who discovers new kinds of spiders when she grows up.

So, that was our weekend in a nutshell! How was yours?

Willie the Millipede

This winter is really really reluctant to give up its hold on us. Every time I think it's finally over... we get another round.

Thursday April 3.

Today we're looking at a high of 38, but it was only 28 this morning at the bus stop... with a wind chill of 10. Tomorrow's forecast says "chilly with snow and rain." SNOW!

One side effect of the never-ending winter is that when it does warm up outside, however briefly, everyone immediately runs out to take advantage of the sun and warmth... and we're no exception! As you may remember, Maisie loved biking last year, but never really got the hang of it on her own - she either rode on the trailbike behind me, or used training wheels. This year it's a different story!

She worked and worked and worked at it until she mastered the art of the two-wheel bike! She was bound and determined to figure it out, and didn't stop until she got there. Now it's all she wants to do.

Saturday wasn't the nicest day ever - overcast and maybe in the 50s or low 60s - but it definitely felt nice compared to where our weather's been. So when we got home from Girl Scouts and Suomi-koulu, the girls headed outside to play almost immediately. They rode their bikes around the block (Ella's doing great on her two-wheeler with training wheels) and played volleyball and soccer with the neighbor kids. After a couple hours of that (seriously, HOURS), they ended up in the backyard where they climbed trees, dug holes, made mud, and found some little bug friends!

First the girls found a roly-poly, which they attempted to sneak into the house so they could keep it as a pet. I explained that it wouldn't be happy in the house - we didn't know what it eats, and the cats might get it, so we needed to put it back outside. They reluctantly complied... but we had to have the conversation again when they found a little millipede.

They really, really, really wanted to bring the millipede inside to keep as a pet of their own. They even named it Willie! Ella especially was unhappy when I said no way, absolutely not, Willie needs to stay outside. So I suggested we write reports about millipedes that they could take to the Science Museum to get points at the Collectors Corner, and that seemed to make everything better.

You may remember that Maisie did this once before, with her pine cones poster. She's also brought in small fossils that she found on the Mississippi River banks. Ella hadn't traded before at the Collectors Corner, so she was excited to get started!

The next morning the girls worked on their reports, using their observations and information we learned from a U of MN Extension website.

Maisie's had more text...



Millipedes have 400 legs. They curl up when they are scared. They are small. They eat leafs that are falling apart. You find them in damp places. They are dark brawn. from Maisie


while Ella mostly drew pictures, and then told me what to write for the captions.

They are long and skinny. They eat crumbly leaves and grass. They curl up and they go straight. This millepede is on my hand.

bonus pic, with Ella's new short haircut

At the Collectors Corner, the Science Museum staff asked the girls a bunch of questions about millipedes and their presentations... What kind of animal is it? How do you know it's not a bird or a mammal? Does it have a skeleton? How did you learn about it? Where do they live? Why does it curl up when it gets scared? The girls did great, and were each awarded 2,500 points. They now busy planning their next reports, so they can get more points!

We had plans to go to Gramma Liisa's house for lunch, but we had a little time to stay and play at the museum. I think the highlight for Maisie was getting to be the helper at the Science Live! show about cryogenics.

She's holding a ball and describing its properties (soft, squishy, bouncy) before it takes a trip to "Liquid Nitrogenland."

It was a great weekend of outdoor learning. I was (am!) so proud of how hard they worked on their reports. The Collectors Corner is such a cool resource, and a great way to get kids interested and motivated in learning about nature and science!

Powderhorn Park Art Fair

There was a lot going on this weekend - opening of the Fringe festival, a birthday party for Maisie, and three separate art fairs! We chose to go to art fair at Powderhorn Park, which is 1) not half as crowded as the ones in Loring Park and Uptown, and 2) an easy six-block walk or bike ride from our house.

The girls and I went on Saturday morning and met up with friends - Beatrix, with her parents Bethany and Patrick, and Rebecca. It was a lovely morning.

Beatrix is exactly in between Maisie & Ella in age, so the three of them can play together really well. She also has curly blond hair and big blue eyes. At one point one of the vendors clearly thought they were all sisters, and asked me "Are they all just a year apart??" Bethany joked that I should've answered "Yeah, turns out that breastfeeding is not reliable birth control."

Our little group walked around the lake, checking out the vendors and taking turns keeping an eye on the kids. The girls took full advantage of the fair food offerings, and ate ice cream, popcorn, chocolate mini donuts, corn on the cob, and corn dogs. (I had a gyro, yum yum yum!)

We caught a performance from Open Eye Figure Theater...

before we headed to our respective homes for naps.

On Sunday morning, Aaron took Maisie to a birthday party at the Como Pool, which left Ella and me to our own devices. I nixed her first activity suggestion ("Go to the Mall of the 'Merica and ride on rides!!!"), so we jointly decided to head back to the art fair.

The first thing she wanted to do was to get some corn on the cob, and who am I to argue with that?

While she ate, we sat by the lake and watched the wildlife. We saw a turtle poke its nose out of the lake, snails bobbing around, a few flashes of fish (it's stocked with crappies, sunnies, and catfish), and of course plenty of birds. In addition to the usual ducks (mallards and cormorants) that live there, there was a pretty big group of Canada geese (maybe 12?) that hadn't been there on Saturday. So we watched the geese and the ducks. We saw a group of 2 female ducks that had three ducklings - we'd seen them on Saturday too, and joked that these lesbian ducks had chosen a very friendly park in which to raise their children. :) Sunday morning was quieter, so Ella and I could hear the ducklings' little peeps as they called to their moms.

At one point the geese started getting REALLY interested in Ella's corn...

They sidled up a lot closer to us than we were expecting. It was a little nerve-wracking, to be honest - I think of those geese as kind of nasty, and they were pretty big birds! I was happy when they finally decided to go for a swim and leave us alone.

Ella and I walked around a bit and took our time exploring the booths. When we made it back to the south side of the park, we saw that Open Eye was getting set up for another performance! Yay!

So we found a place to sit and wait for the show to start. We passed the time by eating ice cream (Ella) and potato salad (me), and playing with a new doll I'd bought her from one of the vendors. Oh, and taking selfies, of course.

After the puppet show, I wanted to walk around a bit more, but Ella was ready to head home, so home we went. Maisie and Aaron still weren't back from the birthday party, so Ella asked me to put on a show for her. She said she wanted to skip her nap, and just rest on the couch a little bit. Then this happened...

The art fair was very fun. It made for a great summer weekend!

Dinosaurs at the zoo!

First, one note: tomorrow is Maisie's last day of Kindergarten. OMG! So if you see me, I might be a big weepy about it. Be nice to me... and tell her congratulations!

Last Saturday, the girls and I headed down to the Minnesota Zoo. There are two new exhibits there for the summer! One has African animals, and the other has dinosaurs. Yes, dinosaurs at the Zoo! Just animatronic... this isn't a Jurassic Park situation.

If you haven't ever been to the Minnesota Zoo, let me take a second to explain its layout. There's one main building that has customer service/ticketing, a cafeteria, and the gift shop, and several indoor exhibits: Discovery Bay, the Tropics Trail, the penguins, and the Minnesota Trail are all in the same building. Then outside, there's a main plaza with a fountain/splash pad and a lot of trails with outdoor exhibits. Russia's Grizzly Coast, the Northern Trail, and the Family Farm are all outside. Dinosaurs and the African animals exhibits are outside, along the Northern Trail.

We had sunscreen, sunhats, and were ready to walk the trails to get to Africa and to see dinosaurs. Sadly, there were other plans for us! When we got to the zoo, we were told that a bison had escaped its enclosure, so nobody could go outside until it was recaptured. WHAT!

So, instead we spent the morning doing activities to help Maisie earn her Girl Scouts Minnesota Zoo badge. Ella was not exactly pleased about this arrangement.

But, what can you do.

Eventually we did all Maisie's activities (How many species of frogs are in Minnesota? What are three bird on the tropics trail? Draw your favorite fish on the coral reef. Draw a food chain of animals you see on the Minnesota trail.) and got the all-clear to head outside. FINALLY! We were off to see the dinosaurs!!

This is a dimetrodon. I don't know why, but I think its fossil looks much scarier than the robot version. Maybe because you can see the teeth so much more clearly? Or maybe it's the freaky spines... hard to say.

Either way, I'm glad we don't have to worry about running across one of these in the wild.

By the time we got through dinosaurs and the African exhibit (not as great as advertised - one giraffe and a bunch of ostriches was really all we saw), the girls were hot and tired. Fortunately, we went through the central plaza with its splash pad/fountain on the way back. They were ready to cool off and weren't going to be stopped by not having brought swimsuits!

A quick pose on the wolf statutes on the way out...

 capped off a great day at the Minnesota Zoo!

Easter at the Zoo!

Ah, springtime. Sun and green grass and trees budding and flowers growing. Isn't it great?

Well, yeah, unless it's Minnesota... in which case it's some snow melting, but a high temperature of 34 degrees. Brr!

On Easter, we met some friends at the Minnesota Zoo. We'd all planned to go out to their family farm exhibit to check out the zoo babies, but brrr!

We did make it as far outside as the grizzly bears with our friends. We got to see one of the zookeepers adding fish to their pond. He said the bears would probably wake up and eat the fish, but they were more interested in snoozing than snacking.

Around lunchtime/naptime our friends headed home, so we bundled up and set off to check out the farm babies at the family farm. It was a chilly walk, but once we got there, it was super fun. We walked through the different barns and saw piglets, ducklings, lambs, and chicken eggs hatching.

We had to feed the goats, of course. There was a volunteer hanging around in the goat yard area, who told us that the girls could come in and brush the goats. YAY!!!! This was apparently their fondest wish. Who knew?!? So we went off to brush goats.

The goats were super friendly, and enjoyed being brushed. But they were also REALLY interested in my phone. Every time I tried to take a pic of the girls brushing the goats...

Get off me!!

..someone would think that the phone was edible, and needed checking out.



What's that in your hand? Mind if I take a look?



This goat here actually jumped up on me like a dog just a moment after I took this - he put his front hooves up on my chest to check out my phone! Down boy!!



A little privacy please?



This goat was surprisingly compliant about posing for a pic while Ella brushed him. Hmmm, I wonder why? Well, see how her tail's up? Turns out that means she's about to poop.

Anyway, the girls had a ton of fun brushing the goats. It was a long day at the zoo (we were there until almost 2:00!) but really, really fun. We saw a lot of baby animals (Bactrian camel and sloth, in addition to the farm babies) and despite the weather, a lovely time was had by all.

A goat was trying to knock me down while I took this; that's why it's skewed.

Farm babies!

This weekend the Minnesota Zoo opened its "family farm" for the season with the arrival of farm babies! It was supposed to be beautiful outside (weather prediction FAIL: they said it'd be 70 on Saturday; when we left the zoo at 11:00 it was only 45, and windy too!) so we were excited to go see the babies.

As expected, the farm babies were EXTREMELY cute.

The lambs and kids were probably my favorites. They were adorable! Most of them were super playful, jumping around through the straw on the floors and even on each other.

Even when they were snuggled up under a heat lamp to keep warm, they were so cute.

SNUGGLES! We also saw ten-day-old piglets, two-week-old calves, baby bunnies, and peepy little herds of ducklings and chicks (hiding inside, out of the cold).

Of course, our own kids are pretty cute too!

More art from Maisie

An octopus family:

Maisie likes to draw me pictures to bring to work. I like it too, especially now that I'm working in a somewhat bland cube. Mostly it's a lot of princesses, but every once in a while I get a gem like this one.

But even when the pictures are predictable, they always make me smile!

Girl Team!

The girls refer to themselves & me as the "girl team." Today they requested a girl team adventure. Okay!

We went to the zoo! It was a lot of fun. Nothing really special - just the three of us hanging out and having a good time. We toured the trails, hit the gift shop, and rode the monorail.

it was really, really great. :)

happy Easter!

Happy Easter to all who celebrate! Our Easter Sunday started early.



Ella of course woke up early, so she and I got up and checked out what the Easter bunny brought her. Her basket had, among other things, a rattle that she's really enjoying!

Maisie joined us shortly.

Her basket had a chocolate bunny in it! And just FYI, it turns out that if you let your preschooler eat a chocolate bunny for breakfast, probably your late morning/early afternoon will not be awesome. Lesson learned!

So this morning, the weather here was beautiful - mid 60s and sunny - so we headed down to the Minnesota Zoo in the morning, to check out the Farm Babies!

(For those who aren't familiar, the MN Zoo has a family farm exhibit, with cattle, sheep, goats, swine, and poultry. Every spring, the farm babies are CRAZY popular.)

This farm baby is two days old. TWO! He was born on Friday. Terribly cute.

This farm baby is a little bit older than that, but still also really cute!

On the way back from the farm, Ella got tired of the stroller...

She needed a new perspective.

Funnily enough, some of the real animal superstars of this trip to the zoo were not even zoo animals. There's a little lake chain between the main part of the zoo and the family farm, and at this time of year, there are a ton of Canada geese there.

Everyone loved the geese! LOOK AT THAT BIG BIRD, MAMA! They were a huge hit.

This one's for Max

Maisie and I took this picture on our last trip to the Minnesota Zoo, just for her cousin Max.

It's a wolverine, of course!

Happy Thanksgiving! (belatedly)

Once again I have to apologize for the length of time between posts! This time, though, I can't blame illness - I dropped and broke our camera chasing Maisie around Underwater Adventures, the aquarium at the Mall of America. So as a result, I have no pictures to share of our lovely Thanksgiving, which included a trip to Iowa to meet baby Maya. But if someone has some and can email them to me (hint hint Clare!) then I'd be happy to share them here.

But we went shopping the day after Thanksgiving and picked up a lovely new camera at Best Buy. (We also got the extended insurance plan that covers accidental damage, say for instance if it were dropped.) So I do have pictures from our trip to the Minnesota Zoo today!

One of the highlights, for Maisie, of a trip to the zoo is always sitting on this giant metal tortoise. It can be hard to get her off the metal tortoise to go see the actual, real animals sometimes!

You may notice that Maisie has another orange hat on! She got this pumpkin hat as a birthday present from her grandma Jo, who made it for her. Since it's too cold out for her other orange hat, she's now taken to this one as her constant headwear. She gets lots of compliments on it!

After walking around for a while, we sat by the gibbons' enclosure and had a snack. I learned today that one of the differences between monkeys and apes is that monkeys have tails, whereas apes do not. So there is a fun animal science fact for you!

We ended our zoo day at Discovery Bay, which houses the aquatic animals. There's a giant aquarium with all kinds of interesting fish (and sharks!), a tidal touch pool that Maisie loves to splash in, and a dolphin tank. Maisie enjoyed watching the dolphins swim around.

Normally there are dolphin shows, but one of the dolphins turned up pregnant, so all shows are cancelled until some time after she gives birth. But in the meantime, we still like to watch them swim around and play together.

Why I don't go out on Saturday nights anymore.

This morning, Maisie and I got up bright and early: 5:55 a.m.! Aaron and I take turns sleeping in on the weekends, so we let him sleep until 8:00, when we woke him up and suggested going to the Minnesota Zoo.


The Zoo has this new exhibit called "Russia's Grizzly Coast" that we'd heard great things about. We figured that, given it's a weekend day with beautiful weather, the exhibit would probably be pretty crowded unless we went early.

It was a great exhibit! There were bears, of course, and several boars,

sea otters, leopards, tigers... it was really well done.

But even though the Zoo opens at 9 and we got there by 9:30, it was already pretty crowded. So, we headed out to check out the Family Farm. Along the way we had to stop and say hi to some friendly prairie dogs, though.

They were very cute and pretty friendly - as you can see, this one came right up to Maisie! There was one big fat prairie dog that kept jumping to try to get over the fence. We were like, buddy, you're going the wrong way. Think tunnels!

One funny thing about the prairie dog exhibit is that, even though there is information all over about how beneficial they are for their environment, there's always a farmer or two complaining about them at the exhibit.

Anyway, we got out to the Family Farm, which is about a mile's walk (or stroller ride). We saw draft horses, a bull, pigs, chickens, and sheep. The highlight, though, was the goat barn!

For $0.50 you can get a handful of little pellets to feed the goats. The goats are really kind of aggressive about seeking it out, and if you put out your hands you'll have a whole bunch of goats nosing around looking for food. Maisie was clearly delighted by this - you should have heard her laughing. If she'd had her way, we would've stayed at the goat barn all day!

She wasn't happy when we said it was time to go,

but she got over it pretty quickly.

Then, this afternoon we spent a couple hours doing yardwork and playing outside. It was hard work!

I never thought I'd turn down a babysitter, but tonight we did. We're bushed! It's a movie and an early bedtime tonight.