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.

Head bonk!

So, last Saturday, Ella and Maisie took another class at the Minnesota Zoo. ("SHARKS!") They were running to the entrance, Ella in front with her hands in her pockets and Maisie bringing up the rear. When Maisie caught up to Ella, she accidentally stepped on Ella's heel... which tripped Ella, sending her face-down onto the curb.

BONK!

Fortunately the Zoo has a nurse on hand. They got Ellie cleaned up, and gave her an ice pack for the rapidly swelling goose egg on her poor little head. Maisie stayed with Ella until Ella calmed down enough to go to the class.

On Sunday we went to the Science Museum, where Ellie actually spent time trying to get another bump on her head, "so they'd match." Clearly no long-term trauma has been suffered.

Now, almost a week later, it's still a little swollen but has faded to a lovely yellow-green color.

It's still not pretty to look at, but it's definitely on the mend. And honestly, the injury is much less severe than it could've been, all things considered. No broken noses or chipped or broken teeth - just a goose egg on her forehead. Still probably took a few years off of Aaron's life though.

Weekend photo roundup

I hope everyone had a great weekend and aren't too sleepy on this post-DST "spring ahead" Monday.

Our weekend started off in less-than-stellar fashion, with Maisie getting some sort of tummy bug and throwing up in her bed Friday night. Not to worry - she's totally fine now, and I'm not sharing any pictures of it! So our Saturday was pretty low key...we just hung around the house, just in case there was going to be a repeat. But fortunately it was a one-time event. So Sunday, we got out and about!

We started the morning playing outside. Aaron and the girls have built an AMAZING snow fort in the back yard out of giant snowballs. Maisie wants to turn it into an igloo, but I don't know if the snow will last long enough for them to do that.

Even if it doesn't fully become an igloo, it's still pretty fun for them to play in and on!

Then, Sunday afternoon, a parenting group I belong to had a meetup at Edinborough Park!

You might remember Edinborough as the place where we had Ella's 3rd birthday party. It's not one of our regular play spaces (mainly because we're members elsewhere, so we tend to go places where we don't have to pay admission, like the zoo or the children's museum), so it's always kind of a treat to go there.

The girls ran and jumped and slid and climbed and then did it all again! It was a lot of fun for all of us... they enjoyed playing, and I enjoyed talking to the other moms and dads.

After two and a half hours of that, we were tired out and ready to eat, so we went to Pizza Luce.

A highlight of this trip was Ella's discussion of tattoos with our server, after asking to see his heavily tattooed arms:

"I know how to do children's tattoos. You put it on your arm, and then someone gets a washcloth and they push it on, and then you peel off the paper! My mommy has grownup tattoos. They push them in your skin with needles! When I'm a grownup I'm going to get grownup tattoos, but not yet. Right now I just get children's tattoos."


Ella, future tattooed lady (Maisie took this picture)



Maisie's pine cones

I'm pretty sure I've mentioned here that we're members of the Science Museum of Minnesota. One of Maisie's favorite things to do at the museum is to visit Collectors' Corner and the Trading Post.

This is a neat area that's tucked away in the back corner of their collections gallery. To be honest, it took me a while to even notice it... I don't know how many times we visited and just walked right by it. But it's really cool! Kids can bring in things they've found in nature to trade. They get points based not just on what they found, but also how much they know about it - the people working there ask the children a bunch of questions about where they found it, how they found it, and what they know about it. The kids can then trade in their points to "buy" things from their display case that has polished rocks, little fossils, and things like that.

The first time we went, Maisie brought some finds from our fossil-hunting expedition. Well! She not only found FOSSILS but she also knew a bunch about the giant inland sea (thank you, Dinosaur Train), so she got a bunch of points. Since then, she's been trying unsuccessfully to have another huge hit like that, and get thousands of points at the Trading Post. This weekend, she finally did it again!

This fall, we collected a bunch of different pine cones around our neighborhood. They were intended for a project that never really took off, so they've been sitting on a shelf ever since. With some encouragement and assistance from me and Aaron, Maisie turned them into a poster!

As you can see, she identified each of them, taped them to the poster, and wrote down the name. She also drew a diagram of the parts of a pine cone, along with a drawing of a pine cone on the end of a branch.

Well, the person working at the trading post was REALLY impressed. It's pretty clear that Maisie did this herself, and I think he appreciated that. He asked her some questions about pine cones generally that she was able to answer, too.

He awarded Maisie 7,000 points, which made her really happy. AND he told her that he'd see if they could display her poster as an example of work that children could do to show their knowledge and earn extra points. It was so cool! She used some of her points to get a conch shell with a lovely pink interior, and saved the rest for next time.

I was (and am!) so proud of her, and even better, I think she was really proud of her poster, too. I offered to carry it in and down the stairs, but she insisted on doing it all herself.

It was a great experience and really rewarding for her. She's already planning her next report - on leaves of trees in our neighborhood, once spring is here and there are any leaves to be found!

The many faces of Ella

I love taking pictures of Ella because her face is so, so expressive. Plus, she's a total ham in front of a camera!

Snow angel!

All right buddy, put 'em up, put 'em up...

Hmmm, you think so?

I'm skeptical...

At the Mall of America...

When will this ride start?!?



OH YEAH!!!!!



I think she was going for kitty whiskers here.

Funny faces!

Surprise Visit

Aaron had a dentist appointment on February 14 (romantic!), but Dr. Norrlander's office called this morning... they had a cancellation, and would he like to come in? He packed up the girls (Maisie's off school today for a record keeping day) and came downtown. So lucky me, I got to hang out with the girls during Aaron's appointment. I met them at Barnes & Noble, then we went to Angel Food for a donut, and ended up over in by the big fountain in the Crystal Court.

I love it when I get to see them during the day. It's such a fun little interlude and a lovely change of pace from my usual.

(also: my oh my are there a lot of... odd... people hanging around in the Crystal Court during the day. One woman we walked by was talking very earnestly to a tree, and as we passed by, I realized she was cursing it out. She and that tree were not friends. One man saw me reading a book to the girls, and offered to lend us his Bible instead. No thanks, guy!)

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Like everyone, I was horrified when I learned about Friday's school shooting in Newtown, CT. I couldn't believe it - and I still kind of can't. It's just too horrifying.

For better or for worse, I was at a CLE on Friday afternoon. It was one of the Hennepin County Bar Association's Law and Literature series - really excellent CLEs, by the way. We were discussing Pearl S. Buck's story John John Chinaman, which tells the story of John Lim, the son of Chinese immigrants living in a small midwestern town immediately prior to WWII. John lives with his pregnant wife, a recent immigrant from China, and his father. His conflicts are much what you might expect - he was born in the U.S. and is American, but isn't accepted as a "real American" by the town. He was teased as a boy, and continues to be teased and looked down on as an adult. His father worries about him, and he worries about his unborn child.

In the story, the mayor of the town is a WWI veteran who lived through some real horrors fighting in France. When he gets word of a draft, he is appalled by the thought that the young men of his town may have to live through something similar to what he had to endure.

I won't give away anything else in case anyone wants to read the story (because I don't know how to do hidden text in blogger). It's a great short story; if anyone wants to read it, let me know. I can email you the pdf we got for the CLE.

Anyway, so the CLE was for "elimination of bias" credits, so those are the issues we discussed - what John, his wife, and his father faced in their town, not being accepted as "real Americans," and to what degree those biases are still present today. But the theme that really hit home for me was how everyone was struggling to keep their loved ones safe. John's father tries to protect John; John tries to protect his wife and unborn child; the mayor tries to protect the young men in his town. But despite these efforts, John and his wife were teased and harassed, and young men were sent off to war. Ultimately, there's very little we can do, to keep our loved ones safe.

On Friday afternoon... this was not a great theme for me. I kept starting to cry, and having to leave the room, then pulling myself together to go back in for another round. So glad I only needed one hour's worth of credit - I left at the mid-afternoon break.

So anyway. After all that, I felt like we needed something fun and a little indulgent, with no TVs around, so we went to the Global Market. Apparently we weren't the only ones with that thought, because the Family Friday was super crowded.

Maisie gets ALL the beverages



Cream cheese wontons from Pham's Deli



Mushroom pizza from Jakeeno's... yum!


We ate wontons and pizza, and danced to the wonderful Roe Family Singers. It was a good way to end an awful day.

We haven't told the girls about the shooting, by the way. We don't watch the news with them in the room, and I didn't want to bring it up. I don't think Maisie needs to know yet. I know, though, that she may hear about it from other kids. So this morning I told her that if she hears someone talking about something they saw on the news, and has questions or wants to talk about it, to come to me or Aaron and we'll talk about it with her. I'm interested to hear how other people are handling this with their kids, though - let me know your thoughts.

We have snow!!

SNOW!!! After last winter where we had very little snow, we finally got a serious snowfall yesterday!

It started late on Saturday night. So by the time we got up on Sunday morning, we had serious snow on the ground! The girls wanted to go outside to play immediately. So we dug out their snowpants and headed outside. They sledded a little bit on the hill in our backyard, and then built a little snowman together... it was about 30 degrees so the weather was perfect for a snowman! 

working together

Tiny, adorable snowman

The snow continued throughout the day... I shoveled once in the morning and Aaron shoveled again in the afternoon, but we need to do it again.



Not our tree,  I just thought it was pretty.



Unfortunately, last night (while it was still snowing) Aaron & I realized that we were out of coffee (and a couple of other things)! We didn't want to take the car out - none of the streets had been plowed yet - so we all bundled up, put the girls in the sled, and walked to Walgreen's. It's only about five blocks, so it's normally an easy walk there. But last night it was a different story! It was getting darker and colder, and we had to trudge through a foot of snow... some people had shoveled, but not everyone. Pulling the girls on the sled was a lot of work for me and Aaron! But we made it there and back, and the girls thought it was a great adventure. And then this morning, there was coffee. So it all worked out in the end. :)





Silly Ella playing in the snow in the dark



Picture dump

Some November pictures that haven't made it into their own post...

Madness!!

Opening birthday presents at Grandma Jo's house, with help from Dieter cousins



Yum!

Cake pops at Jasper's birthday party (so fun!)

A kitty headband she made at the MIA on Target family day

Riding a camel at the Science Museum


Ella wonders why Maisie is making such a silly face

 Pouty duckface at Jakeeno's

first Girl Scouts troop meeting

first banana split, post-Children's Theater at the Bad Waitress. Ella ended up wearing a lot of it.


yee haw!

 mechanical horse at The Egg & I

crafty painting time

Thanksgiving

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! We had a lovely day with a traditional dinner over at Grandma Liisa's house. The girls especially had a great time - they played and played and played.

This post is about what we did earlier in the day, though!

A few years back, I was trying to tell Maisie about Thanksgiving and the idea of thankfulness. Turns out it's kind of abstract, and was a little difficult for her to grasp. So I stole an idea from some friends - to make the idea of 'thankfulness' more tangible for her, we'd do something to demonstrate it. We made cookies for the firefighters at the station nearest our house!

So now, every year on Thanksgiving morning, that's what we do - make cookies and then bring them to the firefighters at the station house nearest us, to say "thank you for helping to keep us safe." We've had mixed results with this project. Sometimes Maisie will get shy, and doesn't want to talk to anyone; one year the firefighters were out on a call when we got there. But this year it was a home run.

When we showed up with the cookies (oatmeal-M&M, if you were wondering), the firefighters there (yay!), and Maisie and Ella were both in great moods. So when the firefighter who answered the door asked the girls if they wanted to see the trucks, they said YES!

And THEN! The doors to the two engines were open. And when the girls asked if they could go inside, she said yes!



yeah, that's a sword....

 They climbed in and out and all over, asking lots of great questions. What is this hose for? (sucking up exhaust when we turn the trucks on) What's in there? (our tools - we can cut someone out of anything with these) What do these switches do? (controls the pressure for the hose) The firefighter showing us around was incredibly patient and answered all of the girls' questions.



Listening to explanations of equipment



Looking at how they open the garage doors


The firefighters were super friendly. They really seemed to appreciate the cookies and were so gracious about showing the girls around. They even gave the girls fire safety coloring books when we were leaving! It was so cool. I thought it was neat, too, that the firefighter who answered the door and showed us around was a woman - often we see "firefighter" as synonymous with "fireman" and that isn't the case!

It was so fun that Maisie wants to make them cookies again on Valentine's Day. :)

And because it bears repeating... thank you, Minneapolis Fire Department and fire departments everywhere, for helping keep us safe!

First Dentist Visit

Ella had her first dentist appointment today. She did a great job! No complaints while the hygienist cleaned and flossed her teeth, and sat still for the x-rays.



No cavities or decay, and everything is coming in nicely... 20 teeth, all right where they're supposed to be.

She particularly enjoyed seeing x-rays ("they took pictures of my skeleton!!"). She also talked almost nonstop the entire time, and charmed the heck out of everyone she met there.

We love our dentist, Dr. Norrlander. She is super gentle and caring, and her staff really works to make sure that kids have a good experience so they don't develop anxiety around dentist visits. If anyone is looking for a dentist in downtown Minneapolis, we highly recommend Dr. Norrlander! 

Minnesota weather

Saturday afternoon:

 Sunny and 70-some degrees. Note short sleeves.

Then, Monday morning at the bus stop:

Air temp of 19 degrees, with a wind chill of 9. Snow on the ground and hot chocolate in the travel mug. The forecast calls for a high temperature of 26.

Brrr! That was fast...