We spent Thanksgiving at my mom's house, as we do every year. Only one of my sisters was able to come, and we had a slightly shorter vacation than usual, due to both of my sons having school on Wednesday, but despite those things we still had a fun long weekend.
My sister and I made Thanksgiving dinner for 13 people, which was less work than I expected, and utterly delicious. (I didn't take any photos of the food, but my sister's turkey was one of the most perfect-looking -- and delicious-tasting -- main courses I've ever seen.) We took the kids to see Fantastic Mr. Fox, which was a big hit for both kids and adults (Wes Anderson + Roald Dahl is like a dream come true for me). We played a lot of Rock Band:
On Saturday we went down to the Cooperstown, NY area (famous for being home to the Baseball Hall of Fame) to go to a local cider mill and to a historical museum and village, the Farmers' Museum. Believe it or not, the kids were not enthralled with this part of the afternoon, but there were some parts they enjoyed. The highlight for them was the carousel ride:
I am in love with this carousel. The animals are all animals native to New York State, and they are both adorable and hilarious in carousel form. Some of the animals included a bear, a loon, a goose, a skunk, a frog, a cow and a fish, as well as the pig, raccoon and beaver shown below:
The historical village was really pretty. It would have been nicer to walk around there on a sunny day, but even with a chilly drizzle it had its charms:
In other news, a few days ago we woke up to the first snow of the season, which we were actually pretty excited about. We have a holly bush outside our front door, and I loved the look of the white snow, red berries and green leaves together:
The trees edging our apartment complex looked beautiful topped with a little snow:
And Evan was thrilled to make some snowballs:
The snow has since melted, but its brief appearance has helped get us in the mood for the holidays. We have a Christmas tree (which we'll hopefully have time to decorate soon), we've taken our Christmas photos, and we've started diving into Christmas books and movies and music. And in two weeks we'll be on our way to the west coast to spend a couple of weeks with Greg's family -- we can't wait!
Oh, and by the way, I've started uploading many of my photos to Flickr -- so far I've mostly put older photos up, but I'm hoping to keep up with posting newer photos there too. Check it out if you're interested!
04 December 2009
friday photos: thanksgiving edition
25 February 2009
catching up
Looking back through my recent posts, I realized that I haven't written much about our lives in a while, so I thought I'd write a brief (though probably not very brief) post about what we've been doing over the last couple of months.
I'll start with Christmas. I wrote about our ridiculous holiday travel experiences, but then completely neglected to write about our actual vacation. We were at Greg's parents' house for about ten days, and it was wonderful to spend so much time with his family after a full year without seeing most of them. We did all the usual holiday stuff -- played games, watched movies, lazed around, ate a LOT -- but probably the most remarkable thing about the vacation was snow. Snow! In the Pacific Northwest! As someone born and bred in upstate New York, spending seven Christmases in green, snow-free Washington state never felt quite like Christmas. But the Pacific Northwest got hit with some unusual weather this winter (luckily, not affecting our travel on that end at all), and we were able to play in the snow, to build snowmen and have snowball fights and go sledding in a place with real hills.
It's always hard to say goodbye to Greg's family, knowing we won't see them again for a long time, but this year we're hoping to visit again in the summer, for the first time in three years, thanks to the travel vouchers and frequent flier miles the airline gave us after all the trouble we had. I didn't realize how long it had been since we'd been to Washington in the summer until the boys and I were watching an episode of Blue Planet about tidal areas, and James, when asked, told me he can't remember exploring tide pools in Washington. I had to stop and think that the last time we were there, he was four, so he probably wouldn't remember much about it. Hopefully that will change this summer.
I say hopefully, because the biggest thing going on with us lately is that Greg is in the final stages of writing his dissertation, really pushing to finish it within a month or two, so by the time summer rolls around, hopefully Dr. Schmidt will be employed. And hopefully whoever employs him will be willing to give him a little vacation time over the summer. We could all use a vacation -- with Greg trying to finish, he's working ridiculously long hours, and we don't see him nearly enough. I've been feeling lonely and overworked on the domestic front, and the boys are even losing out on weekend playtime since Greg is going in to work most Sundays. To give you an idea of how things are, today is Wednesday and James hasn't seen Greg since Sunday. We'll all be glad when graduate school is over and done with.
James is still enjoying first grade, as much as he can enjoy doing a bunch of work that's too easy for him. He brought home another perfect report card a couple of weeks ago. Evan and I are going to more community classes for preschoolers, and we're looking into real preschool for the fall. Last week was winter break, in which the boys and I spent waaaay too much quality time together, which made me incredibly grateful for public schools and birth control.
There's not much else to tell -- we're all healthy (most of the time), we're all content. Pretty boring sometimes, but nothing to complain about.
22 December 2008
surviving a vacation at home
Today is Day Three that we were not supposed to be at home. Remember that 6am flight Monday morning we were supposed to be on? Canceled yesterday at noon. Waking up this morning to mountains of snow and more coming down, I can understand why. Hopefully the weather will be clear enough to fly us out tomorrow. Otherwise we might miss Christmas, and here's how we feel about that:
(Those are sad faces, if it's not obvious.)
We haven't been home for Christmas since before James was born, and we haven't had this much snow in a couple of years, so we are trying to make the most of our unintended vacation and have as much fun as we can.
On Saturday we went sledding, and while we have no photos of the actual sledding, we have happy smiles of kids playing in the snow:
(I think we need a new camera; the color quality of our photos is going further and further downhill.)
When not playing outside, my kids have been spending a lot of time with video games. They're still hooked on Spore, and they got Lego Batman from my sister and her husband for Christmas, so it's hard to tear them away sometimes. Ordinarily I try to keep the video games to a minimum, but really, I can't bring myself to care lately. We're supposed to be with their grandparents right now. If video games make them a little less sad about that, so be it.
I've been baking a lot, because what's Christmas without baking? So we have pumpkin muffins and granola bars and peanut butter cups, and an apple strudel for breakfast this morning. The snow has been heavy enough to intimidate us from going to the grocery store (that and the thought of all the terrible drivers on the road) but it's amazing what you can make from odds and ends in the cupboards and the freezer.
The best, though, is the gingerbread house my friend Sara brought over yesterday. Here's what it's supposed to look like, per the package:
And here's how ours turned out:
When we opened the package, we found a lot of broken pieces that had to be repaired with frosting. Most of the little figures were broken as well, though the frosting couldn't glue them back together. So our happy holiday gingerbread house evolved into a sort of Christmas House of Horrors. The hunchback was the perpetrator (at least we think he/she/it is a hunchback -- a little hard to tell with these candy people): the little boy is strung up on the side of the house, and the little girl has been decapitated in the front yard. We contributed to the depravity by committing cannibalism once the house was finished.
Here's a close-up of the poor little girl.
So that's how we're filling our vacation days. Hopefully tomorrow we'll be off to the west coast, and hopefully we'll make it in time for Christmas. I'll keep you all updated.
20 December 2008
hahaha, did i say hiatus?
...because the Fates had other plans for us. Or maybe I should say Northwest Airlines had other plans. Alternate post title: air travel sucks, especially when there's no travel involved.
Today finds me at home with two wide-open days to fill, so I thought I'd use my new-found wealth of free time to blog about how I got all this extra time. Any of you who follow me on Twitter or Facebook may have read my disgruntled updates yesterday, so now you can get the full story. I'll try to keep it brief, but no promises, because I might get ranty. Read the whole saga below the fold:
Friday, Dec. 19
3:30am: Alarm clock jolts us out of sleep
3:55am: Taxi arrives to take us to the airport
4:05am: Standing in line at Northwest check-in counter
4:20am: NW employees begin to arrive
4:30am: Check-in counter opens and we proceed to check in and check 3 large suitcases
5:00am: Checked in and through security, waiting at the gate
5:30am: Boarding begins for 6am flight to Detroit
6:00am: Airplane backs out of the gate to prepare for flight
Around this time, our pilot makes an announcement: the weather in Detroit isn't looking so good, and we may have to reroute to either Pittsburgh or Minneapolis. We cross our fingers for Minneapolis, since that's our layover between Detroit and Seattle. They are adding extra fuel to the plane in case we are rerouted.
5-10 minutes later, our pilot makes another announcement: the extra fuel has pushed our airplane over the weight limit and they are looking for nine volunteers to get off the plane. No one moves. Plane returns to the gate.
5 or so minutes later, flight crew makes an announcement: NW has another plane headed directly to Minneapolis, and anyone who gets off our plane can be rebooked on the Minneapolis flight. Greg goes to the front of the plane to speak to the NW representative.
Greg returns to me and the kids and says we can get off and go straight to Minneapolis on another flight instead of going through Detroit. We exit the plane with 5 other passengers who have the same plan.
7:00am: We are told at the ticket counter that the NW flight to Minneapolis that was used to lure us off the plane has no extra seats. We are issued travel vouchers and meal vouchers and rebooked on a 12:15pm flight to Detroit.
7:30am: Muffins, bagels and coffee at Dunkin' Donuts, courtesy of NW meal vouchers.
8:30am - 11am: We set up camp next to the children's play area. Kids run and jump and play while Greg and I amuse ourselves with the laptop and the Nintendo DS.
11am-ish: Head back to gate to check status of our new flight. Flight is delayed. Snow has started falling in earnest.
12pm-ish: Find a quiet, unoccupied gate to settle in and wait for flight status updates.
1pm-ish: Lunch at Subway courtesy of NW meal vouchers.
2pm - 5pm: Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. Repeated flight delays. We are told that a flight headed to Rochester was rerouted to Syracuse, and our flight is dependent on that plane getting to Rochester from Syracuse. We also learn during this time period that our luggage has arrived in Seattle. Thankfully our toothbrushes are in our carry-on bags.
5:00pm: Another Detroit flight begins boarding. There are extra seats on this flight but the line of standby passengers is too long for us to get on board. At this point our 12:15pm flight is expected to leave at 7pm.
5:30pm: Detroit flight that has just boarded is now deboarding. I mention this because for the second time in one day, a NW flight is over the weight limit and passengers are asked to leave. This time, however, all passengers must exit the plane because one of the random passengers who was asked to get off refused and argued, and caused this flight to miss its window of opportunity to take off.
6:00pm: The same flight to Detroit begins reboarding.
6:30pm: The flight to Detroit is boarded, but by this time, so many passengers have missed their connecting flights and rebooked new flights for other days that there are 8 available seats.
Around this time, the flight crew is trying to determine how many more people they can take while staying within the weight limits. A pilot approaches us and asks if we are headed to Detroit; when we say yes he tells us he'd like to get us on the plane because our children would help keep the plane under the weight limit.
Then this pilot disappears and is never seen again.
The NW agent at the check-in counter begins letting standby passengers onto the flight. Greg inquires at the counter and we are told we can't get on this flight. The woman tells us that there is some feature of their computer system that won't allow her to change us to this flight, despite the fact that it's going to our destination and there are seats available, because we are still booked on the 12:15pm flight.
7:00pm: Flight to Detroit that we were not allowed to change to takes off. We are told that the plane we are waiting for from Syracuse is on its way and is expected to arrive at 7:30pm. We buy snacks to wait, still using vouchers. At least they were generous about that.
7:30pm: NW agent tells us that the plane from Syracuse is no longer listed as in the air, and our flight time has been moved back to 8:30pm. The kids are starting to get stir-crazy and continually ask when we're getting on the plane to go see Grandma and Papa.
8:00pm: At this point there are eight people left waiting: the four of us, a college student, and a couple with a 17-month old baby. We are all trying to get to Detroit to transfer on to other locations. I send NW a complaint through their website, detailing our saga.
8:30pm: We are informed that the plane we've been waiting for for over 8 hours has had a mechanical issue and our flight is canceled. We are all in tears of exhaustion, frustration and disappointment by this point.
9:00pm: We are rebooked for a Monday morning flight, 6am. We are told that there are no flights available on Saturday, and there is only one flight on Sunday, but it is already overbooked by 15 people, and there is another winter storm due on Sunday anyway. We are given additional travel vouchers. Evan asks if we're getting on the airplane now and I laugh and cry at the same time.
9:30pm: A friend picks us up at the airport to take us home.
10:00pm: We watch A Muppet Family Christmas while I make pasta for my starving children, who are too tired to eat more than a few bites despite how hungry they have been for the last couple of hours.
10:45pm: My children fall asleep, one on the couch and the other on the floor, and I carry them to bed.
11:00pm: Greg phones NW's Baggage Services to find out what is going to happen to our luggage. The employee he speaks with at first argues that our luggage can't be in Seattle, because it should have been taken off the flight when we got off the plane, despite the fact that more than one NW agent told us over the course of the day that our luggage was in Seattle. Then the customer service rep tells Greg that he will have to return to our airport to file a claim with the NW baggage office there. Greg, bless his little heart, argues with the woman for 5 minutes before she relents and checks the damn computer to find that yes, our bags are in Seattle and we can pick them up when we arrive there. Which will hopefully be on Monday.
Today we woke up late to a beautiful day, sunny, with fluffy white snow everywhere. We were dismayed to remember that our kids' boots and snow clothes are in our luggage, but luckily I found some slightly outgrown and some slightly too big items in the basement that will suffice for going sledding today. We have enough canned and frozen food to save us from having to go grocery shopping. We are planning to enjoy our extra two days of vacation even if we're not where we wish we were. We're just hoping that the snow that's expected on Sunday both here and in Seattle will be over by Monday morning so we can just get to our family for Christmas, damn it.
If you've made it to the end of this, thanks for indulging my self-pitying rant. I would advise you to steer clear of Northwest Airlines, but honestly, I don't trust that the others are that much better. The quality of our experiences with air travel has been steadily worsening over the last few years, regardless of which airline we're on. And they don't have to care, because we don't really have any choice.
Sigh. Hope everyone out there is having a better time than we are. And hopefully I won't have anything to blog about any time soon.
17 December 2008
hiatus
Thought I should drop in on the ol' blog to say that I've been way too busy with holiday stuff (and a little bit busy with practicing my laziness) to think about writing any blog posts, and in two days we're leaving for a two-week vacation at Greg's parents' house. I expect that once we're there I'll still be busy with holiday stuff, as well as catching up with the family and playing Rock Band, to do any posting any time soon, so consider the Jungle to be on temporary hiatus.
I don't know whether I've officially mentioned it here, but I'm on Twitter now (see sidebar). I will probably Twitter while I'm away, since that doesn't require much time or effort or thought, so you can still check in here for my Twitter mini-updates, or follow me on the Twitter site if you're eager to know how lazy and/or indulgent I'm being over the holidays.
I hope the next couple of weeks are fun and happy and healthy for everyone, and I'll see you back here in January!
05 December 2008
friday photos: thanksgiving edition
I forgot to bring my camera to my mom's house for Thanksgiving, so I'm stealing some of my sister's photos to post. I spent a lot of time hogging her sweet camera, so it's pretty likely that I took these photos anyway. These are, by the way, photos of three of the things I was most thankful for over our Thanksgiving vacation.
James has been experimenting with a ponytail lately, and this is his samurai impression:
Those of you who know Greg will not be surprised when I say that he was the instigator of the frosting war paint:
Amazing turkey cupcakes that my sister and her husband bought.
Okay, so I'm kidding about cupcakes being one of the top three things I'm thankful for, but seriously, look at the detail on that frosting. That entire thing is edible, and extremely rich and delicious. And we all know that Thanksgiving is about cramming yourself full of desserts that singularly exceed your recommended daily intake of calories. Besides, it's not as easy to take photos of the things I'm truly thankful for: love, good health, prosperity, safe travels, family togetherness, and all that good intangible stuff.
04 December 2008
bankrupting ourselves with holiday travel
Okay, I mentioned in my last post that I wasn't going to complain about airfare prices, among other things, but this is less of a complaining post and more of a startled observation. With math.
Get Rich Slowly linked to an interesting site yesterday: Cost To Drive. You put in your starting point, destination, and what type of car you're driving, and it calculates your estimated fuel costs. The site finds the lowest prices for gas along the way, so it's really more of a minimum cost, but it's still fun to play with.
So this morning, as I was playing with the site, I dusted off the seldom-used math part of my brain and did some additional calculations. Because the site uses the lowest prices, I rounded up (waaaay up) to reflect potential fluctuations and the fact that one might not always find the lowest-priced gas around. I learned that, even with my rounding, our plane tickets for Christmas break cost more than five times the price of fuel for a drive across the country and back.
Then I figured that if we were to drive from New York to Washington, even if we were to stay in decent hotels and eat out, we could easily do the round trip for less than half of the price of our plane tickets. By driving, we save ourselves at least 4 days of travel (assuming that somehow we'd be able to drive pretty much non-stop), which means that we are spending at least $250 a day for those four extra days with Greg's family. Ouch. Not that they're not worth that, of course, but still. Ouch.
02 November 2008
31 October 2008
friday photos: halloween edition
No photos yet of the kids in costume, but we've been getting in the Halloween spirit in other ways.
Chocolate Mice:
(Not a great photo, I know, but I swear to you those delicious little mice were impossible to photograph!)
Spider Deviled Eggs:
I made some nerdy Halloween decorations:
And another jack o'lantern masterpiece from Greg: a skeleton/snowman jack o'lantern.
Happy Halloween, everyone!
08 July 2008
15 June 2008
father's day/weekend photos/weekend recipes
Happy Father's Day! We had a fun day today, celebrating Greg with one of his favorite things -- fresh strawberries. Today was the opening day of the season at the U-Pick farms around here, a couple of weeks earlier than usual thanks to some unusually warm spring weather, so we went out this afternoon and picked fourteen and a half pounds of strawberries. The first, which I neglected to take a photo of, was a spinach strawberry salad that we had with dinner. It's a really simple recipe, one I got from the mother of a friend of mine: spinach, sliced strawberries and crumbled feta cheese with a balsamic vinaigrette dressing. It sounds weird, I know, but the combination of sweet, salty and tangy really works nicely. I used this vinaigrette recipe, and I added about a teaspoon of brown sugar and a little strawberry juice that had collected in the bottom of the bowl. I thought when I was making it that the garlic might be a mistake, but it turned out fine. I'm sure a store-bought dressing would be just as good. And for dessert we had strawberry shortcake! Soooo goooood. I found this shortcake recipe, which is a bit more like a biscuit than cake, but still good. We split each shortcake open and topped the halves with a layer of strawberries. We forgot to sugar the strawberries ahead of time, so we decided to try sprinkling them with cinnamon sugar, which turned out to be a nice touch. Then we topped the strawberries with fresh whipped cream and mini chocolate chips, and most of us were able to refrain from licking our plates clean, but it was hard. That was a good dessert. This one I took a photo of: Hope everyone had a happy weekend/Father's Day!
And then we came home and ate 10 pounds of them. At least, that's what it felt like. But just look at these; I mean, could you really help yourself when faced with these perfect sun-warmed little berries?
You probably won't be surprised to learn that both kids were more interested in snacking than picking the strawberries:
And we managed to eat quite a few more once we got home, with a couple of strawberry dishes. 
22 April 2008
happy earth day!
Being green is so in these days, so in honor of Mother Earth and Earth day, I'm going to post some interesting links on a variety of environmental topics. Enjoy!
Which Candidate is Greenest? -- An article in Vanity Fair discusses which presidential candidate will be best on environmental issues. Yes, we all know it's not McCain, but check out this piece and the other articles it links to for more details.
Find Earth Day Events in Your Area -- I know it's getting a little late in the day for this, but Mother Earth News offers some resources for finding out what's happening in your area today.
10 for the Earth -- Heifer International (an all-around excellent organization) lists ten simple, everyday things you can do to lower your impact on the environment. They may sound familiar -- none of them were new to me -- but it never hurts to be reminded.
Why Bother? -- Michael Pollan addresses the seeming hopelessness of those little individual acts of environmentalism, and makes a compelling case that we should persist in our individual efforts. (Thanks for the link, Kim!)
Greener Pastures -- Speaking of individual acts of environmentalism, Bill Nye (the Science Guy) puts the rest of us to shame. Some of his ideas are simple, others are prohibitively expensive for most of us, but all of them make me wish I were eating his scones and watching hummingbirds with him.
Earth Day Tips -- Another list, this one from National Geographic's Green Guide, of things you can do to make your life more green.
Environmental Cleaning Solutions -- Lots of resources about using environmentally-friendly cleaning products, such as vinegar and baking soda and lemon juice. Keep your home clean using fewer chemicals and pollutants, and save a few bucks too.
The Rainforest Site -- Just one click of your mouse and money is donated to rainforest preservation and habitat protection. (Click to donate to the other worthy causes while you're there, too.)
Thoreau's Laundry -- Interesting post at Shakesville about the intersection of gender issues with environmentalism -- thoughts I've had from time to time, but I don't think I could ever have put it down so coherently. As usual at Shakesville, the comments section is nearly as good as the original post.
Monsanto's Harvest of Fear -- Okay, this is not exactly an Earth Day link, but it's about the evil being done to the earth, to farmers, and to agriculture in general by one of the leading bioengineering companies in the world. Monsanto is responsible for the majority of genetically modified foods out there, as well as a marketer of bovine growth hormones, and they are frighteningly aggressive in both political lobbying and bullying small farmers.
Okay, that's all from me. Go out and do something nice for the Earth today!
17 March 2008
irish for the day
Today is St. Patrick's Day, of course, and because I have a tiny percentage of Irish heritage somewhere waaaay back in my ancestry, and because I like Irish music, and the color green, I have always liked this holiday. I don't know a thing about Saint Patrick, and my idea of Irish music is to put on the Dropkick Murphys and Flogging Molly, but it still makes for a fun holiday.
I'm always a little iffy on the food, though. I'm okay with having the traditional corned beef once a year, but that this big hunk of meat is traditionally boiled has always grossed me out a little bit. I've cooked it this way time and time again, and enjoyed eating it, but always with a little shiver of revulsion at the fact that I'm eating boiled meat. I don't know why, but something about boiled meat just rubs me the wrong way.
But yesterday I stumbled across this recipe for Guinness corned beef, which is actually cooked in the oven! I decided to do mine in the crockpot, and we didn't have any Guinness around, but I substituted the stoutest beer we had in the fridge, and right now every time I take the lid off of the crockpot I am assaulted by the scnet of hot beer and I kind of want to vomit. But, I was unsure about the crazy Voodoo Cake I made yesterday, and that turned out to be surprisingly wonderful, and very rich, so I'm hoping I'll be surprised by this strange beef as well.
After our massive beef ingestion tonight, we'll be returning to our newly acquired state of semi-vegetarianism. And I swear I'm not turning my blog into a food blog, but that's all I can think of to write about lately. Just wait, next week after I return from visiting my sister, this blog will be plastered in photos of my new nephew. Strange foods and new babies, two of my favorite things.
14 February 2008
21 January 2008
racism for six-year-olds
James had school off today, and he's old enough now to pay attention to holidays and to ask questions about why we celebrate them.
Martin Luther King, Jr. Day is a hard one to explain to a six-year-old. He knew of the idea of slavery from a conversation we had about Lincoln a while ago, but how do you explain prejudice, segregation, discrimination, and institutional racism to a child who has no concept of race? He's had classmates and neighbors of all different ethnicities. We have interracial marriages on both sides of my family, so he has cousins with varying skin tones too. He's used to seeing people of different colors in all kinds of settings. Racism -- even the very idea of difference -- has never come up. It's never needed to come up.
So how do you introduce a child to the injustices of the world? How do you explain the importance of King's work, of his life, without exposing the uglier side of humanity? I don't suppose you can, but it's a hard thing to have to tell a child. It's harder still to know that despite King's efforts, there is still a racial divide in America, that it is a really big deal that one of the frontrunners for the presidential race is a black man, that though we don't notice color, there are still so many people who do.
I suppose I should be expressing my gratitude to King, and everyone else who's fought the struggle for civil rights, that my son doesn't know the concept of race in the first place. Hopefully for James and his generation, race will continue to decrease in significance. Maybe someday we will achieve King's dream, and James can tell his children or grandchildren about racism not as something that still permeates society, but as just another chapter in the history books.
07 January 2008
notes from vacation
Oh, how I wish life could always be a vacation. Sleeping late, no housework, lots of video games, eating out, and of course, spending lots of time with family and friends who you don't see nearly often enough.
Some highlights, in no particular order:
Rock Band: I would estimate that we spent about 34 zillion hours playing Rock Band. I became an accomplished drummer, Greg rocked out on the bass, and James sang lead vocals, quickly becoming an expert on a couple of Ramones songs, which he made us play at least 75 times a day.
Horses: James and Evan both got to ride one of Grandma Kathy's horses, as well as visit with all of the horses (and cows, and a donkey) out at the farm. It was Evan's first time riding, and he did pretty well. He was incredibly excited until he realized he had to wear a helmet, so most of his ride was spent trying to take his helmet off.
Christmas: I don't know why I didn't put this first. We had a really nice Christmas with Greg's family. It's so nice that all of his siblings are able to come spend Christmas at their parents' house -- it's always full and busy, the way Christmas should be. I always miss my own family, of course, but it helps a bit to be part of another family.
The boys were showered in gifts, and loved each and every one. The favorites?
1) Nintendo DS: Greg's brother handed his down to us, and gave us a few games. It would be a huge understatement to say we all totally love it. It's getting a lot of use so far. James asked for one for Christmas, and I kind of didn't want one, because I knew we would all want to use it a lot, but I'm not really complaining.
2) Mythical beasts: Greg's brother also got the boys a books and game about mythical creatures, which came with little figures of the creatures, and they are so into them. They spent a lot of time over vacation telling people about Chupacabra (imagine a two-year-old saying that word -- so cute) and now that we're home they've been playing with them a lot. This morning they were fighting over the Hydra -- something I never expected my children to fight over.
Movies: We saw many movies over the course of two weeks. I was psyched to get the movie Labyrinth as a gift, and doubly pleased to see how well it holds up after twenty years. I saw a few movies I would never have watched if it weren't for Greg (namely, Transformers -- the new one, though we now own both movies -- and Alien vs. Predator: Requiem) and I can honestly say I did not hate either of them. Who woulda thought. We also saw King Kong again (the Peter Jackson version), which I love, and which made me cry a little. Again.
The best movie we saw would have to be The Maze, a rare 3-D mystery/suspense movie from 1953, which we did not watch in 3-D, but which we enjoyed anyway. It's a pretty conventional film -- a little too slow, even -- until the end. The end is the real reason to watch this movie. It turns the film from something unremarkable into one of the greatest so-bad-it's-good movies I've ever seen.
New Year's: We went to a fabulous New Year's party at the home of one of Greg's brother's friends, without children, and we dressed up in silly costumes, played hours and hours of Rock Band, relaxed in a hot tub, played some pool, played a little Mario Kart, and had our fortunes told by a mysterious gypsy woman. We finally crawled into bed at 7am, totally satisfied. Oh, and I also took part in the traditional Norwegian custom of eating pickled herring for good luck in the new year. Greg's family loves pickled herring, and they make me eat some every year. The best I can say is that it hasn't killed me. Yet.
Evan boycotted pants during this vacation. He refuses to wear "wiggly" pants. We have yet to figure out what makes pants wiggly, but it seems to be a fairly common problem, since every pair of pants Evan owns is now considered wiggly.
And of course, it was so nice to see Greg's family again. Since we couldn't make it out to visit over the summer, we hadn't seen them in a year, which is really way too long. It was a lot of fun getting to hang out with all of them again.
I'm sure I'm forgetting some things, but that's a brief rundown. Pictures will be posted eventually. And now that we're home, (semi) regular blogging will resume.
25 December 2007
17 December 2007
'tis the season: holiday books
We are a bookish family. Okay, well, to be precise, I am a very bookish person, and I'm doing my best to pass on a love of reading to my boys. One of my favorite things about being a parent is introducing my kids to things I loved as a child (and still love). I had so much fun reading Charlotte's Web to James, and I am waiting impatiently to start reading him the Little House books. But it's also a ton of fun to discover new books together with my children.
This year we've started a holiday book collection. We've always had holiday books, but this year we've collected them in one place and plan to make it a tradition to read our favorites every year. Below the fold, I've compiled a list of some of our favorite holiday and winter children's books, both classics and new favorites.
One of our favorite children's authors in general, ever since Greg's mom got us one of her books years ago, is Jan Brett. Her illustrations are intricate and beautifully drawn, and are wonderful accompaniments to fun stories. The Hat and The Mitten are two of our favorite winter stories, so I was excited to see that this year, she'd come out with a version of The Night Before Christmas. I've been wanting to buy a copy of this poem for the boys, and when I saw Brett's at the bookstore, I knew it was the one. The classic Clement Moore poem with Brett's illustrations is a beautiful combination.
Next on the list, a modern classic, How The Grinch Stole Christmas. This is one of the rare children's books that I can read over and over without tiring of it. Which I had to do when Evan went through a Grinch phase a few months ago, and and requested it every day at naptime, and sometimes bedtime, for god only knows how many days. But the magic of Dr. Seuss is that the rhyming and nonsense words are fun even for grown-ups to say, and until you really memorize it, you have to pay attention for the trickier phrases. And the story can't be beat -- a Scrooge-like cave-dwelling creature learns the true meaning of Christmas just in time to redeem himself. We also love the movie (the original movie, that is, not the horrible Jim Carrey remake), which is very faithful to the book.
Another new favorite, also introduced to us by Greg's mom, is Olive, the Other Reindeer. What could be cuter than a little dog who thinks she's a reindeer? She tries her hardest to help Santa on Christmas Eve -- and succeeds, too, in unexpected ways. This one is really a lot of fun to read, and popular with the kiddos, because that dog is just SO cute.
The last book I'm going to mention is another family favorite, The Polar Express. Haven't seen the movie (sources tell me it's not worth it) but the book is one of those magical Christmas stories that kids and adults love. The illustrations are beautiful, and to combine the Santa myth with a train? Genius, as far as kids are concerned.
And that's it for the holiday books we own, though I have to note two of my favorite Christmas stories, both of which I'm trying to find in children's versions with illustrations I like (tricky, because I'm kind of picky about things like that): The Nutcracker, and A Christmas Carol. Actually, I hope to eventually start a tradition someday of going to see each of those live (we nearly went to see A Christmas Carol at a local theater over the weekend, but it turns out that even with the family discount, we still couldn't afford it), but it won't hurt to have books as well. As I always say (and as Greg always disagrees with me), there's no such thing as "too many books".
14 December 2007
friday photos: christmas past edition
We're having an early Christmas with my mom tomorrow before leaving next week to celebrate the real Christmas Day with Greg's family, so before I leave my computer and all my photos behind (stupid desktop! Someday I'll have a laptop!) I thought I'd post some of my favorite old Christmas photos of the boys, and a bonus Christmas video that makes me laugh no matter how many times I watch it.
A classic photo from Evan's first Christmas -- still cracks me up:
If James had decided to exit the womb three days before his due date instead of being forced out 12 days late, he could have been born on Christmas, and maybe then he would not have repeatedly taken off the cute little Santa hat I bought for his first Christmas. Still, he managed to be pretty cute:
Last year Evan thought, when we brought out all of the Christmas ornaments, that we were giving him a bunch of new, tiny, fragile toys. Of course he had a ridiculous amount of fun:
And here it is, the cutest video of James ever taken, in which he demonstrates how to properly enjoy the season:
Have a good weekend, all!
13 December 2007
'tis the season: rampant consumerism
Okay, this is not strictly a holiday post per se, but I figured that Christmas is the perfect time to write a bit about consumer culture and marketing. Everyone, at this time of year, feels the pressure to buy. If you're a parent, you're feeling it even more, because in addition to the ordinary media pressure to spend a lot of money on your family and friends, you have small children begging you for every cool new thing they lay eyes on, because they know that presents are coming. Lots of parents can shift the responsibility to Santa, but since we don't do Santa, we're stuck looking like Scrooges when we don't come through with the cool gifts. And this is the first year where either of our children has really cared about particular presents. I guess I should be glad they waited this long.
Yesterday I read this piece by Barbara Ehrenreich in The Nation about the ubiquity of the Disney princesses. The popularity of Disney princesses for little girls is the flip side of Star Wars and superheroes for little boys, with a slight difference -- little boys' loyalties and affections are divided between Star Wars and Transformers and Superman and Spiderman, while for little girls, the Disney princesses are it. There aren't any competitors in the same league, at least not for a particular age group. Ehrenreich covers the problems inherent with having princesses as role models, but she doesn't get into why they are so popular, so desired by little girls everywhere. I can answer that, at least in part.
This topic is really interesting to me, especially in light of the book I'm currently reading, Buy, Buy Baby: How Consumer Culture Manipulates Parents and Harms Young Minds, by Susan Gregory Thomas. Thomas writes about how consumer culture has evolved over the last few decades, and the ways in which toy companies market to children and prey on the fears and insecurities of parents in order to generate huge profits. It's been a really interesting read so far, in many ways. Where do the Disney princesses come into this? Thomas devotes a whole chapter to the Disney princess phenomenon and its financial success. It's a perfect example of a product being relentlessly marketed to young children (you can find Disney princesses on merchandise ranging from toothbrushes to bedroom decor to clothing to board games). It also falls into the category of appealing to parental nostalgia. Have you noticed the comeback of '80s characters like the Care Bears, Transformers, Strawberry Shortcake? It's not a coincidence that the children who grew up on these toys are now beginning to have kids of their own.
Thomas cites studies that show that the only measurable thing toddlers and babies learn from watching TV is character recognition. So it's not that little girls inherently want to be beautiful princesses, it's that from the time they are very small, they are saturated in a consumer culture where corporations deliberately target children as consumers. Children begin to form an emotional attachment, through repeated exposure, to a character. Children are incredibly succeptible to marketing, because until the age of 7 or 8, they are unable to understand the idea of persuasion, and at younger ages, can't tell the difference between fantasy and reality. They love Cinderella because they've watched her videos and they have her nightgowns and sleeping bags -- they think of her as a friend because of her presence in their lives -- and so naturally they will want the Cinderella tent and the Cinderella DVD player.
This is true not just of Disney princesses, of course, but all kinds of characters. For my own boys it's Pokemon and Star Wars. Star Wars Monopoly is superior to regular Monopoly because it has Star Wars characters and pictures. I have noticed that my kids are affected not only by media directed at them, but even by media that's not aimed at children. Greg and I were recently having a conversation about diamonds (and nothing positive, because I am not a fan of diamonds) and James, just overhearing the key word, pipes up, "Diamonds? Go to Zales. They're the diamond store," in his most helpful tone. (Also, as a side note: James heard me telling Greg a statistic from the book -- that over a quarter of kids under two have a television in their bedrooms, which I think is appalling -- and said incredulously, "A TV in their BEDROOM? Can I have one??")
I'm pretty anti-consumerism in general, but reading this book makes me want to sell my television and never set foot in a mall again. But it is really helpful to be reading it right now, at this time of year, because I'm able to realize that the overwhelming urge for holiday consumerism I'm feeling, and the ridiculous gift lists my son is composing, are products of the capitalist marketing machine. We are feeling this way because there are people out there whose job it is to make us feel this way, and they are good at what they do. They are getting rich because they are skilled at manipulating consumers. It's casting a new light on the Christmas season for me. I'm not even finished with the book but I'd recommend it to anyone, especially parents.
