week ending nov 18, 2007:

Week ending November 18, 2007: This week Alex was singing and dancing in the kitchen while there was no music playing and it got me to pondering about how adults are rarely filled with the kind of joy that kids find in everyday life. When was the last time you danced in your kitchen without musical accompaniment? This week the kids had their first visit of the year with Santa. Last year both kids wanted to talk to Santa, but Alex wouldn’t sit on Santa’s lap so he stood next to Santa for the picture. This year Chloe didn’t want to get within 6 feet of Santa and hid behind me for a while but eventually she conceded to sit next to Santa (but not on his lap) for a picture. I won’t post the picture until I send out the Christmas cards with the picture of the kids in their Christmas finery. While we were at Homestead Gardens doing our annual holiday photo shoot, a photographer named Scott Suchman from Chesapeake Life magazine asked if he could photograph the kids for use in the magazine. I said sure and Mr. Suchman promised to e-mail me if he was going to use any pictures of the kids. If you, like me, have never heard of the magazine, here’s a link: http://www.chesapeakelifemag.com/. Also this week I took the kids ice skating for the first time. Chloe asked lots of questions like if there was water under the ice or if there was a floor under it. When Alex came into the room, Chloe declared “Alex there is a floor under the ice not water, so we won’t drown!” They both enjoyed it, but Alex liked it more than Chloe. My friend Claudine came with us because I figured we needed a one-to-one adult-to-kid ratio to get the kids started and Casey has sworn off ice skating. Alex spent more time with Claudine than Chloe did, and Claudine is a better ice skating teacher than I am. They started out using the ice skating version of walkers and graduated to holding our hands or, in Alex’s case, skating by his self. It was really gratifying to see the kids face a challenge and come away from it with a feeling of accomplishment. This week Chloe’s been asking us to play the rhyming game. She is so fascinated with words that she loves to try to remember words that rhyme with words I come up with. I’m going to try to include a video from the ice rink. Click the triangle on the lower left of the picture to play the video.