Look who's in a big boy seat !

Allen has been pretty cranky lately... I'm trying to reward him when I can for his (rare) good behavior. So, when I heard the other day that he'd had a good day at school, I told him it was time to get rid of the baby car seats. Look at the happy big boy in his booster! (And his new ensemble for the beach!)

Indoor beach party !

Look who's under the sea with Swimmy! It's Allen, at the Parents as Teachers Beach Fun Party!

What a great time we had. (After some serious initial reluctance. Allen wouldn't even budge off the end table in the Commons area until Miss Julie came over and sweet-talked him into it. By showing him that he and Swimmy could go under the tables, covered with boo-been streamers, and pretend they were under the sea!)

The whole Early Childhood Center was packed with beachy fun. Sand tables, water tables, Build Your Own Beach in a Bottle, kiddie pools filled with confetti instead of water, and beach balls hanging from a clothesline that you could whack with a paddle. We even ran into Abby, one of Allen's friends from preschool! And it was easy for Emilyn to get in on the fun.


Mommy took waaaay to many pictures (and some video) to post here. Click here to see them all!

Project Runway, Girl Scout style !

Emilyn's latest project for Scouts was creating an ensemble for a troop fashion show... We went to the resale shop and found a really pretty butterfly T. That inspired her to change a plain white overshirt and pair of black pants into works of art. Some jewels and patches, and voila!

To see some close-ups of her beautiful work, click here.

Cookin' up some love

Valentine's weekend was tons of fun. Steve and the kiddos got me some yummy chocolate-covered strawberries. I got Steve some freaky beers (chocolate stout, sorghum pilsner, hard cider) and some chocolate treats. I then proceeded to eat half his chocolate treats... (Three days later, with Mini Egg season now upon us, I have decided I must STOP!) Emilyn got a book light and some truffles. Allen got Raging Reptiles, a book, figures and game. (Ask him how big a dwarf chameleon is, and what an anaconda eats.)

For Sunday breakfast, Steve said he wanted to make heart-shaped pancakes. Being the Critchlow that I am, I had to build him a jig to work with, out of tin foil... The foolish boy was just going to fake it and try to pour the shape of a heart?!? Bah!

Anyway, they were pretty thick, but they came out cool and, of course, were yummy.


Hope your Valentine's Day was filled with love and happiness. And hey, at least its passing brings us a little closer to the beach!!

Fossils, worms . . . it's Science Night !

The best thing they've come up with at Sorrento Springs in the past few years is Science Night. Table after table of experiments, projects and generally cool science-y fun.

Allen aced the "sniff test" -- guessing what smell was inside each baby food jar...

A lady mixed sulfuric acid and powdered sugar to make carbon snakes... a guy made a chemical volcano... there were balloons full of dry ice vapor and fossils made of plaster and earthworms doing wormy things...

And Emilyn got to hold a for-real live scorpion!!


Allen, for his part, was totally into everything he could get his hands on. I think he's not happy unless he's learning every minute. To see the rest of the fun, click here.

More icicles for Allen

Snow melt from the roof has covered a lot of our bushy-rose-whatever tree at the corner of the house. Since Allen loves icicles, he's naturally drawn to it. And, darn it, it looks cool. So I took a bunch of pictures.

He tried his hardest to break some of them off... Tough task when there's real, live, strong branches inside each one.

For more icicle photos (and a dinosaur track!), click here.

Allen's Valentine party

Bonus party for the preschoolers... between winter and spring comes: the Valentine party!

Allen, of course, got dinosaur Valentines for his class... (one other boy.) They are the super-cool kind that show a different picture when you tilt them. These have the skeletons of the dinosaurs as the second image! He signed (almost) every one. He's just not as into writing as he was when school first started...

Each kid made an awesome Valentine's mailbox. Allen delivered all of his when we first got to school.

Then it was time for Mommy to come back for the party... I don't have pictures, but I had a cool heart-shaped box craft for each of the kiddos to make. Again, I dropped a bundle on a preschool project. But they had fun!

There were also cool games and a yummy, heart-shaped snack. (Allen said he wanted pink.)


Thanks to all the kids, moms and Ms. Kim and Ms. Marlene for a fun day!

Unmasked

Time for that much-beloved fatherly duty... Girl Scouts Daddy-Daughter Dance! Emilyn and Steve volunteered to escort Grace (not pictured) because her dad lives in Florida. Awwww! What a nice gesture!

This year, a masquerade ball theme... don't they look wonderful! (Lucky for Steve, Emilyn only made one mask...)

And look who's getting so big... Eye shadow!?!?