Thankful

Had my parents down for Thanksgiving. It's always great that the kids are so excited to see them. They didn't want to go to bed, and then Jack came into our room in the middle of the night to ask when they would get up. Hugs all around in the morning. Jack played Scrabble with Nana, while Kate, humorously, picked Headbandz to play with Baba (where you wear a picture of something on your head and have to guess what it is; Baba was a toaster).

We played Hearts, Parcheesi, and Chess; Emily and I, having each played a lot of Hearts back in the day, really enjoyed it. Even though Kate wanted to get points, and Jack didn't seem to fully grasp the goal, either. Later, out of the blue, he announced, "I really like board games a lot right now."

Went to Cathy's for Thanksgiving. The kids disappeared to play with their cousins for most of it. We reconvened at dinner, and for presents (it was also the first night of Hannukah).jack and Kate each got a present, and when we went home, they immediately began playing with them. Jack's was an electronics projects set, Kate's a Barbie makeup art set.

It isn't often that I see Jack completely enthralled by something. He'd make a project, show it to us, smile, make another one. At one point I was in the kitchen, he brought it out, showed me what he made, and we walked back to the living room. He looked down at the set in his hands and said, almost to himself more than me, "I love this." Like he was filled with wonder about how much he enjoyed it. I don't see that very often. It's pretty cool.

I put Kate to bed. She read to me. She has become a great reader, quickly. Kissed her goodnight, went to say goodnight to Jack. He said, "Tomorrow, will you play with my electronics set with me?" You bet.

Walking home

We walked home from school today. It was a little cold but beautiful, sunny and clear.

Kate was a little sulky initially, preferring not to walk. Jack, in contrast, would walk home every day if he could. So he made it fun for Kate.

"Kate, let's see what we can find for leaves, OK? We can find the biggest, or the most colorful?" They did that for a couple of minutes, then Kate got leaves in her sneakers and was irritated. So Jack said, "Let's walk on the sidewalk, and see what else we can find."

They spotted what seemed to be a piece of colorful glass fused into the sidewalk. "Look, Kate, it's a secret passageway!" Jack said. "We need to find the key!" They knelt down and sifted through rocks and twigs. "Is this the key?" asked Kate. "What about this?" "Ooh, that's a good key. Hmm, no it doesn't work."

We walked some more. Jack found a metal key ring. "THIS is the key!" They both ran back to the fused glass. "Yeah, look at this, that's great!"

Walked a few yards more. Played with more leaves. Analyzed the staples in a telephone pole. Careful, I said.

On the street parallel to ours there are two big columns on either side, like a gate or archway. "Stop!" Jack instructed to us. "We can't go through without the key." They both knelt to find the key. Kate came up with a stick, Jack a rock. Jack said, "We place the rock here--" (in front of one column) "--and poke it with the stick." Kate poked it. "There! Now we can go through." So we did. 

Came to the white stones on the border of a neighbor's lawn. Kate dubbed them the "Rocks of Joy," and jumped from rock to rock. Jack followed suit. I told them it was time to cross. Kate looked up. "Look, MORE Rocks of Joy!" We crossed, and they continued jumping from rock to rock.

On the cross street near our house, there was a big, waist-level tree stump at the edge of the road, where a tree had been knocked down in a storm. They approached it reverently. "This is the thump-thump stump," Jack explained. "You have to pat it while singing a song to pass." They both patted the stump like a drum, singing a made-up song. We passed.

On our street, we passed a house with a lawn decoration of a turkey rising out of a pumpkin. They walked up to it and said hello to the turkey. I noticed the owner on her porch and warned them not to touch it. She said, it's OK, they can look. So they did.

We passed a guy walking his dog. The dog's tail whipped back and forth as she saw us. As we passed, Kate moved aside, I held out my hand to greet the dog. It flopped down on its back and Jack and I scratched its belly. Its tail went thump thump thump.

Reached home, having made a 10-minute walk in about half an hour. "See, Kate, isn't walking home GREAT?" said Jack.

Art

Jack and I do a lot of outside activities, either football or baseball or whatnot. Kate plays occasionally, but it isn't her first choice. Today, with Jack going to swim practice, I tried to figure out what I could do with just Kate that she would enjoy. And then I remembered she had been drawing pictures from the Hand Art book last week, so I suggested that. And her eyes lit up and she nodded vigorously.

The Hand Art book enables you to make all kinds of animals whose heads or bodies start out by tracing your hand. A bat is made with two hands. And a butterfly, and... You get the idea. And it is hard for Kate to trace her own hand, so we did them together.

"You're a good tracer, Daddy," she said admiringly, as I traced her hand. Well, thank you, Katie.

We made elephants, dogs, bats, and giraffes. I made her a kitty that she loved. I know this because when I finished it and gave it to her, she said, " I LOVE it." Then we made pictures for everyone else. I made an elephant for Jack. When he saw it he looked at it for a minute, smiled, and said "Thank you." Very sincere. It was nice.

Saying goodnight to Kate, I said, it was fun making hand art with you, Kate. And it really was.