Tonight, I picked Berit up at Destination Imagination. First we went to Whole Foods for dinner. I asked Berit to change into her yoga clothes in the bathroom there, while I got food. She choked on the words, almost crying as shetried to express her fear at me being so far away. So instead, we got dinner together - a nice meanl of salmon, brocolli, mushrooms and cornbread. Berit ate and liked the mushrooms.

Afterwards we went to the YMCA for yoga. She was great, as usual - flexible as Gumby and willing to do most of the postures, as long as she was guaranteed short breaks in between.

After yoga, it was over to Barnes & Noble for a small after dinner treat and a few books. It was a stellar adventure.

Early in the morning, I've got "Bear and the Big Blue House" on to entertain the kids while I'm getting ready for work. In a moment of parental guilt before walking outthe door, I offer Berit the opportunity to do one of the tangram daily puzzles with me. It's a no brainer for her -Really, Dad, as much as I'd love to, there's actual television happening right now that I can't afford to miss. Rowan, on the other hand, shoots me a huge grin and says, "I'll do a tangram with you, Daddy," despite the alluring presence of TV. She loved doing it, too - having my attention to herself. I loved it, too.

I picked up Berit at gymnastics class - that was great fun. We hung around for a while afterward so that she could play a bit on the parallel bars and show me her stuff. She's quite good, and I was very proud watching her.

Griffin is Mr. Independence these days- he's constantly moving the chairs over to the kitchen counter to get at fruit, eggs. knives...

The other night upon returning late from the bookstore, I found that Pam had gone to bed already. The only one awake in the house was Rowan, who came out to me all cuteness, smiles, and red cheeks and proferred a sketch pad to me.

"Here's the drawing pad, Daddy."

I had no idea why she was coming out to give this to me at 10:30 pm, but as with many things the kids do I just accepted it and thanked her. I also advised her that it was very late and ushered her back into her bedroom to go to sleep, where (aHa!) saw that she had been busily cutting up pages from the drawing pad into small confetti that was strewn all about the room, making it into a winter wonderland of small white bits of paper. :)

this is an avant-blog test post

I just noticed that December was a pathetic 2 entries. I promise to do better.

New Years Day!

It was a beautiful day - a balmy 50 degrees on which I took Berit up on her request for a bike ride. We found the Coal Creek Trail that took us all the way from this house to our old house. Berit was pleasantly surprised to see how far she had ridden, and I was very impressed with her stoic approach to the ride! To top it off, we saw a coyote on the way home... and not just some distant sighting, either. The coyote was within 10-15 yards of us in the open space off the trailside. Big, too! He just looked at us, and then disappeared behind a tree. Most certainly an auspicious omen for the new year.

We followed this up with a family hike in the open space behind the house, and we later went to Grammy's house to celebrate Rowan's Birthday!

Whoa!! That was a fast month.

Another Christmas come and gone. Maybe I'm a scrooge, but it wasn't really all that, know what I mean?

I mean it was cool, and the kids got nice presents, and we had a nice time with Pam's family and all, but in the final analysis, I wasn't that impressed. Maybe it's an indicator of my spiritual state, and I need to do something to maintain that.

While reading one of "The Magic School Bus" books the other night, Berit pointed to a picture of an open door and asked me how the illustrator drew it so that it looked open. So we got out some paper and pens and launched into a fun lesson on perspective. Examples I used included (but were not limited to) the old "Kids in the Hall" routine where you squeeze the other person's head with your thumb and forefinger. Berit dug it, though, and she did a pretty good job with the whole perspective thing. It lasted a few minutes before we moved on to writing "bubble letters."